...

Over time, however, this advantage disappeared. IP best-match lookup chips were developed that could do a proper IP lookup at full line rate for OC-48 and even OC-192.

Though I appreciate your point Dave,.....

Throw enough silicon at any single problem and you can solve it. The question is what can you do with the silicon you have at your disposal for a given thermal/power/cost foot print. ...

Don't misunderstand me. I am _NOT_ one of those people opposed to MPLS! I happen to be a developer working on MPLS software, and I think it is some very good technology. I was only referring to Craig's statement regarding some people's assertion that label/VC forwarding is faster than IP forwarding. I agree with him that this assertion is not true today, although it was true in the not-too-recent past. Other uses of MPLS (including traffic engineering, various kinds of VPN technologies, policies, etc.) are still very important, useful, and desirable features. -- David