Re: Is Cisco equpiment de facto for you?

[Jack Bates <jbates () brightok net>]

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)