Chose Cisco 1000 Series Aggregation Services Routers (ASR 1000)
Cisco ASR 1000 is a competent device, it is built for multi purposes, you can use it in private cloud solutions, WAN router in your company and branches. The capability to support multiple OPEN standard routing protocols allow it to establish neighborship with customer, partner …
Verified User
Engineer
Chose Cisco 1000 Series Aggregation Services Routers (ASR 1000)
We needed tried and true device to support both internet edge and OTV functionality. While the ASR1K line is reaching end-of-life, the Catalyst 8500-series platform was brand new so we were not ready to invest in that platform; however, in hindsight, given Cisco has EoL'd the …
Chose Cisco 1000 Series Aggregation Services Routers (ASR 1000)
For cloud network all these products complement each other to ensure HA reliability, optimized path, workload mobility, multi services, multi hypervisor support to service our workloads.
We chose the Nexus series over the Catalyst series based on performance and the future roadmap of the Catalyst series. Our vendor told us that the Catalyst system was going to begin focusing on campus networks; meanwhile, the Nexus was the future of the data center. Couple that …
Cisco 1000 Series Aggregation Services Routers (ASR 1000)
Cisco Nexus Series Switches
Likelihood to Recommend
Cisco
- It is well suited for companies that have a big WAN environment, this devices can fit in there easily and have multiple provider circuits. - Well suited for private cloud environments where multi tenancy is required, - Device can be used as IPN/ISN device as it supports jumbo frames for an ACI multi-site/remote leaf deployment. - Device is well suited for branches that have their own DIA and MPLS circuits.
It fits perfectly in all our data centers where we are using it. For small companies or smaller racks or something. I don't think it fits there because Cisco Nexus Series Switches is a big one. It's the most advanced one.
Maintenance, upgrades, and software certification can be performed without service interruptions because of the modular nature of NX-OS and features such as In-Service Software Upgrade (ISSU) and the capability for processes to restart dynamically
FabricPath:
Enables each device to build an overall view of the topology; this is similar to other link state routing protocols. Each device in the FabricPath topology is identified by a switch-id. The Layer 2 forwarding tables are built based on reachability to each switch-id, not by the MAC address. Eliminates spanning-tree to maximize network bandwidth and flexibility in topological configurations, as well as simplify operational support and configuration. This enables a tremendous amount of flexibility on the topology because you can now build FabricPath topologies for Layer 2-based networks the same as for Layer 3-based networks
Overlay Transport Virtualization (OTV): Enables the Layer 2 extension between distributed data centers over any transport Layer 3 network
The ASR 1000 series routers can, as with most devices, improve with additional memory capacity and upgraded chip sets for faster processing.
There seems to be limitations on the number of routing sessions the smaller ASR devices can handle, which can be overcome with proper planning and placement within the network.
Implementing jumbo frames on interfaces of its fabric extender series (N2k, etc.) by editing the network QoS does not have to be a global configuration that would affect all its interfaces. It can be improved to become just an interface configuration.
Licensing on the NXOS is a bit complicated and expensive. I understand that the Nexus is made for core data center switching but it does not have to break the bank.
OTV technology is for Nexus only. Based on the advantage of the technology, it should be made vendor-neutral to accommodate other vendor devices.
The device without a doubts performs at the level required and expected, we can renew it and use it as we have been using it for years. The device can be used as DCI, IPN/ISN, or even private cloud for customer circuit handoff, it also supports IPSec properly. The device is well suited in multiple segments of the network.
Actually if we need to implement or develop our actual DC we will use Cisco Nexus Series Switches again. The solution is well known and we will be able to interconnect easily the switches, as we're not using all the possibilities of features we know what is solution is a long term solution.
All our modular contingency service exercises use this equipment, it allows us to perform this type of exercises very easily, in a controlled and effective way. It is used at least once a month for these types of events. It also allows configuration replication in computers that are under the same model.
The platform has a good performance. The major issue is all the bugs you can discover across the operations, and it can be a big challenge depending on the number of Cisco Nexus Series Switches you have deployed. In our case, we own more than 200 Cisco Nexus Series Switches 9k, and we face an upgrade process, it could be a long time project to grant a new software deployment in all our switches platform.
These switches are very fast. They've been designed to work within the data center. We connect them to Cisco UCS-B Mini servers with the storage being directly attached. They are able to handle the data traffic pretty easily. We can also move servers pretty fast from data center to data center without overloading them. This has allowed our company to stay running during any kind of conditional outage. We have come to really rely on them for business continuity.
We have received training on the equipment, which has made us add more networks on our own, we provide first level support, we validate the publication of the equipment and we can satisfy the needs of our internal clients in terms of the prompt recovery of the affected services
Overall, Cisco has great products and I believe that they believe in the philosophy of a great customer experience. Although there have been a few technical support issues that caused a lot of company anxiety, in most cases, Cisco has gone above and beyond in making a valiant effort to help the customer solve any issues.
Before standardizing on the Cisco ASR 1000 we had explored the idea of using Juniper routers. Ultimately we felt the Cisco ASR 1000 was a better fit at the time. We have been very happy with this decision, but it might not be the right decision for everyone. It fit our environment and our needs very well, Juniper is also a very good choice.
The Cisco 9000 stacks up quite well against the Cisco Catalyst 3850 switches. The additional features available in the Nexus 9000, such as VPN, FCoE, 40 gigabits, give us the ability to support the future needs of the company in our data center. The Nexus 9000 allowed us to condense our core and aggregation environment that comprised of 2 Catalyst 6504 and 2 Catalyst 6509 to a port of Nexus 9000. Although the Catalyst 3850 would be sufficient to handle routing, those features in the Nexus 9000 made it the clear choice for us.
The Nexus 3000 series switches are data center switches, so I would say they have similar security ability to other switches in this segment. I don't have a lot of experience doing more than basic ACL security on switches, but I know these can be integrated into other security solutions like Cisco ISE and 802.1x authentication. It could also be integrated into an ACI solution to add micro segmentation, which would bring in other security functions.
It is a healthy return on investment with planned packed size data. Average unicast latency is low and consistent with small and large packets (barring mid-sized).
Cisco devices last longer and also have a decent trade-in policy to recover some value when equipment is replaced.
Higher concurrent IPSec tunnels are offered, we tested for 1500+, fielding both encrypted and a mix of encrypted and cleartext traffic.
