Cisco 5000 Series Network Convergence System (NCS 5000) vs Cisco 9000 Series Aggregation Services Routers (ASR 9000)

• Higher port density allows for both higher bandwidth ports to the customer network as well as sufficient uplink capacity to the core.
• Small rack space, smarter design, smaller footprint allows for more hardware the fit in the same amount of rack space.
• Lower power consumption, less heat output results in savings within the data center environment.

Read full review

• [Cisco 9000] Series [Aggregation Services] Routers are exceptionally reliable when compared to other market options.
• One strength of Cisco routers, in general, is their compatibility with any standard market tools from other vendors.
• [It is] unmatched in terms of sheer performance.
• [It] comfortably supports very strong throughput requirements.

Read full review

• Bugs
• Transport components stability
• Tac response time in some xases

Read full review

• [The] upgrade process [is] overly complicated compared to NX-OS or IOS. New images and the current configuration need to be compiled into "golden IOS's". If you don't include the configuration, you will have a clean device with no configuration.
• [There are] major bugs in every release. We have had to cycle through all of our routers 3 times in the last year for updates due to show-stopping bugs that did not come to light until after the changes were made in production.
• [It has] terrible documentation. You have to mine their site to get to any documentation for recent versions of IOS-XR. If you make the leap from 32-bit cXR to 64-bit eXR, then the documentation is more or less non-existent. Due to the internal architecture of hardware itself, technical specs can change from software version to software version, so don't expect any sort of firm scalability numbers. You'll have to rely on your sales engineer for that.

Read full review

• The lower power consumption helps in reducing costs, improves efficiency
• Better port density leads to less chassis upgrades, less costly upgrades
• Smaller footprint allows for more devices in the future within available colo space

Read full review

• Higher reliability has significantly reduced the need for manual intervention.
• Lower downtime ensures better top-line figures.
• Although it may be difficult to quantify, I am certain that the higher performance does have an impact (maybe indirectly) on other business functions. High-performance routers are like the oil that keeps an engine running smoothly.

Read full review