Hello gents: I wanted to put this out there for all of you. Our network consists of a mixture of Cisco and Extreme equipment. Would you say that it's fair to say that if you are serious at all about being a service provider that your core equipment is Cisco based? Am I limiting myself by thinking that Cisco is the "de facto" vendor of choice? I'm not looking for so much "fanboy" responses, but more of a real world experience of what you guys use that actually work and does the job..... No technical questions here, just general feedback. I try to follow the Tolly Group who compares products, and they continually show that Cisco equipment is a poor performer in almost any equipment compared to others, I find that so hard to believe..... Thanks! Brandon
On Mon, 10 Jan 2011, Brandon Kim wrote:
Would you say that it's fair to say that if you are serious at all about being a service provider that your core equipment is Cisco based?
I would not necessarily say that. Granted, most of the places I've worked are Cisco shops to a large extent, that does not mean it is the only solution to many problems. There are product spaces where Cisco has a very well established presence (routers, switches, remote access, wireless, DWDM, IP telephony, etc), but there are other players in those spaces, in additional to spaces where Cisco does not have as large of a presence. There are many people who will give 'buy Cisco' as a default answer to many networking needs, much the same as there are meny people who will give 'buy Microsoft' or 'buy Oracle' for software/database needs. There are other solutions to those needs. If you see a piece of gear from a new vendor, don't be afraid to contact them to see if get their sales team in to give you a presentation or take a box for a test drive. Ideally, you also have acess to some type of lab or non-production environment where you can try out equipment without putting 'live' data at risk. In most shops I've worked in, the final decision comes down to: 1. cost 2. performance/reliability 3. support 4. scalability (read: investment protection, speaking back to point 1) 5. interoperability 6. security 7. environmental factors (rack space, power, cooling, etc) Pretty much all of the subsequent points ties back to point 1 in some way. Network devices are tools designed to do one or more jobs. The job you're trying to do determines the tools you use, and how you use them. jms PS: I take test results from Tolly/Gartner/Burton/etc with a grain of salt. When a vendor performs well in a bake-off, they will proudly trumpet that fact. When they don't they will usually claim that either the box they tested was broken, or the testing methodology was flawed in some way :)
On Jan 10, 2011, at 10:31 AM, Brandon Kim wrote:
Hello gents:
I wanted to put this out there for all of you. Our network consists of a mixture of Cisco and Extreme equipment.
Would you say that it's fair to say that if you are serious at all about being a service provider that your core equipment is Cisco based?
Am I limiting myself by thinking that Cisco is the "de facto" vendor of choice? I'm not looking for so much "fanboy" responses, but more of a real world experience of what you guys use that actually work and does the job.....
I think a lot of this depends on the market. If you're into FTTH/FTTP then Cisco is not the way to go. They have no serious offerings in this space IMHO. (that are cost competitive). Each vendor has various things they do well. Cisco surely is well capitalized with a broad portfolio of offerings in the DWDM to IP space. I do believe they are the "IBM" of the industry, ie: "Nobody ever was fired for buying IBM(sic)". This does not mean they (nor anyone else) delivers a perfect solution. This is a challenge that I frequently remind the vendors of, as apparently many customers actually do *yell* at them when there are bugs, vs offering constructive partnerships to resolve the issues. I think that Juniper, Foundry(Brocade) and some other vendors offer compelling products in the core space as well. It's well worth its while to build a relationship with your vendors so you can have that constructive partnership IMHO. Then when you hit a serious problem, you can take constructive actions vs just screaming loudly and hoping they jump. - Jared
On 1/10/2011 9:31 AM, Brandon Kim wrote:
Would you say that it's fair to say that if you are serious at all about being a service provider that your core equipment is Cisco based?
Am I limiting myself by thinking that Cisco is the "de facto" vendor of choice? I'm not looking for so much "fanboy" responses, but more of a real world experience of what you guys use that actually work and does the job.....
You have to really narrow the network criteria. What's good for DSL subscriber termination with or without subscriber management features (on router, or handled externally), in core networks a t1/t3/oc3/gig-e/oc48/10G+ speeds, mpls features, etc. The first kickoff on any network is if it is service provider or enterprise. The feature sets and types of boxes differ greatly between these for most manufacturers (as does price). I've been happy with, and disappointed with, Cisco, Extreme, Juniper, and Brocade. There's a few others out there that I haven't used or tested. In the Terabit market, I love Alcatel and Juniper, but I can't afford the terabit market. :) Jack
In my experience it all comes down to Cisco-certified people being easy to find, and managers not wanting to spend all their time in the hiring process. So yes, I've generally seen Cisco as the de-facto choice, but it's rarely been a technical argument that swings the balance. I'm generally playing in the Enterprise space now, though. -saxon On 10 January 2011 08:31, Brandon Kim <brandon.kim@brandontek.com> wrote:
Hello gents:
I wanted to put this out there for all of you. Our network consists of a mixture of Cisco and Extreme equipment.
Would you say that it's fair to say that if you are serious at all about being a service provider that your core equipment is Cisco based?
Am I limiting myself by thinking that Cisco is the "de facto" vendor of choice? I'm not looking for so much "fanboy" responses, but more of a real world experience of what you guys use that actually work and does the job.....
No technical questions here, just general feedback. I try to follow the Tolly Group who compares products, and they continually show that Cisco equipment is a poor performer in almost any equipment compared to others, I find that so hard to believe.....
Thanks!
Brandon
Our core business is not as a service provider, as in selling services to others, but we act as a service provider providing services for the various customers in our internal network that we support. Our core used to be an all Cisco Core. a few years back the decision was made to replace this with Alcatel-Lucent IPD products. I can say we are happy that we did replace the Cisco core, and we have had a very good experience with the IPD product line. I am sure others can attest to this also. The features and functionality along with the reliability have been very good, and in my opinion they have a strong product. Our edge at this point is a mixture of Cisco access switches, and we also still have some Cisco Distribution. On Mon, Jan 10, 2011 at 10:31 AM, Brandon Kim <brandon.kim@brandontek.com>wrote:
Hello gents:
I wanted to put this out there for all of you. Our network consists of a mixture of Cisco and Extreme equipment.
Would you say that it's fair to say that if you are serious at all about being a service provider that your core equipment is Cisco based?
Am I limiting myself by thinking that Cisco is the "de facto" vendor of choice? I'm not looking for so much "fanboy" responses, but more of a real world experience of what you guys use that actually work and does the job.....
No technical questions here, just general feedback. I try to follow the Tolly Group who compares products, and they continually show that Cisco equipment is a poor performer in almost any equipment compared to others, I find that so hard to believe.....
Thanks!
Brandon
Cisco shop here that is avidly converting to Juniper..... Paul -----Original Message----- From: Brandon Kim [mailto:brandon.kim@brandontek.com] Sent: Monday, January 10, 2011 10:32 AM To: nanog group Subject: Is Cisco equpiment de facto for you? Hello gents: I wanted to put this out there for all of you. Our network consists of a mixture of Cisco and Extreme equipment. Would you say that it's fair to say that if you are serious at all about being a service provider that your core equipment is Cisco based? Am I limiting myself by thinking that Cisco is the "de facto" vendor of choice? I'm not looking for so much "fanboy" responses, but more of a real world experience of what you guys use that actually work and does the job..... No technical questions here, just general feedback. I try to follow the Tolly Group who compares products, and they continually show that Cisco equipment is a poor performer in almost any equipment compared to others, I find that so hard to believe..... Thanks! Brandon =
We have traditionally been a Cisco shop, but we are starting to move toward Juniper for much of our needs, and will be recommending Juniper as an alternative for customers' needs. From a technical point of view, I find the configurations to be simpler and easier to understand, and I like the fact that most everything runs the same OS, with the same interface. From a financial point of view, Juniper tends to be less expensive for more performance, and their support contracts are much cheaper. All that said, and as other's have said, Cisco is always a safe choice, particularly since many people are familiar with them. -Randy -- | Randy Carpenter | Vice President, IT Services | Red Hat Certified Engineer | First Network Group, Inc. | (419)739-9240, x1 ---- ----- Original Message -----
Hello gents:
I wanted to put this out there for all of you. Our network consists of a mixture of Cisco and Extreme equipment.
Would you say that it's fair to say that if you are serious at all about being a service provider that your core equipment is Cisco based?
Am I limiting myself by thinking that Cisco is the "de facto" vendor of choice? I'm not looking for so much "fanboy" responses, but more of a real world experience of what you guys use that actually work and does the job.....
No technical questions here, just general feedback. I try to follow the Tolly Group who compares products, and they continually show that Cisco equipment is a poor performer in almost any equipment compared to others, I find that so hard to believe.....
Thanks!
Brandon
I've tried to use other vendors threw out the years for internal L2/L3. Always Cisco for perimeter routing/firewalling. from my personal experience, each time we took a chance and tried to use another vendor for internal L2 needs, we would be reminded why it was a bad choice down the road, due to hardware reliability, support issues, multiple and ongoing software bugs, architectural design choices. Then for the next few years I'd regret the decision. This is not to say Cisco gear has been without its issues, but they are much fewer and handled better when stuff hits the fan. the only other vendor at this point in my career I'd fee comfortable deploying for internal enterprise switching, including HPC requirements which is not CIsco branded, would be Force10 or Extreme. it has always been Cisco for edge routing/firewalling, but i wouldn't be opposed to trying Juniper for routing, I know of a few shops who do and they have been pleased thus far. I've little or no experience with many of the other vendors, and I'm sure they have good offerings, but I won't be beta testing their firmwares anymore (one vendor insisted we upgrade our firmware on our core equipment several times in one year…). Cisco isn't a good choice if you don't have the budget for the smart net contracts. They come at a price. a little 5505 with unrestricted license and contract costs over 2k, a 5540 about 40k-70k depending on options, with a yearly renewal of about 15k or more… -g On Jan 10, 2011, at 11:21 AM, Randy Carpenter wrote:
We have traditionally been a Cisco shop, but we are starting to move toward Juniper for much of our needs, and will be recommending Juniper as an alternative for customers' needs. From a technical point of view, I find the configurations to be simpler and easier to understand, and I like the fact that most everything runs the same OS, with the same interface. From a financial point of view, Juniper tends to be less expensive for more performance, and their support contracts are much cheaper.
All that said, and as other's have said, Cisco is always a safe choice, particularly since many people are familiar with them.
-Randy
-- | Randy Carpenter | Vice President, IT Services | Red Hat Certified Engineer | First Network Group, Inc. | (419)739-9240, x1 ----
----- Original Message -----
Hello gents:
I wanted to put this out there for all of you. Our network consists of a mixture of Cisco and Extreme equipment.
Would you say that it's fair to say that if you are serious at all about being a service provider that your core equipment is Cisco based?
Am I limiting myself by thinking that Cisco is the "de facto" vendor of choice? I'm not looking for so much "fanboy" responses, but more of a real world experience of what you guys use that actually work and does the job.....
No technical questions here, just general feedback. I try to follow the Tolly Group who compares products, and they continually show that Cisco equipment is a poor performer in almost any equipment compared to others, I find that so hard to believe.....
Thanks!
Brandon
-- This message and any attachments may contain confidential and/or privileged information for the sole use of the intended recipient. Any review or distribution by anyone other than the person for whom it was originally intended is strictly prohibited. If you have received this message in error, please contact the sender and delete all copies. Opinions, conclusions or other information contained in this message may not be that of the organization.
There have been awfully too many time when Cisco TAC would just say that since the problem you are trying to troubleshoot is between Cisco and VendorX, we can't help you. You should have bought Cisco for both sides. I had that happen when I was troubleshooting LLDP between 3750s and Avaya phones, TACACS between Cisco and tac_plus daemon, link bundling between juniper EX and Cisco, some obscure switching issues between CAT and Procurves and other examples like that just don't recall them anymore. Every time I'm reminded that if you have a lot of Cisco on the network, the rest should be cisco too, unless there is a very good technical/financial reason for it, but you should be prepared to be your own help in those cases. Vendors love to point at the other vendors for solutions. At least in my experience. My $0.02 Andrey On Mon, Jan 10, 2011 at 11:52 AM, Greg Whynott <Greg.Whynott@oicr.on.ca>wrote:
I've tried to use other vendors threw out the years for internal L2/L3. Always Cisco for perimeter routing/firewalling.
from my personal experience, each time we took a chance and tried to use another vendor for internal L2 needs, we would be reminded why it was a bad choice down the road, due to hardware reliability, support issues, multiple and ongoing software bugs, architectural design choices. Then for the next few years I'd regret the decision. This is not to say Cisco gear has been without its issues, but they are much fewer and handled better when stuff hits the fan.
the only other vendor at this point in my career I'd fee comfortable deploying for internal enterprise switching, including HPC requirements which is not CIsco branded, would be Force10 or Extreme. it has always been Cisco for edge routing/firewalling, but i wouldn't be opposed to trying Juniper for routing, I know of a few shops who do and they have been pleased thus far. I've little or no experience with many of the other vendors, and I'm sure they have good offerings, but I won't be beta testing their firmwares anymore (one vendor insisted we upgrade our firmware on our core equipment several times in one year…).
Cisco isn't a good choice if you don't have the budget for the smart net contracts. They come at a price. a little 5505 with unrestricted license and contract costs over 2k, a 5540 about 40k-70k depending on options, with a yearly renewal of about 15k or more…
-g
-- Andrey Khomyakov [khomyakov.andrey@gmail.com]
From: Andrey Khomyakov Sent: Monday, January 10, 2011 11:36 AM To: nanog group Subject: Re: Is Cisco equpiment de facto for you?
There have been awfully too many time when Cisco TAC would just say that since the problem you are trying to troubleshoot is between Cisco and VendorX, we can't help you. You should have bought Cisco for both sides. I had that happen when I was troubleshooting LLDP between 3750s and Avaya phones, TACACS between Cisco and tac_plus daemon, link bundling between juniper EX and Cisco, some obscure switching issues between CAT and Procurves and other examples like that just don't recall them anymore.
On the other hand, the other vendors are generally willing to bend over backwards and sort out interoperability issues and often have technical resources that are just as experienced on the Cisco gear as the Cisco techs are. And while Cisco might have at one time done the "you should have bought Cisco (click)" act, I don't get that impression these days as more networks have equipment from mixed vendors for very specific parts. There are reasons why one might choose to purchase gear from different vendors in a "best of breed" approach. One might have load balancers from A10 or Citrix, a firewall from Juniper or Palo Alto Networks, access switches from Arista, core gear from Brocade and maybe even a couple of Cisco boxes here and there where they make sense. Having one single vendor for no reason other than to simply ease troubleshooting might be a valid reason in some networks but doesn't make sense in others. If you don't have the technical resources to sort out issues in-house, sure, it might make sense to let the vendor do it all and in that case you will need a network from one vendor. Different vendors have different things they do very well. A network might want to leverage those good aspects in their network design. It basically comes down to the type of service you are offering and how much money you have. For a "best of breed" network, you might have to pay a little more for in-house talent. For a homogeneous network, you might sacrifice performance in some areas for savings on talent. It just depends on what is important to you. No one vendor, in my experience, makes the very best gear at the very best price in every portion of the network. That isn't Cisco specific, it goes for practically all vendors.
Once upon a time, Andrey Khomyakov <khomyakov.andrey@gmail.com> said:
There have been awfully too many time when Cisco TAC would just say that since the problem you are trying to troubleshoot is between Cisco and VendorX, we can't help you. You should have bought Cisco for both sides.
That kind of behavior from a vendor tells me I shouldn't have bought that vendor for either side. -- Chris Adams <cmadams@hiwaay.net> Systems and Network Administrator - HiWAAY Internet Services I don't speak for anybody but myself - that's enough trouble.
i think it really depends on who answers your call. I've called Cisco a few times before for inter vendor issues and they gave us the " call the other vendor " finger. .. Other times they saved the day. i know some shops negotiate their support contract which precludes them from going threw the regular support escalation process. you get to speak to a more senior tech on the first 'hello'. -g On Jan 10, 2011, at 3:04 PM, Chris Adams wrote:
Once upon a time, Andrey Khomyakov <khomyakov.andrey@gmail.com> said:
There have been awfully too many time when Cisco TAC would just say that since the problem you are trying to troubleshoot is between Cisco and VendorX, we can't help you. You should have bought Cisco for both sides.
That kind of behavior from a vendor tells me I shouldn't have bought that vendor for either side.
-- This message and any attachments may contain confidential and/or privileged information for the sole use of the intended recipient. Any review or distribution by anyone other than the person for whom it was originally intended is strictly prohibited. If you have received this message in error, please contact the sender and delete all copies. Opinions, conclusions or other information contained in this message may not be that of the organization.
To your point Andrey, It probably works both ways too. I'm sure HP would love to finger point as well. I remember reading for my CCNP one of the thought process behind getting all Cisco is the very reason you pointed out, get all Cisco! How convenient though for Cisco to do that, I wonder if they are being sincere(sarcasm). Wouldn't it a perfect world for Cisco to just have everyone buy their stuff...I think it's a cop out though and you really should try to support your product as best you can if it is connected to another vendor. I'm sad to hear that TACACS took that route. I hope they at least tried their hardest to support you.....
From: khomyakov.andrey@gmail.com Date: Mon, 10 Jan 2011 14:35:36 -0500 Subject: Re: Is Cisco equpiment de facto for you? To: nanog@nanog.org
There have been awfully too many time when Cisco TAC would just say that since the problem you are trying to troubleshoot is between Cisco and VendorX, we can't help you. You should have bought Cisco for both sides. I had that happen when I was troubleshooting LLDP between 3750s and Avaya phones, TACACS between Cisco and tac_plus daemon, link bundling between juniper EX and Cisco, some obscure switching issues between CAT and Procurves and other examples like that just don't recall them anymore.
Every time I'm reminded that if you have a lot of Cisco on the network, the rest should be cisco too, unless there is a very good technical/financial reason for it, but you should be prepared to be your own help in those cases.
Vendors love to point at the other vendors for solutions. At least in my experience.
My $0.02
Andrey
On Mon, Jan 10, 2011 at 11:52 AM, Greg Whynott <Greg.Whynott@oicr.on.ca>wrote:
I've tried to use other vendors threw out the years for internal L2/L3. Always Cisco for perimeter routing/firewalling.
from my personal experience, each time we took a chance and tried to use another vendor for internal L2 needs, we would be reminded why it was a bad choice down the road, due to hardware reliability, support issues, multiple and ongoing software bugs, architectural design choices. Then for the next few years I'd regret the decision. This is not to say Cisco gear has been without its issues, but they are much fewer and handled better when stuff hits the fan.
the only other vendor at this point in my career I'd fee comfortable deploying for internal enterprise switching, including HPC requirements which is not CIsco branded, would be Force10 or Extreme. it has always been Cisco for edge routing/firewalling, but i wouldn't be opposed to trying Juniper for routing, I know of a few shops who do and they have been pleased thus far. I've little or no experience with many of the other vendors, and I'm sure they have good offerings, but I won't be beta testing their firmwares anymore (one vendor insisted we upgrade our firmware on our core equipment several times in one year…).
Cisco isn't a good choice if you don't have the budget for the smart net contracts. They come at a price. a little 5505 with unrestricted license and contract costs over 2k, a 5540 about 40k-70k depending on options, with a yearly renewal of about 15k or more…
-g
-- Andrey Khomyakov [khomyakov.andrey@gmail.com]
just a side note, HP probably was the most helpful vendor i've dealt with in relation to solving/providing inter vendor interoperability solutions. they have PDF booklets on many things we would run into during work. for example, setting up STP between Cisco and HP gear, ( http://cdn.procurve.com/training/Manuals/ProCurve-and-Cisco-STP-Interoperabi... ). At the time the other vendor in this case (cisco) flat our refused to help us. this was a few years back tho, things may of changed. I'd ask support "you are not telling me i'm the _only_ customer trying to do this" … to which they would try and play the "well most people don't mix gear".. HP's example should be the yard stick in the field. -g On Jan 10, 2011, at 3:04 PM, Brandon Kim wrote:
To your point Andrey,
It probably works both ways too. I'm sure HP would love to finger point as well. I remember reading for my CCNP one of the thought process behind getting all Cisco is the very reason you pointed out, get all Cisco!
How convenient though for Cisco to do that, I wonder if they are being sincere(sarcasm).
Wouldn't it a perfect world for Cisco to just have everyone buy their stuff...I think it's a cop out though and you really should try to support your product as best you can if it is connected to another vendor.
I'm sad to hear that TACACS took that route. I hope they at least tried their hardest to support you.....
From: khomyakov.andrey@gmail.com Date: Mon, 10 Jan 2011 14:35:36 -0500 Subject: Re: Is Cisco equpiment de facto for you? To: nanog@nanog.org
There have been awfully too many time when Cisco TAC would just say that since the problem you are trying to troubleshoot is between Cisco and VendorX, we can't help you. You should have bought Cisco for both sides. I had that happen when I was troubleshooting LLDP between 3750s and Avaya phones, TACACS between Cisco and tac_plus daemon, link bundling between juniper EX and Cisco, some obscure switching issues between CAT and Procurves and other examples like that just don't recall them anymore.
Every time I'm reminded that if you have a lot of Cisco on the network, the rest should be cisco too, unless there is a very good technical/financial reason for it, but you should be prepared to be your own help in those cases.
Vendors love to point at the other vendors for solutions. At least in my experience.
My $0.02
Andrey
On Mon, Jan 10, 2011 at 11:52 AM, Greg Whynott <Greg.Whynott@oicr.on.ca>wrote:
I've tried to use other vendors threw out the years for internal L2/L3. Always Cisco for perimeter routing/firewalling.
from my personal experience, each time we took a chance and tried to use another vendor for internal L2 needs, we would be reminded why it was a bad choice down the road, due to hardware reliability, support issues, multiple and ongoing software bugs, architectural design choices. Then for the next few years I'd regret the decision. This is not to say Cisco gear has been without its issues, but they are much fewer and handled better when stuff hits the fan.
the only other vendor at this point in my career I'd fee comfortable deploying for internal enterprise switching, including HPC requirements which is not CIsco branded, would be Force10 or Extreme. it has always been Cisco for edge routing/firewalling, but i wouldn't be opposed to trying Juniper for routing, I know of a few shops who do and they have been pleased thus far. I've little or no experience with many of the other vendors, and I'm sure they have good offerings, but I won't be beta testing their firmwares anymore (one vendor insisted we upgrade our firmware on our core equipment several times in one year…).
Cisco isn't a good choice if you don't have the budget for the smart net contracts. They come at a price. a little 5505 with unrestricted license and contract costs over 2k, a 5540 about 40k-70k depending on options, with a yearly renewal of about 15k or more…
-g
-- Andrey Khomyakov [khomyakov.andrey@gmail.com]
-- This message and any attachments may contain confidential and/or privileged information for the sole use of the intended recipient. Any review or distribution by anyone other than the person for whom it was originally intended is strictly prohibited. If you have received this message in error, please contact the sender and delete all copies. Opinions, conclusions or other information contained in this message may not be that of the organization.
to which they would try and play the "well most people don't mix gear".. ha! Funny if you responded with, "Oh really? Thanks I didn't know that, I guess I'll get all HP...who do I talk to, to return this Cisco router?"
From: Greg.Whynott@oicr.on.ca To: brandon.kim@brandontek.com CC: khomyakov.andrey@gmail.com; nanog@nanog.org Date: Mon, 10 Jan 2011 15:20:06 -0500 Subject: Re: Is Cisco equpiment de facto for you?
just a side note, HP probably was the most helpful vendor i've dealt with in relation to solving/providing inter vendor interoperability solutions. they have PDF booklets on many things we would run into during work. for example, setting up STP between Cisco and HP gear, ( http://cdn.procurve..com/training/Manuals/ProCurve-and-Cisco-STP-Interoperab... ).
At the time the other vendor in this case (cisco) flat our refused to help us. this was a few years back tho, things may of changed. I'd ask support "you are not telling me i'm the _only_ customer trying to do this" … to which they would try and play the "well most people don't mix gear"..
HP's example should be the yard stick in the field.
-g
On Jan 10, 2011, at 3:04 PM, Brandon Kim wrote:
To your point Andrey,
It probably works both ways too. I'm sure HP would love to finger point as well. I remember reading for my CCNP one of the thought process behind getting all Cisco is the very reason you pointed out, get all Cisco!
How convenient though for Cisco to do that, I wonder if they are being sincere(sarcasm).
Wouldn't it a perfect world for Cisco to just have everyone buy their stuff...I think it's a cop out though and you really should try to support your product as best you can if it is connected to another vendor.
I'm sad to hear that TACACS took that route. I hope they at least tried their hardest to support you.....
From: khomyakov.andrey@gmail.com Date: Mon, 10 Jan 2011 14:35:36 -0500 Subject: Re: Is Cisco equpiment de facto for you? To: nanog@nanog.org
There have been awfully too many time when Cisco TAC would just say that since the problem you are trying to troubleshoot is between Cisco and VendorX, we can't help you. You should have bought Cisco for both sides. I had that happen when I was troubleshooting LLDP between 3750s and Avaya phones, TACACS between Cisco and tac_plus daemon, link bundling between juniper EX and Cisco, some obscure switching issues between CAT and Procurves and other examples like that just don't recall them anymore.
Every time I'm reminded that if you have a lot of Cisco on the network, the rest should be cisco too, unless there is a very good technical/financial reason for it, but you should be prepared to be your own help in those cases.
Vendors love to point at the other vendors for solutions. At least in my experience.
My $0.02
Andrey
On Mon, Jan 10, 2011 at 11:52 AM, Greg Whynott <Greg.Whynott@oicr.on.ca>wrote:
I've tried to use other vendors threw out the years for internal L2/L3. Always Cisco for perimeter routing/firewalling.
from my personal experience, each time we took a chance and tried to use another vendor for internal L2 needs, we would be reminded why it was a bad choice down the road, due to hardware reliability, support issues, multiple and ongoing software bugs, architectural design choices. Then for the next few years I'd regret the decision. This is not to say Cisco gear has been without its issues, but they are much fewer and handled better when stuff hits the fan.
the only other vendor at this point in my career I'd fee comfortable deploying for internal enterprise switching, including HPC requirements which is not CIsco branded, would be Force10 or Extreme. it has always been Cisco for edge routing/firewalling, but i wouldn't be opposed to trying Juniper for routing, I know of a few shops who do and they have been pleased thus far. I've little or no experience with many of the other vendors, and I'm sure they have good offerings, but I won't be beta testing their firmwares anymore (one vendor insisted we upgrade our firmware on our core equipment several times in one year…).
Cisco isn't a good choice if you don't have the budget for the smart net contracts. They come at a price. a little 5505 with unrestricted license and contract costs over 2k, a 5540 about 40k-70k depending on options, with a yearly renewal of about 15k or more…
-g
-- Andrey Khomyakov [khomyakov.andrey@gmail.com]
--
This message and any attachments may contain confidential and/or privileged information for the sole use of the intended recipient. Any review or distribution by anyone other than the person for whom it was originally intended is strictly prohibited. If you have received this message in error, please contact the sender and delete all copies. Opinions, conclusions or other information contained in this message may not be that of the organization.
On Mon, 10 Jan 2011 14:39:19 -0600, Brandon Kim <brandon.kim@brandontek.com> wrote:
to which they would try and play the "well most people don't mix gear"..
ha! Funny if you responded with, "Oh really? Thanks I didn't know that, I guess I'll get all HP...who do I talk to, to return this Cisco router?"
I've threatened that one against Juniper and minutes later I had an engineer on the phone. At 3:30am. Funny how once you mention buying another vendor they raise an eyebrow.
From: Greg.Whynott@oicr.on.ca To: brandon.kim@brandontek.com CC: khomyakov.andrey@gmail.com; nanog@nanog.org Date: Mon, 10 Jan 2011 15:20:06 -0500 Subject: Re: Is Cisco equpiment de facto for you?
just a side note, HP probably was the most helpful vendor i've dealt with in relation to solving/providing inter vendor interoperability solutions. they have PDF booklets on many things we would run into during work. for example, setting up STP between Cisco and HP gear, ( http://cdn.procurve..com/training/Manuals/ProCurve-and-Cisco-STP-Interoperab... ).
At the time the other vendor in this case (cisco) flat our refused to help us. this was a few years back tho, things may of changed. I'd ask support "you are not telling me i'm the _only_ customer trying to do this" … to which they would try and play the "well most people don't mix gear"..
HP's example should be the yard stick in the field.
-g
On Jan 10, 2011, at 3:04 PM, Brandon Kim wrote:
To your point Andrey,
It probably works both ways too. I'm sure HP would love to finger
of the thought process behind getting all Cisco is the very reason you pointed out, get all Cisco!
How convenient though for Cisco to do that, I wonder if they are being sincere(sarcasm).
Wouldn't it a perfect world for Cisco to just have everyone buy their stuff...I think it's a cop out though and you really should try to support your product as best you can if it is connected to another vendor.
I'm sad to hear that TACACS took that route. I hope they at least
point as well. I remember reading for my CCNP one tried their hardest to support you.....
From: khomyakov.andrey@gmail.com Date: Mon, 10 Jan 2011 14:35:36 -0500 Subject: Re: Is Cisco equpiment de facto for you? To: nanog@nanog.org
There have been awfully too many time when Cisco TAC would just say
since the problem you are trying to troubleshoot is between Cisco and VendorX, we can't help you. You should have bought Cisco for both sides. I had that happen when I was troubleshooting LLDP between 3750s and Avaya phones, TACACS between Cisco and tac_plus daemon, link bundling between juniper EX and Cisco, some obscure switching issues between CAT and Procurves and other examples like that just don't recall them anymore.
Every time I'm reminded that if you have a lot of Cisco on the network, the rest should be cisco too, unless there is a very good technical/financial reason for it, but you should be prepared to be your own help in
cases.
Vendors love to point at the other vendors for solutions. At least in my experience.
My $0.02
Andrey
On Mon, Jan 10, 2011 at 11:52 AM, Greg Whynott <Greg.Whynott@oicr.on.ca>wrote:
I've tried to use other vendors threw out the years for internal L2/L3. Always Cisco for perimeter routing/firewalling.
from my personal experience, each time we took a chance and tried to use another vendor for internal L2 needs, we would be reminded why it was a bad choice down the road, due to hardware reliability, support issues, multiple and ongoing software bugs, architectural design choices. Then for the next few years I'd regret the decision. This is not to say Cisco gear has been without its issues, but they are much fewer and handled better when stuff hits the fan.
the only other vendor at this point in my career I'd fee comfortable deploying for internal enterprise switching, including HPC requirements which is not CIsco branded, would be Force10 or Extreme. it has always been Cisco for edge routing/firewalling, but i wouldn't be opposed to trying Juniper for routing, I know of a few shops who do and they have been pleased thus far. I've little or no experience with many of the other vendors, and I'm sure they have good offerings, but I won't be beta testing their firmwares anymore (one vendor insisted we upgrade our firmware on our core equipment several times in one year…).
Cisco isn't a good choice if you don't have the budget for the smart net contracts. They come at a price. a little 5505 with unrestricted license and contract costs over 2k, a 5540 about 40k-70k depending on
that those options,
with a yearly renewal of about 15k or more…
-g
-- Andrey Khomyakov [khomyakov.andrey@gmail.com]
--
This message and any attachments may contain confidential and/or privileged information for the sole use of the intended recipient. Any review or distribution by anyone other than the person for whom it was originally intended is strictly prohibited. If you have received this message in error, please contact the sender and delete all copies. Opinions, conclusions or other information contained in this message may not be that of the organization.
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for vendors who we were not getting the goods from, I've found calling your sales rep much more efficient than anything you can say/ask/beg/threaten the tech on the phone. Sales guys have the inside numbers to call, the clout to get things moving as they generate revenue for said vendor. his pay comes from you, you pay him, he works for 2. -g On Jan 10, 2011, at 4:14 PM, Thomas Donnelly wrote:
On Mon, 10 Jan 2011 14:39:19 -0600, Brandon Kim <brandon.kim@brandontek.com> wrote:
to which they would try and play the "well most people don't mix gear"..
ha! Funny if you responded with, "Oh really? Thanks I didn't know that, I guess I'll get all HP...who do I talk to, to return this Cisco router?"
I've threatened that one against Juniper and minutes later I had an engineer on the phone. At 3:30am. Funny how once you mention buying another vendor they raise an eyebrow.
From: Greg.Whynott@oicr.on.ca To: brandon.kim@brandontek.com CC: khomyakov.andrey@gmail.com; nanog@nanog.org Date: Mon, 10 Jan 2011 15:20:06 -0500 Subject: Re: Is Cisco equpiment de facto for you?
just a side note, HP probably was the most helpful vendor i've dealt with in relation to solving/providing inter vendor interoperability solutions. they have PDF booklets on many things we would run into during work. for example, setting up STP between Cisco and HP gear, ( http://cdn.procurve..com/training/Manuals/ProCurve-and-Cisco-STP-Interoperab... ).
At the time the other vendor in this case (cisco) flat our refused to help us. this was a few years back tho, things may of changed. I'd ask support "you are not telling me i'm the _only_ customer trying to do this" … to which they would try and play the "well most people don't mix gear"..
HP's example should be the yard stick in the field.
-g
On Jan 10, 2011, at 3:04 PM, Brandon Kim wrote:
To your point Andrey,
It probably works both ways too. I'm sure HP would love to finger
of the thought process behind getting all Cisco is the very reason you pointed out, get all Cisco!
How convenient though for Cisco to do that, I wonder if they are being sincere(sarcasm).
Wouldn't it a perfect world for Cisco to just have everyone buy their stuff...I think it's a cop out though and you really should try to support your product as best you can if it is connected to another vendor.
I'm sad to hear that TACACS took that route. I hope they at least
point as well. I remember reading for my CCNP one tried their hardest to support you.....
From: khomyakov.andrey@gmail.com Date: Mon, 10 Jan 2011 14:35:36 -0500 Subject: Re: Is Cisco equpiment de facto for you? To: nanog@nanog.org
There have been awfully too many time when Cisco TAC would just say
since the problem you are trying to troubleshoot is between Cisco and VendorX, we can't help you. You should have bought Cisco for both sides. I had that happen when I was troubleshooting LLDP between 3750s and Avaya phones, TACACS between Cisco and tac_plus daemon, link bundling between juniper EX and Cisco, some obscure switching issues between CAT and Procurves and other examples like that just don't recall them anymore.
Every time I'm reminded that if you have a lot of Cisco on the network, the rest should be cisco too, unless there is a very good technical/financial reason for it, but you should be prepared to be your own help in
cases.
Vendors love to point at the other vendors for solutions. At least in my experience.
My $0.02
Andrey
On Mon, Jan 10, 2011 at 11:52 AM, Greg Whynott <Greg.Whynott@oicr.on.ca>wrote:
I've tried to use other vendors threw out the years for internal L2/L3. Always Cisco for perimeter routing/firewalling.
from my personal experience, each time we took a chance and tried to use another vendor for internal L2 needs, we would be reminded why it was a bad choice down the road, due to hardware reliability, support issues, multiple and ongoing software bugs, architectural design choices. Then for the next few years I'd regret the decision. This is not to say Cisco gear has been without its issues, but they are much fewer and handled better when stuff hits the fan.
the only other vendor at this point in my career I'd fee comfortable deploying for internal enterprise switching, including HPC requirements which is not CIsco branded, would be Force10 or Extreme. it has always been Cisco for edge routing/firewalling, but i wouldn't be opposed to trying Juniper for routing, I know of a few shops who do and they have been pleased thus far. I've little or no experience with many of the other vendors, and I'm sure they have good offerings, but I won't be beta testing their firmwares anymore (one vendor insisted we upgrade our firmware on our core equipment several times in one year…).
Cisco isn't a good choice if you don't have the budget for the smart net contracts. They come at a price. a little 5505 with unrestricted license and contract costs over 2k, a 5540 about 40k-70k depending on
that those options,
with a yearly renewal of about 15k or more…
-g
-- Andrey Khomyakov [khomyakov.andrey@gmail.com]
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On 1/10/2011 3:20 PM, Greg Whynott wrote:
HP probably was the most helpful vendor i've dealt with in relation to solving/providing inter vendor interoperability solutions. they have PDF booklets on many things we would run into during work. for example, setting up STP between Cisco and HP gear, ( http://cdn.procurve.com/training/Manuals/ProCurve-and-Cisco-STP-Interoperabi... ).
Well, technically, the HP reference tells you how to convert your Cisco default PVST over to MST to match the HP preference. The handful of HP switches versus the stacks and stacks of production Cisco requiring conversion to suit them was "intimidating" to say the least :-) Foundry/Brocade on the other hand do PVST (so they say, I haven't given it a thorough lab test). Jeff
just to play devils advocate.. PVST is Cisco propriety. I'd rather see vendors default to an open standard as opposed to something which is closed. the lowest common denominator… in my eyes the document tells you how to make a cisco and hp switch work together, not convert. numbers alone do not denote intelligence, if so cockroaches would rule the world. 8) -g On Jan 10, 2011, at 5:32 PM, Jeff Kell wrote:
On 1/10/2011 3:20 PM, Greg Whynott wrote:
HP probably was the most helpful vendor i've dealt with in relation to solving/providing inter vendor interoperability solutions. they have PDF booklets on many things we would run into during work. for example, setting up STP between Cisco and HP gear, ( http://cdn.procurve.com/training/Manuals/ProCurve-and-Cisco-STP-Interoperabi... ).
Well, technically, the HP reference tells you how to convert your Cisco default PVST over to MST to match the HP preference.
The handful of HP switches versus the stacks and stacks of production Cisco requiring conversion to suit them was "intimidating" to say the least :-)
Foundry/Brocade on the other hand do PVST (so they say, I haven't given it a thorough lab test).
Jeff
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On 1/10/2011 14:32, Jeff Kell wrote:
On 1/10/2011 3:20 PM, Greg Whynott wrote:
HP probably was the most helpful vendor i've dealt with in relation to solving/providing inter vendor interoperability solutions. they have PDF booklets on many things we would run into during work. for example, setting up STP between Cisco and HP gear, ( http://cdn.procurve.com/training/Manuals/ProCurve-and-Cisco-STP-Interoperabi... ).
Well, technically, the HP reference tells you how to convert your Cisco default PVST over to MST to match the HP preference.
The handful of HP switches versus the stacks and stacks of production Cisco requiring conversion to suit them was "intimidating" to say the least :-)
To be fair, one is Cisco proprietary while the other is IEEE 802.1Q. ~Seth
To be fair to Cisco and maybe I'm way off here. But it seems they do come out with a way to do things first which then become a standard that they have to follow. ISL/DOT1Q HSRP/VRRP etherchannel/LACP Just some examples..... I'm not aware of too many other vendors that create their own protocol, in which they then become a standard?
Date: Mon, 10 Jan 2011 14:46:53 -0800 From: sethm@rollernet.us To: nanog@nanog.org Subject: Re: Is Cisco equpiment de facto for you?
On 1/10/2011 14:32, Jeff Kell wrote:
On 1/10/2011 3:20 PM, Greg Whynott wrote:
HP probably was the most helpful vendor i've dealt with in relation to solving/providing inter vendor interoperability solutions. they have PDF booklets on many things we would run into during work. for example, setting up STP between Cisco and HP gear, ( http://cdn.procurve.com/training/Manuals/ProCurve-and-Cisco-STP-Interoperabi... ).
Well, technically, the HP reference tells you how to convert your Cisco default PVST over to MST to match the HP preference.
The handful of HP switches versus the stacks and stacks of production Cisco requiring conversion to suit them was "intimidating" to say the least :-)
To be fair, one is Cisco proprietary while the other is IEEE 802.1Q.
~Seth
On 1/10/2011 14:54, Brandon Kim wrote:
To be fair to Cisco and maybe I'm way off here. But it seems they do come out with a way to do things first which then become a standard that they have to follow.
ISL/DOT1Q HSRP/VRRP etherchannel/LACP
Just some examples..... I'm not aware of too many other vendors that create their own protocol, in which they then become a standard?
All I found (quickly without trying too hard) is that the IEEE version is based on Cisco's MISTP rather than PVST. ~Seth
This is a two-edged sword. Cisco tends to do their own thing, then, try to push their way of doing it onto the standards bodies when the competition starts trying to catch up. Other vendors tend to bring ideas that will require interoperability to the standards bodies and work on getting the standard at least partially defined before spending effort on implementation. There are advantages and drawbacks to both approaches. Owen On Jan 10, 2011, at 2:54 PM, Brandon Kim wrote:
To be fair to Cisco and maybe I'm way off here. But it seems they do come out with a way to do things first which then become a standard that they have to follow.
ISL/DOT1Q HSRP/VRRP etherchannel/LACP
Just some examples..... I'm not aware of too many other vendors that create their own protocol, in which they then become a standard?
Date: Mon, 10 Jan 2011 14:46:53 -0800 From: sethm@rollernet.us To: nanog@nanog.org Subject: Re: Is Cisco equpiment de facto for you?
On 1/10/2011 14:32, Jeff Kell wrote:
On 1/10/2011 3:20 PM, Greg Whynott wrote:
HP probably was the most helpful vendor i've dealt with in relation to solving/providing inter vendor interoperability solutions. they have PDF booklets on many things we would run into during work. for example, setting up STP between Cisco and HP gear, ( http://cdn.procurve.com/training/Manuals/ProCurve-and-Cisco-STP-Interoperabi... ).
Well, technically, the HP reference tells you how to convert your Cisco default PVST over to MST to match the HP preference.
The handful of HP switches versus the stacks and stacks of production Cisco requiring conversion to suit them was "intimidating" to say the least :-)
To be fair, one is Cisco proprietary while the other is IEEE 802.1Q.
~Seth
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-aECSsfd4Wk Watch this video, now, I know that it is essentially advertisement from brocade but the guy from ams-ix says something very interesting - "For us it is important to have a board-level relationship with the vendor, no matter who it is". So in the end this might be a factor in deciding which equipment to buy - whether your company will be able to have a higher-level relationship with your vendor so that you can expect appropriate treatment in case of emergency. With bigger company this would be harder, though I think the position "account manager" is essential this, whereas with smaller companies it is easier to build such a relationship
Thank you for this. I find him very honest and humble. Although he didn't mention Cisco, should I assume that he's probably thinking about Cisco without saying it? For anyone that has watched this, he has mentioned going from dual star topology to an MPLS. Perhaps one can educate me a little on how that is better off-list? It is an intresting topology. Do you guys run MPLS internally as your main topology? I was a little confused on that part....
Date: Tue, 11 Jan 2011 01:17:39 +0000 From: lorddoskias@gmail.com To: nanog@nanog.org Subject: Re: Is Cisco equpiment de facto for you?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-aECSsfd4Wk
Watch this video, now, I know that it is essentially advertisement from brocade but the guy from ams-ix says something very interesting - "For us it is important to have a board-level relationship with the vendor, no matter who it is". So in the end this might be a factor in deciding which equipment to buy - whether your company will be able to have a higher-level relationship with your vendor so that you can expect appropriate treatment in case of emergency. With bigger company this would be harder, though I think the position "account manager" is essential this, whereas with smaller companies it is easier to build such a relationship
On Tue, 11 Jan 2011 01:17:39 GMT, lorddoskias said:
appropriate treatment in case of emergency. With bigger company this would be harder, though I think the position "account manager" is essential this
Heard someplace, but we've been here ourselves: "We were thrilled to hear they were assigning us our very own lead account manager, until we found out the other levels were platinum, gold, silver, and bronze..."
On Jan 10, 2011, at 11:35 AM, Andrey Khomyakov wrote:
There have been awfully too many time when Cisco TAC would just say that since the problem you are trying to troubleshoot is between Cisco and VendorX, we can't help you. You should have bought Cisco for both sides. I had that happen when I was troubleshooting LLDP between 3750s and Avaya phones, TACACS between Cisco and tac_plus daemon, link bundling between juniper EX and Cisco, some obscure switching issues between CAT and Procurves and other examples like that just don't recall them anymore.
This has been my justification in the past for buying Cisco for neither side the next time. I've never had Juniper tell me that until they could show clearly that the misbehaving item was the brand C hardware on the other side. They even went so far as to provide me very detailed analysis of the exact form of misbehavior in the brand C gear and offered to talk to the C-TAC if I could arrange it in order to better communicate the problem. While I'm not sure this is the usual behavior of the J-TAC, I can say that the C-TAC behavior described above is all too common.
Every time I'm reminded that if you have a lot of Cisco on the network, the rest should be cisco too, unless there is a very good technical/financial reason for it, but you should be prepared to be your own help in those cases.
A network-equipment vendor that won't help you resolve interoperability problems with equipment they didn't build (BTW, I've had C-TAC refuse to resolve problems between different business units of C-Gear, too) IS a reason to buy from other vendors, IMHO.
Vendors love to point at the other vendors for solutions. At least in my experience.
Good vendors don't do that. Vendors that do that don't get my business. Vote with your feet and your $$. My $.0.2.
My $0.02
Andrey
Owen
On Mon, 10 Jan 2011 09:31:32 -0600, Brandon Kim <brandon.kim@brandontek.com> wrote:
Hello gents:
I wanted to put this out there for all of you. Our network consists of a mixture of Cisco and Extreme equipment.
Would you say that it's fair to say that if you are serious at all about being a service provider that your core equipment is Cisco based?
Am I limiting myself by thinking that Cisco is the "de facto" vendor of choice? I'm not looking for so much "fanboy" responses, but more of a real world experience of what you guys use that actually work and does the job.....
No technical questions here, just general feedback. I try to follow the Tolly Group who compares products, and they continually show that Cisco equipment is a poor performer in almost any equipment compared to others, I find that so hard to believe.....
Cisco is typically not known as the fastest or most power efficient when compared to other vendors, but they usually have some advanced feature sets that are very nice. In the ISP space this may be less helpful, but in the SMB and Enterprise space this can be very helpful. Things such as Call Manager Express, Web Content Filtering, WebEx Nodes, Server Load Balancing, Wireless Lan Controllers, etc. that are either built into IOS or available with a line card or module, are nice tools to have at your disposal, and often can mean reducing the number of devices you need in your rack. As of the Tolly group, I find whomever pays Tolly for the survey tends to be the fastest. Example: Abstract: HP commissioned Tolly to evaluate the performance, power consumption and TCO of its E5400 zl and E8200 switch series and compare those systems with the Cisco Systems Catalyst 3750-X and Catalyst 4500. This is because the Vendor is getting to pick what they want to benchmark rather than the company benchmarking them. No one is going to choose tests that their product will lose in. There isn't much in the way of "Tom's Hardware Style" testing of enterprise gear to my knowledge. Cisco gear is also known for long life, being very consistent, and high reliability. A walk through colos you will often see many many Cisco 12000's for those exact reasons. I feel each vendor has its strong points, price/performance may not be Cisco's but Cisco's ease of configuration and feature sets, along with reliability are definitely notable. -=Tom
Thanks!
Brandon
-- Using Opera's revolutionary email client: http://www.opera.com/mail/
Wow, overall consensus is that there are quite a few that are migrating to Juniper from Cisco. I am a bit biased because I have spent an awful amount of time invested into Cisco and understanding how to configure them. But being a former business owner, I also am very much sensitive to costs and business needs. For those that have been Cisco focused, do you stay fully objective, and are you willing to pitch another vendor knowing that you will have to learn a new IOS? And that that will be your time that you'll have to spend to understand the product and support it? We have been selling HP procurves to SMB's because of the cost factor. I don't really mind them all that much. I've tried to fit Cisco switches in the mix but their pricing is just so much more as well as the smartnet costs. They really price themselves out and that is unfortunate. I will be looking at refreshing our core switches and routers soon so I will stay objective as much as I can. =)
To: nanog@nanog.org Subject: Re: Is Cisco equpiment de facto for you? Date: Mon, 10 Jan 2011 10:36:24 -0600 CC: brandon.kim@brandontek.com From: tad1214@gmail.com
On Mon, 10 Jan 2011 09:31:32 -0600, Brandon Kim <brandon.kim@brandontek.com> wrote:
Hello gents:
I wanted to put this out there for all of you. Our network consists of a mixture of Cisco and Extreme equipment.
Would you say that it's fair to say that if you are serious at all about being a service provider that your core equipment is Cisco based?
Am I limiting myself by thinking that Cisco is the "de facto" vendor of choice? I'm not looking for so much "fanboy" responses, but more of a real world experience of what you guys use that actually work and does the job.....
No technical questions here, just general feedback. I try to follow the Tolly Group who compares products, and they continually show that Cisco equipment is a poor performer in almost any equipment compared to others, I find that so hard to believe.....
Cisco is typically not known as the fastest or most power efficient when compared to other vendors, but they usually have some advanced feature sets that are very nice. In the ISP space this may be less helpful, but in the SMB and Enterprise space this can be very helpful. Things such as Call Manager Express, Web Content Filtering, WebEx Nodes, Server Load Balancing, Wireless Lan Controllers, etc. that are either built into IOS or available with a line card or module, are nice tools to have at your disposal, and often can mean reducing the number of devices you need in your rack.
As of the Tolly group, I find whomever pays Tolly for the survey tends to be the fastest.
Example: Abstract:
HP commissioned Tolly to evaluate the performance, power consumption and TCO of its E5400 zl and E8200 switch series and compare those systems with the Cisco Systems Catalyst 3750-X and Catalyst 4500.
This is because the Vendor is getting to pick what they want to benchmark rather than the company benchmarking them. No one is going to choose tests that their product will lose in. There isn't much in the way of "Tom's Hardware Style" testing of enterprise gear to my knowledge.
Cisco gear is also known for long life, being very consistent, and high reliability. A walk through colos you will often see many many Cisco 12000's for those exact reasons.
I feel each vendor has its strong points, price/performance may not be Cisco's but Cisco's ease of configuration and feature sets, along with reliability are definitely notable.
-=Tom
Thanks!
Brandon
-- Using Opera's revolutionary email client: http://www.opera.com/mail/
On Mon, 10 Jan 2011, Brandon Kim wrote:
For those that have been Cisco focused, do you stay fully objective, and are you willing to pitch another vendor knowing that you will have to learn a new IOS? And that that will be your time that you'll have to spend to understand the product and support it?
I work at a multivendor shop - we're not afraid to work with other vendors' gear. There's a lot of Cisco here, but there is a lot of non-Cisco here too. Core routing/switching: Cisco Access switches: Cisco Border routers: Juniper Firewalls: Cisco/Fortinet Load balancers: F5 Wireless: Cisco IP Telephony: Avaya SAN: Cisco/Brocade (I think - I don't touch the storage stuff too much :)) VPNs: Juniper/Fortinet/Cisco (depending on VPN type/application) UPSs: Emerson(Liebert) and Eaton(Powerware) jms
the pro curve line is cheap and the standard support contract price can't be beat (life time free). For many ' normal ' deployments it would be a good choice. in a 10Gbit HPC or highly redundant environment I'd probably be looking at Extreme or Force 10. There is a feature on the Cisco 6500 series which is very appealing for those needing highly redundant / quick fail over, VSS. Currently you can only get it on 6500's or better, so the cost of admission is huge, and you have to have the physical space to mount the units. Extreme has a similar feature which is available threw out most of the product line, meaning you don't have to drop 6 figures for a redundant zero time fail over solution and can fit it into as little as 2Us in the rack. I recently set up a pair of Summit 650's using the virtual switch feature. I have multiple 10Gbit clients terminated to the pair. zero time fail over when a link goes down, its nice. This is what I find is the trend with features and Cisco, Cisco sticks with what is known and a bit reluctant to throw a new feature into the mix, where as a compeating vendor sees that as an opertunity. Cisco is slow and steady, where the other vendors tend to be lighter on their feet. sometimes when you are quick on your feet, you trip more often than the one walking slowly. -g On Jan 10, 2011, at 12:04 PM, Brandon Kim wrote:
Wow, overall consensus is that there are quite a few that are migrating to Juniper from Cisco.
I am a bit biased because I have spent an awful amount of time invested into Cisco and understanding how to configure them. But being a former business owner, I also am very much sensitive to costs and business needs.
For those that have been Cisco focused, do you stay fully objective, and are you willing to pitch another vendor knowing that you will have to learn a new IOS? And that that will be your time that you'll have to spend to understand the product and support it?
We have been selling HP procurves to SMB's because of the cost factor. I don't really mind them all that much. I've tried to fit Cisco switches in the mix but their pricing is just so much more as well as the smartnet costs. They really price themselves out and that is unfortunate.
I will be looking at refreshing our core switches and routers soon so I will stay objective as much as I can.
=)
To: nanog@nanog.org Subject: Re: Is Cisco equpiment de facto for you? Date: Mon, 10 Jan 2011 10:36:24 -0600 CC: brandon.kim@brandontek.com From: tad1214@gmail.com
On Mon, 10 Jan 2011 09:31:32 -0600, Brandon Kim <brandon.kim@brandontek.com> wrote:
Hello gents:
I wanted to put this out there for all of you. Our network consists of a mixture of Cisco and Extreme equipment.
Would you say that it's fair to say that if you are serious at all about being a service provider that your core equipment is Cisco based?
Am I limiting myself by thinking that Cisco is the "de facto" vendor of choice? I'm not looking for so much "fanboy" responses, but more of a real world experience of what you guys use that actually work and does the job.....
No technical questions here, just general feedback. I try to follow the Tolly Group who compares products, and they continually show that Cisco equipment is a poor performer in almost any equipment compared to others, I find that so hard to believe.....
Cisco is typically not known as the fastest or most power efficient when compared to other vendors, but they usually have some advanced feature sets that are very nice. In the ISP space this may be less helpful, but in the SMB and Enterprise space this can be very helpful. Things such as Call Manager Express, Web Content Filtering, WebEx Nodes, Server Load Balancing, Wireless Lan Controllers, etc. that are either built into IOS or available with a line card or module, are nice tools to have at your disposal, and often can mean reducing the number of devices you need in your rack.
As of the Tolly group, I find whomever pays Tolly for the survey tends to be the fastest.
Example: Abstract:
HP commissioned Tolly to evaluate the performance, power consumption and TCO of its E5400 zl and E8200 switch series and compare those systems with the Cisco Systems Catalyst 3750-X and Catalyst 4500.
This is because the Vendor is getting to pick what they want to benchmark rather than the company benchmarking them. No one is going to choose tests that their product will lose in. There isn't much in the way of "Tom's Hardware Style" testing of enterprise gear to my knowledge.
Cisco gear is also known for long life, being very consistent, and high reliability. A walk through colos you will often see many many Cisco 12000's for those exact reasons.
I feel each vendor has its strong points, price/performance may not be Cisco's but Cisco's ease of configuration and feature sets, along with reliability are definitely notable.
-=Tom
Thanks!
Brandon
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On 1/10/2011 3:31 PM, Brandon Kim wrote:
Hello gents:
I wanted to put this out there for all of you. Our network consists of a mixture of Cisco and Extreme equipment.
Would you say that it's fair to say that if you are serious at all about being a service provider that your core equipment is Cisco based?
Am I limiting myself by thinking that Cisco is the "de facto" vendor of choice? I'm not looking for so much "fanboy" responses, but more of a real world experience of what you guys use that actually work and does the job.....
No technical questions here, just general feedback. I try to follow the Tolly Group who compares products, and they continually show that Cisco equipment is a poor performer in almost any equipment compared to others, I find that so hard to believe.....
Thanks!
Brandon
Just as a pointer - one of the largest and most utilized IX (AMS-IX) has their platform built on Brocade devices.
Brandon
Just as a pointer - one of the largest and most utilized IX (AMS-IX) has their platform built on Brocade devices.
Brocade device's pre Foundry purchase correct? I can't see anyone that large using Foundry in large deployments.. -g -- This message and any attachments may contain confidential and/or privileged information for the sole use of the intended recipient. Any review or distribution by anyone other than the person for whom it was originally intended is strictly prohibited. If you have received this message in error, please contact the sender and delete all copies. Opinions, conclusions or other information contained in this message may not be that of the organization.
On 1/10/2011 11:03 AM, Greg Whynott wrote:
Brocade device's pre Foundry purchase correct? I can't see anyone that large using Foundry in large deployments..
People (who should know) have told me L3 does for some of their 10GE bonding. If you want high end at low cost, the box does it. Just price 100GE cards at the different vendors. :) Jack
Cisco and my new Love; Juniper.. for Tier I / Peer On Mon, Jan 10, 2011 at 10:43 AM, Jack Bates <jbates@brightok.net> wrote:
On 1/10/2011 11:03 AM, Greg Whynott wrote:
Brocade device's pre Foundry purchase correct? I can't see anyone that large using Foundry in large deployments..
People (who should know) have told me L3 does for some of their 10GE bonding. If you want high end at low cost, the box does it. Just price 100GE cards at the different vendors. :)
Jack
-- -B
In article <xs4all.61EC3786-5732-4C5A-8938-A15E840DC75B@oicr.on.ca> you write:
Just as a pointer - one of the largest and most utilized IX (AMS-IX) has their platform built on Brocade devices.
Brocade device's pre Foundry purchase correct? I can't see anyone that large using Foundry in large deployments..
Well the ams-ix has been using Foundry for years, so it's really the Brocade-formerly-Foundry hardware. http://www.ams-ix.net/infrastructure/ http://www.ams-ix.net/infrastructure-detail/ Mike.
On Mon, 10 Jan 2011, Greg Whynott wrote:
Just as a pointer - one of the largest and most utilized IX (AMS-IX) has their platform built on Brocade devices.
Brocade device's pre Foundry purchase correct? I can't see anyone that large using Foundry in large deployments..
Probably not as large as AMX-IX, but London Internet Exchange (LINX): both as Foundry and Brocade. Jethro. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Jethro R Binks, Network Manager, Information Services Directorate, University Of Strathclyde, Glasgow, UK The University of Strathclyde is a charitable body, registered in Scotland, number SC015263.
For anyone that is following this thread/subject from yesterday, is it me or does it seem as if Cisco really isn't the choice for most SP's? Someone has mentioned that it all really depends on your needs and what it is you want to provide. IMO, every vendor has something they are good at. I wouldn't use Cisco for everything, nor Juniper etc etc... The concern I sense is that from Cisco's POV, it's their way or the highway. Not only do you pay a premium for smartnet, but if there's an issue, they are quick to point the finger. That is not service/support that I desire.... Is this what everyone is sensing as well? I'm starting to look at Brocade now just to do some fair comparisons.....
Date: Tue, 11 Jan 2011 13:56:31 +0000 From: jethro.binks@strath.ac.uk To: nanog@nanog.org Subject: Re: Is Cisco equpiment de facto for you?
On Mon, 10 Jan 2011, Greg Whynott wrote:
Just as a pointer - one of the largest and most utilized IX (AMS-IX) has their platform built on Brocade devices.
Brocade device's pre Foundry purchase correct? I can't see anyone that large using Foundry in large deployments..
Probably not as large as AMX-IX, but London Internet Exchange (LINX): both as Foundry and Brocade.
Jethro.
.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Jethro R Binks, Network Manager, Information Services Directorate, University Of Strathclyde, Glasgow, UK
The University of Strathclyde is a charitable body, registered in Scotland, number SC015263.
On Tue, 11 Jan 2011, Brandon Kim wrote:
Someone has mentioned that it all really depends on your needs and what it is you want to provide.
Agree 100%. Some vendors are better at delivering X than others.
IMO, every vendor has something they are good at. I wouldn't use Cisco for everything, nor Juniper etc etc...
A lot of it comes down to striking an appropriate balance between the points I made in my last message. Using a different vendor for every service you offer would probably not scale too well in terms of manageability, but getting into bed with one vendor can have consequences as well. It's ultimately up to you to decide how you want to proceed since you're the one spending the money :)
The concern I sense is that from Cisco's POV, it's their way or the highway. Not only do you pay a premium for smartnet, but if there's an issue, they are quick to point the finger. That is not service/support that I desire....
Some of that perceived arrogance came from being the big kid on the block. The way Cisco acted in the past when they were pretty much the only game in town reminds me a lot of the way Microsoft and Oracle conduct(ed) their business as well, even today **. I haven't seen much of that from Cisco in a while, but if I have a problem with a TAC case or a TAC engineer, I'll get my account team involved. Over the years, a number of legitimate competitors to Cisco have gained market share, and competition often has the effect of adjusting attitudes and leveling the playing field a bit. jms ** - had an account rep from Cisco in the dot-com days, whose idea of customer interaction was calling to confirm that the purchase order just came off the fax machine :)
On 1/11/2011 8:23 AM, Brandon Kim wrote:
For anyone that is following this thread/subject from yesterday, is it me or does it seem as if Cisco really isn't the choice for most SP's?
Just going on Cisco, Juniper, and Brocade. Cisco (especially ASR) makes the best DSL services aggregation feature set, Juniper a close second. Brocade doesn't have subscriber management functionality. The ASR is the cheapest subscriber management router I've been able to find (outside of 7200) and supports redundant processors. Brocade has the cheapest 10GE/100GE interfaces, does well in many middleman situations. It has limitations on 802.11ad which can be redesigned using p2p vpls if you need granular control at the SP edge. At last check, multi-topology for isis was still on roadmap but not implemented. This may have changed. Not sure. Juniper makes for excellent core routing, BGP and business customer edge. The functionality a Juniper does support is very robust. With the new MX line's trio chipset, they are continuing to push more edge/subscriber management features to the edge, all hardware supported. An additional point is always added to Cisco for supporting the used market. This drastically lowers purchase cost at a slightly higher support cost. Even an ASR, which is hard to find used, can keep it's cost low by adding used SPA interfaces. This generally means I look at Cisco for the subscriber management aggregation router, Juniper for the core, and Brocade for mpls switching in metro scenarios where the cost of Juniper at each of the metro pops makes for a very scary bill.
The concern I sense is that from Cisco's POV, it's their way or the highway. Not only do you pay a premium for smartnet, but if there's an issue, they are quick to point the finger. That is not service/support that I desire....
Premium for smartnet is offset by the fact that you can get smartnet on used gear at a fraction of the cost. Even if your used portion is only the linecards (which new often cost more than the chassis/switching fabric/dual routing engines), it's a huge cost savings for large deployments in broadband aggregation w/ subscriber management. To be honest, I use smartnet to upgrade the OS. I quit calling TAC after they failed to understand, much less help me with my eigrp over frame relay with automatic ISDN backup on route failure and re-establishment of eigrp over the ISDN. :)
Is this what everyone is sensing as well? I'm starting to look at Brocade now just to do some fair comparisons.....
Nothing wrong with brocade unless you want high end 802.1ad, multi-topology (may be fixed, or will soon) isis, subscriber management. There is no fair comparisons, though. Each box has it's strengths and weaknesses. Jack (currently using C/J, Brocade is spec'd if management will ever sign off on replacing those darn C5500s which are 10 years overdue to upgrade)
On 1/11/11 6:49 AM, Jack Bates wrote:
To be honest, I use smartnet to upgrade the OS. I quit calling TAC after they failed to understand, much less help me with my eigrp over frame relay with automatic ISDN backup on route failure and re-establishment of eigrp over the ISDN. :)
The cisco-nsp mailing list is often much more helpful than TAC. ~Seth
Brocade device's pre Foundry purchase correct? I can't see anyone that large using Foundry in large deployments..
Foundry/Brocade is used heavily in portions of DoD's research and engineering community. It is usually preferred where you need high 10Gig port density, IPv6, and/or sflow. But Juniper and Cisco are used heavily as well, depending on local requirements and culture. --Ron
All the places I've worked in the past decade have been all Cisco shops for routing and switching, with a lot of Cisco use for security too (firewalls and IDS). Same with my current position, but we're switching to Juniper for all those product categories. Same or better performance, but 10-20% less cost. Additionally, I find the Juniper command line has more features that make operating and monitoring much more efficient. Also, JunOS has only one development train which means that the commands I use work on every single Juniper platform. It always bugs me when I’m trying to setup QOS across a network with different Cisco platforms (CatOS, ASA, different versions of IOS) and each platform has a completely different way of doing it. F5 all the way for content management. TippingPoint for IPS. On Mon, Jan 10, 2011 at 10:31 AM, Brandon Kim <brandon.kim@brandontek.com>wrote:
Hello gents:
I wanted to put this out there for all of you. Our network consists of a mixture of Cisco and Extreme equipment.
Would you say that it's fair to say that if you are serious at all about being a service provider that your core equipment is Cisco based?
Am I limiting myself by thinking that Cisco is the "de facto" vendor of choice? I'm not looking for so much "fanboy" responses, but more of a real world experience of what you guys use that actually work and does the job.....
No technical questions here, just general feedback. I try to follow the Tolly Group who compares products, and they continually show that Cisco equipment is a poor performer in almost any equipment compared to others, I find that so hard to believe.....
Thanks!
Brandon
-- James Smith
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 pfsense in redundant pair for routing/security/vlan termination cisco all the way for l2 switching On 01/10/2011 09:38 AM, James Smith wrote:
All the places I've worked in the past decade have been all Cisco shops for routing and switching, with a lot of Cisco use for security too (firewalls and IDS). Same with my current position, but we're switching to Juniper for all those product categories. Same or better performance, but 10-20% less cost. Additionally, I find the Juniper command line has more features that make operating and monitoring much more efficient. Also, JunOS has only one development train which means that the commands I use work on every single Juniper platform. It always bugs me when I’m trying to setup QOS across a network with different Cisco platforms (CatOS, ASA, different versions of IOS) and each platform has a completely different way of doing it.
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participants (24)
-
Andrey Khomyakov -
b nickell -
Brandon Kim -
Charles N Wyble -
Chris Adams -
Craig V -
George Bonser -
Greg Whynott -
Jack Bates -
James Smith -
Jared Mauch -
Jeff Kell -
Jethro R Binks -
Justin M. Streiner -
lorddoskias -
Miquel van Smoorenburg -
Owen DeLong -
Paul Stewart -
Randy Carpenter -
Ron Broersma -
Saxon Jones -
Seth Mattinen -
Thomas Donnelly -
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