Dial Concentrators - TNT / APX8000 R.I.P.
I'm told by our Alcatel rep that the APX 8000 is no longer supported and that we can no longer get hardware support because they "don't have any spare parts". I share a certain amount of love for this platform dating back to Ascend, but what am I to do now? Obviously no one is making large investments in their dial platform, but are there any other viable alternatives out there that are actually supported? ~jerry
I think the only one under support may be the Cisco AS series (AS5800 only now?): http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/hw/univgate/ps509/ The other platform I knew besides the TNT was the Nortel CVX but it is EOL also. -Scott -----Original Message----- From: Jerry Bonner [mailto:JBonner@enventis.com] Sent: Monday, May 10, 2010 12:29 PM To: nanog@nanog.org Subject: Dial Concentrators - TNT / APX8000 R.I.P. I'm told by our Alcatel rep that the APX 8000 is no longer supported and that we can no longer get hardware support because they "don't have any spare parts". I share a certain amount of love for this platform dating back to Ascend, but what am I to do now? Obviously no one is making large investments in their dial platform, but are there any other viable alternatives out there that are actually supported? ~jerry
I don't think that you can buy new support contracts for the AS5800 series anymore. http://www.cisco.com/en/US/prod/collateral/iad/ps509/ps512/end_of_life_notic... -Bill On Mon, May 10, 2010 at 09:50, Scott Berkman <scott@sberkman.net> wrote:
I think the only one under support may be the Cisco AS series (AS5800 only now?):
http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/hw/univgate/ps509/
The other platform I knew besides the TNT was the Nortel CVX but it is EOL also.
-Scott
-----Original Message----- From: Jerry Bonner [mailto:JBonner@enventis.com] Sent: Monday, May 10, 2010 12:29 PM To: nanog@nanog.org Subject: Dial Concentrators - TNT / APX8000 R.I.P.
I'm told by our Alcatel rep that the APX 8000 is no longer supported and that we can no longer get hardware support because they "don't have any spare parts".
I share a certain amount of love for this platform dating back to Ascend, but what am I to do now? Obviously no one is making large investments in their dial platform, but are there any other viable alternatives out there that are actually supported?
~jerry
Does this not highlight a wider issue? I realise that dialup is hardly 'cutting edge' but there are providers out there with a significant number of dialup customers still on the books. Surely there's still a market for (what should be by now) a straightforward, well known piece of kit? In parts of the world where broadband is not ubiquitous and dialup remains useful as a Plan-B or is simply the only choice (for whatever reason), what are the practical choices now? Whilst folks may not be fielding 'new' dialup kit, I dare say that we're going to be continuing to see dialup customers on the books for the next 5 years, perhaps a lot longer? That's a whole product lifespan... On Tue, May 11, 2010 5:03 am, Bill Fehring wrote:
I don't think that you can buy new support contracts for the AS5800 series anymore.
http://www.cisco.com/en/US/prod/collateral/iad/ps509/ps512/end_of_life_notic...
-Bill
On Mon, May 10, 2010 at 09:50, Scott Berkman <scott@sberkman.net> wrote:
I think the only one under support may be the Cisco AS series (AS5800 only now?):
http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/hw/univgate/ps509/
The other platform I knew besides the TNT was the Nortel CVX but it is EOL also.
Mark Foster wrote:
Does this not highlight a wider issue?
I realise that dialup is hardly 'cutting edge' but there are providers out there with a significant number of dialup customers still on the books. Surely there's still a market for (what should be by now) a straightforward, well known piece of kit?
In parts of the world where broadband is not ubiquitous and dialup remains useful as a Plan-B or is simply the only choice (for whatever reason), what are the practical choices now?
Whilst folks may not be fielding 'new' dialup kit, I dare say that we're going to be continuing to see dialup customers on the books for the next 5 years, perhaps a lot longer? That's a whole product lifespan...
Welcome to what telcos have been dealing with for 10 to 20 years with product lifecycles. The PSTN isn't exactly a growing market, and has lots of EOL switches, yet it continues to run. Secondary support markets, grey markets, and strategic migrations to carry internal sparing. Or you find a cost effective way to replace it with something; or you accept that the revenue vs. cost-to-maintain is too high and just kill the product. aj p.s. UTStarcom was still supporting the [former USR/3com] TotalControl chassis as of about 2 years ago; I don't know if they still do. They were positioning it as a migration platform for legacy X.25 networks.
On Tue, 11 May 2010, Alastair Johnson wrote:
Welcome to what telcos have been dealing with for 10 to 20 years with product lifecycles. The PSTN isn't exactly a growing market, and has lots of EOL switches, yet it continues to run. Secondary support markets, grey markets, and strategic migrations to carry internal sparing.
Or you find a cost effective way to replace it with something; or you accept that the revenue vs. cost-to-maintain is too high and just kill the product.
Some telcos are starting to kill off legacy services as they reach the end of their life cycle. I saw an application from Verizon in West Virginia to modify their tariff to remove SMDS as a service. According to the filing, no customers were using it and vendor support for it was coming to an end. I'm assuming at some point that Verizon stopped selling the service and quietly told any remaining customers that they needed to transition to other services because SMDS would be turned off on a certain date. I've heard of some LECs starting to mull dropping frame relay as a supported service as well... jms
I've heard of some LECs starting to mull dropping frame relay as a supported service as well...
The provider I work for stopped selling Frame Relay four years ago. However, we didn't throw out the last Nortel Passport switches until about one year ago. Steinar Haug, Nethelp consulting, sthaug@nethelp.no
On 5/10/2010 6:36 PM, Mark Foster wrote:
Does this not highlight a wider issue?
I realise that dialup is hardly 'cutting edge' but there are providers out there with a significant number of dialup customers still on the books. Surely there's still a market for (what should be by now) a straightforward, well known piece of kit?
In parts of the world where broadband is not ubiquitous and dialup remains useful as a Plan-B or is simply the only choice (for whatever reason), what are the practical choices now?
Whilst folks may not be fielding 'new' dialup kit, I dare say that we're going to be continuing to see dialup customers on the books for the next 5 years, perhaps a lot longer? That's a whole product lifespan...
How about an Aastra CVX shelf? We used one at an ISP I used to work for in Maine. It worked well. Dial-up was considered the cash cow then. --C
When I sold my business in January, we still had 4 PRI circuits that were providing Dial-Up access using Livingston Portmaster 3's. I bet those things will run for another 5 years! :) Dial Up still has a place in many areas where Broadband cannot cost-effectively reach. Better to have Dial Up than nothing at all.
There are those ppl who just want to do e-mail, are comfortable with dial-up, don¹t want to pay for than $5-10 for internet, and can¹t get anything else. -- Justin Wilson <j2sw@mtin.net> http://www.mtin.net/blog Wisp Consulting Tower Climbing Network Support From: "Gregory J. Boehnlein" <damin@nacs.net> Date: Tue, 11 May 2010 12:32:56 -0400 To: 'Mark Foster' <blakjak@blakjak.net>, 'Bill Fehring' <lists@billfehring.com> Cc: <nanog@nanog.org> Subject: RE: Dial Concentrators - TNT / APX8000 R.I.P. When I sold my business in January, we still had 4 PRI circuits that were providing Dial-Up access using Livingston Portmaster 3's. I bet those things will run for another 5 years! :) Dial Up still has a place in many areas where Broadband cannot cost-effectively reach. Better to have Dial Up than nothing at all.
On Wed, May 12, 2010 4:38 am, Justin Wilson wrote:
There are those ppl who just want to do e-mail, are comfortable with dial-up, don¹t want to pay for than $5-10 for internet, and can¹t get anything else.
Indeed. The arguments for alternatives based on the fact theyre cheap, don't counter the fact that it's not available _everywhere_. Thus the wider concern I flagged; if the only source for equipment and spares is the grey market, aren't the vendors missing the boat on something which shouldn't even have a major overhead to maintain? What about developing nations where Internet isn't yet as commonplace as it is in the 'west' ?
Mark Foster wrote:
On Wed, May 12, 2010 4:38 am, Justin Wilson wrote:
There are those ppl who just want to do e-mail, are comfortable with dial-up, don¹t want to pay for than $5-10 for internet, and can¹t get anything else.
Indeed. The arguments for alternatives based on the fact theyre cheap, don't counter the fact that it's not available _everywhere_.
Thus the wider concern I flagged; if the only source for equipment and spares is the grey market, aren't the vendors missing the boat on something which shouldn't even have a major overhead to maintain?
The source for equipment and spares isn't the "grey market" - it's the USED market. There should be ample used equipment to meet the small amount of dial-up equipment purchases needs for years to come as many ISPs phase out dial-up equipment and services and offer their old (still working but no-longer-needed) dial-up equipment for resale.
What about developing nations where Internet isn't yet as commonplace as it is in the 'west' ?
Most developing nations today are leapfrogging right over POTS and dial-up into a cellular/wireless infrastructure. This is why there is so little demand for dial-up infrastructure equipment. If there's a significant need for dial-up equipment and support then at least one company will provide legacy support, perhaps act as a reseller to help provision used dial-up equipment and recondition the equipment etc. You *can* still buy brand new buggy whips: http://www.jedediahsbuggywhip.com/ http://www.drivingessentials.com/Whips.htm There are still vendors selling thousands of different types of radio tubes, even though they haven't been manufactured for many years: http://www.vacuumtubes.net/ jc
On May 12, 2010, at 12:56 PM, JC Dill wrote:
You *can* still buy brand new buggy whips:
http://www.jedediahsbuggywhip.com/ http://www.drivingessentials.com/Whips.htm
I get my wooden oars and paddles here: http://www.shawandtenney.com/ They are great and work well on the double-ended rowboats (canoe shaped) we have. - Jared
Mark Foster wrote:
Thus the wider concern I flagged; if the only source for equipment and spares is the grey market, aren't the vendors missing the boat on something which shouldn't even have a major overhead to maintain?
There is no sales of new chassis, which means the manufacturing is shut down. The costs to maintain support and spares for an obsolete platform with a declining customer base and no further sales is quite high for the vendor. If they charged the real cost to provide support to the operator, most likely the operator wouldn't take the support contract. End result: end of support. If the operator /really/ needs to keep it going, they'll figure out a way to spare it. Telcos have been specialists in this regard for a long time.
What about developing nations where Internet isn't yet as commonplace as it is in the 'west' ?
They skip dialup.
On 2010-05-14 22:04, Alastair Johnson wrote:
Mark Foster wrote:
What about developing nations where Internet isn't yet as commonplace as it is in the 'west' ?
They skip dialup.
dial modems are the end game for a 140 year old technology (300-3400hz pots lines). There is literally no reason if you don't already have that infrastructure that you would expend capital to replicate that sort of physical plant.
On Mon, 10 May 2010, Jerry Bonner wrote:
I'm told by our Alcatel rep that the APX 8000 is no longer supported and that we can no longer get hardware support because they "don't have any spare parts".
I share a certain amount of love for this platform dating back to Ascend, but what am I to do now? Obviously no one is making large investments in their dial platform, but are there any other viable alternatives out there that are actually supported?
Vendors aren't releasing much new dial gear anymore because customers aren't buying it. Your best bet might be to check the secondary market for TNT/APX8000 parts. I have a small handful of AS5300s still floating around for that handful of users who can't (or won't) ditch dialup. Luckily that number is small enough that I can replace any failed parts with parts from other chassis, since the ones I have were EOL'd long ago. jms
Once upon a time, Justin M. Streiner <streiner@cluebyfour.org> said:
I have a small handful of AS5300s still floating around for that handful of users who can't (or won't) ditch dialup. Luckily that number is small enough that I can replace any failed parts with parts from other chassis, since the ones I have were EOL'd long ago.
I'm in the same boat with TNTs. We bought replacement fans years ago (about the only TNT part we've had fail, outside the odd card or two). How are ISPs that still offer dialup going to handle dialup and IPv6? I know the TNTs don't do it, and I don't think most of the old equipment in use in many places does. -- Chris Adams <cmadams@hiwaay.net> Systems and Network Administrator - HiWAAY Internet Services I don't speak for anybody but myself - that's enough trouble.
In message <20100511002909.GA1109404@hiwaay.net>, Chris Adams writes:
How are ISPs that still offer dialup going to handle dialup and IPv6? I know the TNTs don't do it, and I don't think most of the old equipment in use in many places does.
Just tunnel IPv6 over IPv4 and run a tunnel broker. Mark -- Mark Andrews, ISC 1 Seymour St., Dundas Valley, NSW 2117, Australia PHONE: +61 2 9871 4742 INTERNET: marka@isc.org
On Mon, 10 May 2010, Chris Adams wrote:
Once upon a time, Justin M. Streiner <streiner@cluebyfour.org> said:
I have a small handful of AS5300s still floating around for that handful of users who can't (or won't) ditch dialup. Luckily that number is small enough that I can replace any failed parts with parts from other chassis, since the ones I have were EOL'd long ago.
I'm in the same boat with TNTs. We bought replacement fans years ago (about the only TNT part we've had fail, outside the odd card or two).
How are ISPs that still offer dialup going to handle dialup and IPv6? I know the TNTs don't do it, and I don't think most of the old equipment in use in many places does.
My suspicion is that providers' dial gear might be included in the chunks of their networks that are considered 'not native v6 capable' as another way to try to 'goose' more people off of dialup and onto a broadband connection where v6 might be supported more easily. jms
In message <Pine.BSI.4.64.1005101701400.9419@malasada.lava.net>, Antonio Querubin writes:
On Mon, 10 May 2010, Chris Adams wrote:
How are ISPs that still offer dialup going to handle dialup and IPv6? I know the TNTs don't do it, and I don't think most of the old equipment in use in many places does.
6to4
You don't want 6to4. Even if you provide relay routers the return traffic is problematic. 6to4 also requires public IPv4 addresses and you will eventually want to share these between your customers.
Antonio Querubin 808-545-5282 x3003 e-mail/xmpp: tony@lava.net
-- Mark Andrews, ISC 1 Seymour St., Dundas Valley, NSW 2117, Australia PHONE: +61 2 9871 4742 INTERNET: marka@isc.org
In message <201005110413.o4B4DIsN031537@drugs.dv.isc.org>, Mark Andrews writes:
How are ISPs that still offer dialup going to handle dialup and IPv6? I know the TNTs don't do it, and I don't think most of the old equipment in use in many places does.
6to4
You don't want 6to4. Even if you provide relay routers the return traffic is problematic. 6to4 also requires public IPv4 addresses and you will eventually want to share these between your customers.
6rd would also be appropriate for this if you don't want to run a tunnel broker. -- Mark Andrews, ISC 1 Seymour St., Dundas Valley, NSW 2117, Australia PHONE: +61 2 9871 4742 INTERNET: marka@isc.org
On Tue, 11 May 2010, Mark Andrews wrote:
6to4
You don't want 6to4. Even if you provide relay routers the return traffic is problematic. 6to4 also requires public IPv4 addresses and you will eventually want to share these between your customers.
Providing 6to4 for dialup users is an adequate level of effort. And we're mot running out of public IPv4 addresses anytime soon for the blossoming dialup business ;). Antonio Querubin 808-545-5282 x3003 e-mail/xmpp: tony@lava.net
Chris Adams wrote:
How are ISPs that still offer dialup going to handle dialup and IPv6? I know the TNTs don't do it, and I don't think most of the old equipment in use in many places does.
Most likely the customers still on dialup are not going to worry about IPv6 - if their systems even support it. In fact several operators I have spoken to have considered their legacy dialup plant as a good place to test Carrier Grade NAT in a low impact manner. Couple it with some kind of ALG (transparent proxy + DNS tricks) for IPv6-only sites and you have something which might work. If you really need native IPv6 support for dialup then using a legacy NAS as a dial-terminator LAC and tunneling to an IPv6 capable LNS might be a solution for you. aj
On May 10, 2010, at 12:28 PM, Jerry Bonner wrote:
Obviously no one is making large investments in their dial platform, but are there any other viable alternatives out there that are actually supported?
The current 'still works, has features, etc' box is as5400xm, and is terming most of a full ct3 per chassis. Any-Service Any-Port, t.37 on/off ramping, and v.34/v.92 works quite well, as do the nifty high-touch features (mppc, stac, mlppp-lfi, hqos, etc), thanks to the npe-g1-worth of CPU in the box. We use this for v.110/120 isdn and switched-56 (yes, it still exists) calls, tdm-tdm ISDN switching, and a few pstn OOB channels. -Tk
In a message written on Mon, May 10, 2010 at 11:28:42AM -0500, Jerry Bonner wrote:
I share a certain amount of love for this platform dating back to Ascend, but what am I to do now? Obviously no one is making large investments in their dial platform, but are there any other viable alternatives out there that are actually supported?
DSL, Cable Modems, WiFi, WiMax, FTTH..... Seriously, AT&T now offers $10 per month DSL: http://arstechnica.com/old/content/2007/06/att-launches-10-dsl-it-hopes-no-o..., 768k down, 128k up. There comes a time when the old tech just doesn't make sense, even if a small customer base still wants it. -- Leo Bicknell - bicknell@ufp.org - CCIE 3440 PGP keys at http://www.ufp.org/~bicknell/
On 2010-05-11, at 11:08, Leo Bicknell wrote:
There comes a time when the old tech just doesn't make sense, even if a small customer base still wants it.
There will also no doubt continue to be many customers for whom dial is the only option. It's not long ago that I lived in such a house, deceptively close to the outskirts of town but in terms of wire distance and load coils it might as well have been on the moon. The house was in a wireless dead zone by a river, there was no cable, and the only line of sight to another structure was through several acres of 2.4GHz-absorbing trees. The further you move away from urban centres, the easier it is to find examples of this. Joe
30% of all people in the US (110 million) have no access to broadband. Large areas of my state have no access to broadband because its rural (Maine). Aastra CVX (it used to be a Nortel product.) --Curtis On 5/11/2010 11:29 AM, Joe Abley wrote:
On 2010-05-11, at 11:08, Leo Bicknell wrote:
There comes a time when the old tech just doesn't make sense, even if a small customer base still wants it.
There will also no doubt continue to be many customers for whom dial is the only option.
It's not long ago that I lived in such a house, deceptively close to the outskirts of town but in terms of wire distance and load coils it might as well have been on the moon. The house was in a wireless dead zone by a river, there was no cable, and the only line of sight to another structure was through several acres of 2.4GHz-absorbing trees.
The further you move away from urban centres, the easier it is to find examples of this.
Joe
On 2010-05-11, at 11:08, Leo Bicknell wrote:
There comes a time when the old tech just doesn't make sense, even if a small customer base still wants it.
There will also no doubt continue to be many customers for whom dial is
Thirty percent? If "no access" includes financial means or developed interest, that may be true, but 99% of all zip codes have at least person with internet access. And the FCC has stated that "95 percent of Americans, or 290 million people, have terrestrial broadband access" http://blog.zcorum.com/2010/03/national-broadband-plan-the-debate-begins/. Frank -----Original Message----- From: Curtis Maurand [mailto:cmaurand@xyonet.com] Sent: Tuesday, May 11, 2010 10:51 AM To: nanog@nanog.org Subject: Re: Dial Concentrators - TNT / APX8000 R.I.P. 30% of all people in the US (110 million) have no access to broadband. Large areas of my state have no access to broadband because its rural (Maine). Aastra CVX (it used to be a Nortel product.) --Curtis On 5/11/2010 11:29 AM, Joe Abley wrote: the only option.
It's not long ago that I lived in such a house, deceptively close to the
outskirts of town but in terms of wire distance and load coils it might as well have been on the moon. The house was in a wireless dead zone by a river, there was no cable, and the only line of sight to another structure was through several acres of 2.4GHz-absorbing trees.
The further you move away from urban centres, the easier it is to find
examples of this.
Joe
On 2010-05-13 19:43, Frank Bulk wrote:
Thirty percent? If "no access" includes financial means or developed interest, that may be true, but 99% of all zip codes have at least person with internet access. And the FCC has stated that "95 percent of Americans, or 290 million people, have terrestrial broadband access" http://blog.zcorum.com/2010/03/national-broadband-plan-the-debate-begins/.
Frank
-----Original Message----- From: Curtis Maurand [mailto:cmaurand@xyonet.com] Sent: Tuesday, May 11, 2010 10:51 AM To: nanog@nanog.org Subject: Re: Dial Concentrators - TNT / APX8000 R.I.P.
30% of all people in the US (110 million) have no access to broadband. Large areas of my state have no access to broadband because its rural (Maine).
The rural population represented 20.7% of the us population in the 2000 census. about 70% of the US population is concentrated in about 2% of the land area.
Aastra CVX (it used to be a Nortel product.)
--Curtis
On 2010-05-11, at 11:08, Leo Bicknell wrote:
There comes a time when the old tech just doesn't make sense, even if a small customer base still wants it.
There will also no doubt continue to be many customers for whom dial is
On 5/11/2010 11:29 AM, Joe Abley wrote: the only option.
It's not long ago that I lived in such a house, deceptively close to the
outskirts of town but in terms of wire distance and load coils it might as well have been on the moon. The house was in a wireless dead zone by a river, there was no cable, and the only line of sight to another structure was through several acres of 2.4GHz-absorbing trees.
The further you move away from urban centres, the easier it is to find
examples of this.
Joe
participants (20)
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Chris Adams -
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Leo Bicknell -
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