Re: MPLS/MEF Switches and NIDs

[Thomas Scott <mr.thomas.scott () gmail com>]

Second vote for the Nokia 7200 line, their price points are hard to beat.
The 7250 was originally designed (per the Nokia reps I've talked to) to be
a data center switch, but I've seen more than one MSO deploy them in the
field to great effect. They also make fantastic satellite boxes for their
7750 chassis. The 7210 is definitely older, but is a fantastic little MPLS
PE router.

SRoS is also easy to pickup, considering it was written by ex-Juniper and
Cisco employees (TiMetra/TiMos if I recall correctly?)

- Thomas Scott | mr.thomas.scott () gmail com


On Thu, May 27, 2021 at 7:10 AM Brandon Martin <lists.nanog () monmotha net>
wrote:

> On 5/26/21 12:39 PM, Colton Conor wrote:
> > Ciena seems to have multiple options available with Segment Routing,
> > MPLS, and streaming telemetry support. I am probably most interested
> > in what Ciena has to offer. Has anyone deployed the 3000 or 5000
> > product line of Ciena? How does it compare to Juniper? The Ciena 3924
> > is sub $1000 for example, and has 4 10G ports on it.
>
> I've used the Ciena 3000 series switches as NIDs a fair bit and have no
> real complaints about them aside from TAC being a bit loathe to give out
> new versions of SAOS even when the version you've got deployed is going
> EOL.  I've not used the MPLS functionality mostly because it's a pricey
> software license add-on and I can get by without, but the MEF and
> associated carrier-oriented Ethernet functionality seems to be pretty
> much top notch in terms of feature set, stability, and configurability.
> I mostly use the 3928 though partially because the 3924 is new enough it
> didn't make it into my standard build-out BOM.  The 3928 does also have
> redundant PSU (fixed, but there are two) if that matters to you.  At
> sub-$1000, the 3924 is a good deal in comparison if it'll do what you need.
>
> If you've never used them, you might find the config language a bit
> annoying in that it's more Yoda syntax than Cisco, but it's also more
> consistent than Cisco (what isn't?), so it's got that going for it.
> Documentation is alright.  TAC is responsive to inquiries.
>
> --
> Brandon Martin