Cisco 5500 Series Network Convergence System (NCS 5500) vs. Nokia 7750 Service Router (SR)

Cloud based solutions, these need the necessary bandwidth going from point A to point B. Automate as much as possible from a WAN Core edge standpoint, take away the always on maintaining of the routers/switches on the network. Automation is extremely important in today's world. The Cisco 5500 Series Network Convergence System would not be a very viable solution for a small company, especially from a budgetary standpoint.

Incentivized

Nokia 7750 Service Routers (SR) are good as a core switch and brings in value for money, with its high capacity switching and routing. It is suited as the best MPLS switch and has been a popular choice for L3 routing too by many SP. It is not good for distribution and access.

Incentivized

• It is versatile due to the diversity in models and form factors.
• Low power consumption compared to similar models
• Mature operating system code allowing for quick production installation and configuration.

Incentivized

• MPLS switching
• VPRN
• VPLS

Incentivized

• Horizontal blade designs are rare these days because if the gear is shipped in a rack, the blade can bend. The NCS5500's blades are horizontal.
• Not a NCS5500 specific issue, but XR has a ways to go, but will continue to grow with customer input.

Incentivized

• Buffer capacity
• Load balancing

Incentivized

Cisco support is always informative and reliable. Depending on the level of support you subscribe to, the techs and Cisco TAC are well versed in hardware and operating system of the NCS series routers. You can receive 24x7 support and either Next Business Day or 4-hour part replacement from Cisco if required.

Incentivized

Ultimately other Arista and Juniper choices were tested but design and testing did not give much detail as to why these are better overall or in comparison. We are already using Cisco in this level of the topology so that was most likely the strongest reason and fit the application we are using it for.

We have both Nokia 7750 and Cisco ASR 9000 in our network. The main advantage of the Nokia 7750 is its compatibility with the SAM element manager and users easily can configure using SAM. This feature is not found on ASR9k. Cisco is good for L3 routing especially BGP functionalities and peering.

Incentivized

• 100% uptime for 5 years.
• No successful intrusion attempts in 5 years.
• Very high throughput has allowed for constant and reliable connectivity.

Incentivized

• Reliable switch with high uptime
• Good value compared to competition
• Versatile

Incentivized