Re: Cogent input

[seph <seph () directionless org>]

Here as well. We're a small content provider, and we have cogent as one
of our ISPs. Though I wouldn't feel comfortable using only them, my
experience has been pretty good. Their NOC is competent, and service has
been reliable.

seph

Bret Clark <bclark () spectraaccess com> writes:

> I hate when these questions get asked, because as the saying goes..."a
> person happy with a service will only tell one other person, but a
> person unhappy with a service with tell ten other people".  So I think a
> lot of times you'll get skewed responses...but with that said, we've
> been using Cogent now for a year and no complaints at all. Had some
> minor downtime back in April due to a hardware failure, but Cogent
> responded extremely quickly, scheduled an emergency maintainance and had
> us  running rather quickly. Face it, hardware problems happen so I can't
> blame Cogent on the failure. The few times I've dealt with their tech
> support group I found 99% of them very knowledgeable and I know that
> when we initially turned on the link they went the extra mile to resolve
> some initial problems during the weekend time frame. 
>
> My 2 cents and with any provider mileage will vary,
> Bret
>
>
>
> On Thu, 2009-06-11 at 15:01 +0100, Andrew Mulholland wrote:
>
> > At $JOB-1 we used Cogent.
> >
> > Lots of horror stories had been heard about them.
> >
> > We didn't have such problems.
> >
> > Had nx1Gig from them.
> >
> > On the few occasions where we had some slight issues, I was happy to
> > be able to get through to some one useful on the phone quickly, and
> > not play pass the parcel with call centre operatives.
> >
> >
> > and at least in the quantities we were buying they were significantly
> > better value than others, which was the primary reason we went with
> > them.
> >
> >
> >
> > andrew
> >
> >
> >
> > On Thu, Jun 11, 2009 at 2:55 PM, Paul Stewart<pstewart () nexicomgroup net> wrote:
> > > Our experience with them was at least one major (longer than an hour)
> > > outages PER MONTH and many of those times they were black holing our
> > > routes in their network which was the most damaging aspect.  The outages
> > > were one thing but when our routes still somehow managed to get
> > > advertised in their network (even though our BGP session was down) that
> > > really created issues.  I have heard from some nearby folks who still
> > > have service that it's gotten better, but we are also in the "regional
> > > offering" when it comes to IP Transit and have sold connections to many
> > > former Cogent customers who were fed up and left.
> > >
> > > I have found with Cogent that you will get a LOT of varying opinions on
> > > them - there are several other players (at least in our market) that are
> > > priced very similar now and have a better history behind them.....
> > >
> > > The specific de-peering issues never effected us much due to enough
> > > diversity in our upstreams and a fair amount of direct/public peering...
> > >
> > > Thanks,
> > >
> > > Paul
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > -----Original Message-----
> > > From: Justin Shore [mailto:justin () justinshore com]
> > > Sent: Thursday, June 11, 2009 9:47 AM
> > > To: NANOG
> > > Subject: Cogent input
> > >
> > > I'm in search of some information about Cogent, it's past, present and
> > > future.  I've heard bits and pieces about Cogent's past over the years
> > > but by no means have I actively been keeping up.
> > >
> > > I'm aware of some (regular?) depeering issues.  The NANOG archives have
> > > given me some additional insight into that (recurring?) problem.  The
> > > reasoning behind the depeering events is a bit fuzzy though.  I would be
> > >
> > > interested in people's opinion on whether or not they should be consider
> > >
> > > for upstream service based on this particular issue.  Are there any
> > > reasonable mitigation measures available to Cogent downstreams if
> > > (when?) Cogent were to be depeered again?  My understanding is that at
> > > least on previous depeering occasion, the depeering partner simply
> > > null-routed all prefixes being received via Cogent, creating a blackhole
> > >
> > > essentially.  I also recall reading that this meant that prefixes being
> > > advertised and received by the depeering partner from other peers would
> > > still end up in the blackhole.  The only solution I would see to this
> > > problem would be to shut down the BGP session with Cogent and rely on a
> > > 2nd upstream.  Are there any other possible steps for mitigation in a
> > > depeering event?
> > >
> > > I also know that their bandwidth is extremely cheap.  This of course
> > > creates an issue for technical folks when trying to justify other
> > > upstream options that cost significantly more but also don't have a
> > > damaging history of getting depeered.
> > >
> > > Does Cogent still have an issue with depeering?  Are there any
> > > reasonable mitigation measures or should a downstream customer do any
> > > thing in particular to ready themselves for a depeering event?  Does
> > > their low cost outweigh the risks?  What are the specific risks?
> > >
> > > Thanks
> > >  Justin
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
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