13 Jul
1997
13 Jul
'97
6:08 p.m.
There is one significant difference between routed and switched backbones. The hops on routed backbones can be seen by end users using tools such as traceroute. On switched backbones, the hops are still there, but can not be seen by end users. Hence the marketing perception is different though the results are really the same. The router side could turn the argument. "With a routed backbone, you can actually SEE what is happening to your packets. It is not a hidden unknown, thus prone to failure you can not diagnose. With routers you know it went bad at nqu1. With switches, it just went bad." randy