Rob M VanHooren writes:
Hi, just a quickie (respond via e-mail, I'll summarize to the list)...
Need to build a core NSP backbone.
Who's equipment do I want:
Like this is a question?
You don't want Bay and you certainly don't want 3Com. If your network is fairly slow (ethernets and T1s only) you can use PCs running a reasonable BSD and GateD. Otherwise, the only commercial choice is Cisco.
Just out of curiosity ... Why not considering the 4th vendor, Cabletron, for this kind of equipment, before using PCs. They just released some announcement that major companies and campuses are using their equipment for new backbones. Just asking though :-) Arnaud. -- Arnaud C. Girsch -+- The OASys Group, Inc. agirsch@OASysGroup.com -+- Tel: 408-872-0203 Fax: 408-872-0210 - Saratoga, CA
Arnaud Girsch writes:
You don't want Bay and you certainly don't want 3Com. If your network is fairly slow (ethernets and T1s only) you can use PCs running a reasonable BSD and GateD. Otherwise, the only commercial choice is Cisco.
Just out of curiosity ... Why not considering the 4th vendor, Cabletron, for this kind of equipment, before using PCs.
PCs are cheap and I know them well. I wasn't aware Cabletron even had a box with a BGP-4 implementation in it.
They just released some announcement that major companies and campuses are using their equipment for new backbones.
That sounds like salesspeak. I've used lots of cabletron hubs and such over the years, but they never seemed to have real routers. Perry
On Thu, 7 May 1998, Perry E. Metzger wrote:
Arnaud Girsch writes:
You don't want Bay and you certainly don't want 3Com. If your network is fairly slow (ethernets and T1s only) you can use PCs running a reasonable BSD and GateD. Otherwise, the only commercial choice is Cisco.
Just out of curiosity ... Why not considering the 4th vendor, Cabletron, for this kind of equipment, before using PCs.
PCs are cheap and I know them well. I wasn't aware Cabletron even had a box with a BGP-4 implementation in it.
PCs are also designed with a mindset that saving $.10 on a component saves millions, encouraging overly cheap designs. Considering the typical PC customer has no problem with rebooting their machine several times a day, that gives them plenty of room to cut corners without pissing off their primary client base. This is not to say that you can't build solid hardware, but the typical PC vendors simply do not have a level of quality sufficient for 24x7 operation. "Cheap" often winds up "expensive" when you count the cost of downtime. We run all Cisco routers and have had exactly one failure on any box in 4 years (a power supply in a 4500). While the software quality has gotten worse lately and you have to be careful selecting which code to run, the software has generally been as stable as the hardware.
They just released some announcement that major companies and campuses are using their equipment for new backbones.
That sounds like salesspeak. I've used lots of cabletron hubs and such over the years, but they never seemed to have real routers.
As far as I know, Cabletron's router blades for their switches are just Cisco 4500's with one of the NPM slots tied to the backplane. I assume you could run BGP on it, although performance might not be good enough. John Tamplin Traveller Information Services jat@Traveller.COM 2104 West Ferry Way 205/883-4233x7007 Huntsville, AL 35801
On Thu, May 07, 1998 at 05:03:28PM -0500, John A. Tamplin wrote:
Why not considering the 4th vendor, Cabletron, for this kind of equipment, before using PCs.
PCs are cheap and I know them well. I wasn't aware Cabletron even had a box with a BGP-4 implementation in it.
PCs are also designed with a mindset that saving $.10 on a component saves millions, encouraging overly cheap designs. Considering the typical PC customer has no problem with rebooting their machine several times a day, that gives them plenty of room to cut corners without pissing off their primary client base. This is not to say that you can't build solid hardware, but the typical PC vendors simply do not have a level of quality sufficient for 24x7 operation.
I'll speak to that. He didn't say precisely what I think he meant, so I'll say it: it's not all that hard to build PC-class equipment for mission critical standards. A vast majority of the voice mail/automated attendant systems out there nowadays are "PC" gear... which does _not_ mean J. Random Compaq... IMS, WTI and half a dozen other vendors sell gear that ought to be perfectly rugged enough for this, and remember: if the gear costs a tenth what it's commercial competition costs, your redundancy is a hot spare in the next rack, and move a couple cables.
"Cheap" often winds up "expensive" when you count the cost of downtime. We run all Cisco routers and have had exactly one failure on any box in 4 years (a power supply in a 4500). While the software quality has gotten worse lately and you have to be careful selecting which code to run, the software has generally been as stable as the hardware.
Can you get the source from Cisco? ;-)
As far as I know, Cabletron's router blades for their switches are just Cisco 4500's with one of the NPM slots tied to the backplane. I assume you could run BGP on it, although performance might not be good enough.
There was a buyout?
John Tamplin Traveller Information Services
Damn, sorry; didn't even look. If you take anything I said too harshly, change your mind. :-) Cheers, -- jra -- Jay R. Ashworth jra@baylink.com Member of the Technical Staff Unsolicited Commercial Emailers Sued The Suncoast Freenet "Two words: Darth Doogie." -- Jason Colby, Tampa Bay, Florida on alt.fan.heinlein +1 813 790 7592 Managing Editor, Top Of The Key sports e-zine ------------ http://www.totk.com
"John A. Tamplin" writes:
On Thu, 7 May 1998, Perry E. Metzger wrote:
PCs are cheap and I know them well. I wasn't aware Cabletron even had a box with a BGP-4 implementation in it.
PCs are also designed with a mindset that saving $.10 on a component saves millions, encouraging overly cheap designs. Considering the typical PC customer has no problem with rebooting their machine several times a day, that gives them plenty of room to cut corners without pissing off their primary client base.
That is an excellent theory. The problem is, once I get PCs running BSD up, they typically remain up for hundreds of days, generally until I have to reboot them -- crashes are extremely rare. They give me no more hardware trouble than Ciscos. It might just be that I'm buying better PCs than some, but I'm perfectly happy with the results.
This is not to say that you can't build solid hardware, but the typical PC vendors simply do not have a level of quality sufficient for 24x7 operation.
If you have a decent fully redundant network, the failure of any single component isn't going to knock you out of the water no matter what you do. If you are depending on your hardware never crashing to keep you afloat, I have bad news for you: all hardware can die, no matter what the label says. None the less, as I said...
"Cheap" often winds up "expensive" when you count the cost of downtime.
...as I said, I have experienced no greater downtime on modern PCs than I have with any other sort of equipment, provided the machines are running a real operating system and have passed burn-in successfully.
We run all Cisco routers and have had exactly one failure on any box in 4 years (a power supply in a 4500).
I'm happy for you. I've got LOTS of PCs deployed in the field running NetBSD, and the things don't die on me. I've had exactly one failure in the last several years myself, and it was a disk crash. Luckily, the machine had a mirrored drive and a quick swap put it back in commission. In short, unless you have numbers to indicate otherwise, I can't say that PCs cost you much, in the short term or the long term. What Cisco's will buy you is better handling of T3s, SONET, etc., and the ability to handle much higher performance lines. They also have much better remote management facilities, in so far as the things have real serial consoles and such, which PCs don't. Perry
On Thu, May 07, 1998 at 09:30:34PM -0400, Perry E. Metzger wrote:
"John A. Tamplin" writes:
On Thu, 7 May 1998, Perry E. Metzger wrote:
PCs are cheap and I know them well. I wasn't aware Cabletron even had a box with a BGP-4 implementation in it.
PCs are also designed with a mindset that saving $.10 on a component saves millions, encouraging overly cheap designs. Considering the typical PC customer has no problem with rebooting their machine several times a day, that gives them plenty of room to cut corners without pissing off their primary client base.
That is an excellent theory. The problem is, once I get PCs running BSD up, they typically remain up for hundreds of days, generally until I have to reboot them -- crashes are extremely rare. They give me no more hardware trouble than Ciscos. It might just be that I'm buying better PCs than some, but I'm perfectly happy with the results.
The largest single source of failures in PCs is a failure in the power supply fan. In most PCs, that will cook the remainder of the box in short order. The fix, of course, is to have more than one fan in the box (duh!), and to buy power supplies that cost an extra $10 so they have higher-quality fans in them. -- -- Karl Denninger (karl@MCS.Net)| MCSNet - Serving Chicagoland and Wisconsin http://www.mcs.net/ | T1's from $600 monthly / All Lines K56Flex/DOV | NEW! Corporate ISDN Prices dropped by up to 50%! Voice: [+1 312 803-MCS1 x219]| EXCLUSIVE NEW FEATURE ON ALL PERSONAL ACCOUNTS Fax: [+1 312 803-4929] | *SPAMBLOCK* Technology now included at no cost
Karl Denninger writes:
That is an excellent theory. The problem is, once I get PCs running BSD up, they typically remain up for hundreds of days, generally until I have to reboot them -- crashes are extremely rare. They give me no more hardware trouble than Ciscos. It might just be that I'm buying better PCs than some, but I'm perfectly happy with the results.
The largest single source of failures in PCs is a failure in the power supply fan.
In most PCs, that will cook the remainder of the box in short order.
The fix, of course, is to have more than one fan in the box (duh!), and to buy power supplies that cost an extra $10 so they have higher-quality fans in them.
In general, I don't buy branded PCs. I tend to go to places where I get to spec the motherboard, drives, power supply, case, etc. There are a bunch of vendors that will let you work this way. Typically you end up having to form a relationship with a particular guy at your vendor who you know will get you what you want. Paul Vixie turned me on to Billy Bath (who now works at Tesys) but there are lots of others. I've done some work with a place in NYC operated by an immigrant family, where I literally walk in and point and the parts in the glass cases of their tiny and crowded shop. "I want THAT motherboard, THAT case, THAT powersupply... I'll need two machines, by tomorrow afternoon." Typically these places/guys are very cheap, but since I'm spec'ing every last bit of the thing I get pretty good control, since I end up knowing every detail of what I'm in for in advance. I don't believe in buying no-name stuff where I don't know what's in it, but its so easy to spec the whole thing these days that you *do* end up knowing what's in it. Perry
On Thu, May 07, 1998 at 10:39:00PM -0400, Perry E. Metzger wrote:
In general, I don't buy branded PCs. I tend to go to places where I get to spec the motherboard, drives, power supply, case, etc. There are a bunch of vendors that will let you work this way. Typically you end up having to form a relationship with a particular guy at your vendor who you know will get you what you want. Paul Vixie turned me on to Billy Bath (who now works at Tesys) but there are lots of others. I've done some work with a place in NYC operated by an immigrant family, where I literally walk in and point and the parts in the glass cases of their tiny and crowded shop. "I want THAT motherboard, THAT case, THAT powersupply... I'll need two machines, by tomorrow afternoon."
Typically these places/guys are very cheap, but since I'm spec'ing every last bit of the thing I get pretty good control, since I end up knowing every detail of what I'm in for in advance. I don't believe in buying no-name stuff where I don't know what's in it, but its so easy to spec the whole thing these days that you *do* end up knowing what's in it.
Perry
I've been working with a place called CompuElectronics in Lincolnwood now for something like three years. The folks there aren't the cheapest, but you don't get crap from them, and they build to order. -- -- Karl Denninger (karl@MCS.Net)| MCSNet - Serving Chicagoland and Wisconsin http://www.mcs.net/ | T1's from $600 monthly / All Lines K56Flex/DOV | NEW! Corporate ISDN Prices dropped by up to 50%! Voice: [+1 312 803-MCS1 x219]| EXCLUSIVE NEW FEATURE ON ALL PERSONAL ACCOUNTS Fax: [+1 312 803-4929] | *SPAMBLOCK* Technology now included at no cost
PCs are also designed with a mindset that saving $.10 on a component saves millions, encouraging overly cheap designs. Considering the typical PC customer has no problem with rebooting their machine several times a day, that gives them plenty of room to cut corners without pissing off their primary client base. This is not to say that you can't build solid hardware, but the typical PC vendors simply do not have a level of quality sufficient for 24x7 operation.
I doubt that anyone was suggesting building your backbone out of closeout specials from CompUSA. If you're reasonably careful in choosing and assembling your PC hardware, particularly in your choise of power supply and cooling, and run one of the mature BSDs on them, it's not hard to get 24x7 reliability. I have a bunch of BSDI boxes here doing everything from routing to DNS to web CGIs to X animations (often all on the same PC) and the number of crashes is down below one per year. If I rack mounted them and put them in a climate controlled environment rather than my spare bedroom, they'd do even better. As someone else noted, for what they cost you can get two of everything for hot sparing. There are vendors that specialize in BSD PCs who can put together systems like this for you. Even on cheapo PC hardware, the vast majority of the crashes using system software from suburban Seattle are due to software bugs, not hardware problems. My former main server which was rock solid under BSDI crashes daily with Windows 98. -- John R. Levine, IECC, POB 727, Trumansburg NY 14886 +1 607 387 6869 johnl@iecc.com, Village Trustee and Sewer Commissioner, http://iecc.com/johnl, Member, Provisional board, Coalition Against Unsolicited Commercial E-mail
At 05:47 PM 5/7/98 -0400, Perry E. Metzger wrote:
Arnaud Girsch writes:
You don't want Bay and you certainly don't want 3Com. If your network is fairly slow (ethernets and T1s only) you can use PCs running a reasonable BSD and GateD. Otherwise, the only commercial choice is Cisco.
Just out of curiosity ... Why not considering the 4th vendor, Cabletron, for this kind of equipment, before using PCs.
PCs are cheap and I know them well. I wasn't aware Cabletron even had a box with a BGP-4 implementation in it.
They just released some announcement that major companies and campuses are using their equipment for new backbones.
That sounds like salesspeak. I've used lots of cabletron hubs and such over the years, but they never seemed to have real routers.
Perry
Given that Cisco built their routers for them, and then they pissed off Cisco to the point where they didn't renew there code license for IOS in there hubs because of their anti Cisco marketing campaign. Cabletron has a bad rap with consultants. Don't ever try to partner with them and walk them in someplace. They are the borg, you will be assimilated. Now that I ragged on em, they do have solid stuff. I have one client who has had their MMAC hubs up and running for about 8 years with narry a hiccup. And these are in rotten basements. If you can get past their attitude.... Eric ============================================================================ ==== Eric Germann Computer and Communications Technologies ekgermann@cctec.com Van Wert, OH 45891 Phone: 419 968 2640 http://www.cctec.com Fax: 419 968 2641 Network Design, Connectivity & System Integration Services A Microsoft Solution Provider
Vendors are only good as their reps. Our CableTron rep. is excellent in technical evaluation, and esp. in follow through. Yes, we use CISCO on our edge routers, but our rep. has just been replaced due to his lack of follow through. :-) neil On Thu, 7 May 1998, Eric Germann wrote:
At 05:47 PM 5/7/98 -0400, Perry E. Metzger wrote:
Arnaud Girsch writes:
You don't want Bay and you certainly don't want 3Com. If your network is fairly slow (ethernets and T1s only) you can use PCs running a reasonable BSD and GateD. Otherwise, the only commercial choice is Cisco.
Just out of curiosity ... Why not considering the 4th vendor, Cabletron, for this kind of equipment, before using PCs.
PCs are cheap and I know them well. I wasn't aware Cabletron even had a box with a BGP-4 implementation in it.
They just released some announcement that major companies and campuses are using their equipment for new backbones.
That sounds like salesspeak. I've used lots of cabletron hubs and such over the years, but they never seemed to have real routers.
Perry
Given that Cisco built their routers for them, and then they pissed off Cisco to the point where they didn't renew there code license for IOS in there hubs because of their anti Cisco marketing campaign.
Cabletron has a bad rap with consultants. Don't ever try to partner with them and walk them in someplace. They are the borg, you will be assimilated.
Now that I ragged on em, they do have solid stuff. I have one client who has had their MMAC hubs up and running for about 8 years with narry a hiccup. And these are in rotten basements.
If you can get past their attitude....
Eric
============================================================================ ==== Eric Germann Computer and Communications Technologies ekgermann@cctec.com Van Wert, OH 45891 Phone: 419 968 2640 http://www.cctec.com Fax: 419 968 2641
Network Design, Connectivity & System Integration Services A Microsoft Solution Provider
At 05:47 PM 5/7/98 -0400, Perry E. Metzger wrote:
Arnaud Girsch writes:
Why not considering the 4th vendor, Cabletron, for this kind of equipment, before using PCs.
PCs are cheap and I know them well. I wasn't aware Cabletron even had a box with a BGP-4 implementation in it.
they just bought Yago, who were developing an ASIC based "big honking router". it's just hit beta. if i were staying at INet Solutions (today is my last day at the old shop) i'd have an evalution/beta unit in here right now. they're still working on the various and sundry port cards; the original version didn't have a lot of the WAN cards it needed to be a really useful backbone piece.
That sounds like salesspeak. I've used lots of cabletron hubs and such over the years, but they never seemed to have real routers.
but the smartswitch 2200 runs RIPv1... and according to cabletron's press release, it does "level 4 switching"... cheers, richard -- Richard Welty rwelty@neworks.net http://www.neworks.net
participants (9)
-
agirsch＠OASysGroup.com -
Eric Germann -
Jay R. Ashworth -
John A. Tamplin -
johnl＠iecc.com -
Karl Denninger -
Neil Villacorta -
Perry E. Metzger -
Richard Welty