We use quite a bit of extreme switches. I personally don't have anything against them other than their purple color and that I don't really know their IOS that well. But to be fair, they have worked just fine.....
In the future I hope we can migrate over to cisco switches because I'm bias..... =) > From: mer...@metalink.net > To: nanog@nanog.org > Subject: RE: Recommendations for Metro-Ethernet Equipment > Date: Thu, 21 Oct 2010 15:05:37 -0400 > > Thanks to everyone who responded. Just got done talking with Extreme which > no one really mentioned. Seems like decent gear reasonably priced. Anyone > care to comment on them specifically or have them used them a metro Ethernet > build? > > > ===== > Eric Merkel > MetaLINK Technologies, Inc. > Email: merkel at metalink.net > > > -----Original Message----- > From: Dan Armstrong [mailto:d...@beanfield.com] > Sent: 2010-10-20 19:50 > To: Ramanpreet Singh > Cc: Jason Lixfeld; nanog@nanog.org > Subject: Re: Recommendations for Metro-Ethernet Equipment > > I think that's what Jason just said. :-) > > > > > On 2010-10-20, at 5:24 PM, Ramanpreet Singh wrote: > > > 7600's/ASR 1k > > > > Have you looked in to Ciso ME 3600X/ME 3800X series? > > > > Without a bias these are the top notch products in the market for Metro E. > > > > -Raman > > > > On Wed, Oct 20, 2010 at 12:57 PM, Jason Lixfeld <ja...@lixfeld.ca> wrote: > >> On 2010-10-20, at 11:24 AM, Eric Merkel wrote: > >> > >>> Any suggestions, success or horror stories are appreciated. ;) > >> > >> I've been going through pretty much the same exercise looking for a > decent PE for almost two years. Our requirements were for a PE device that > had between 12-24 ports (in a perfect world, mixed mode 10/100/1000 copper + > SFP), 10G uplinks, EoMPLS, MPLS VPN, DHCP server, port-protect/UNI (or > similar) capabilities, DC power and a small footprint (1RU) > >> > >> Of all the ones we looked at (Juniper, Cisco, Extreme, Brocade, MRV, > Alcatel) initially, MRV was the only contender. The rest either didn't have > a product, or their offering didn't meet various points within our criteria. > >> > >> As such, we bought a bunch of MRVs in early 2009 and after four months of > trial and error, we yanked every single one out of the network. From a > physical perspective, the box was perfect. Port density was perfect, > mixed-mode ports, promised a 10G uplink product soon, size was perfect, > power was perfect, we thought we had it nailed. Unfortunately there are no > words to describe how terrible the software was. The CLI took a little > getting used to, which is pretty much par for the course when you're dealing > with a new vendor, but the code itself was just absolutely broken, > everywhere. Duplex issues, LDP constantly crashing taking the box with it, > OSPF issues, the list went on and on. To their credit, they flew engineers > up from the US and they were quite committed to making stuff work, but at > the end of the day, they just couldn't make it go. We pulled the plug in > May 2009 and I haven't heard a thing about their product since then, so > maybe they've got it all together. > >> > >> While meeting with Juniper a few months later about a different project, > they said they had a product that might fit our needs. The EX4200. As > such, we had a few of these loaned to our lab for a few months to put > through their paces, from a features and interoperability perspective. They > work[1] and they seem to work well. The show stopper was provisioning[1] > and size. The box is massive, albeit it is still 1U. > >> > >> [1] (I'm not a Juniper guy, so my recollection on specific terms and > jargon may be a bit off kilter) they only support ccc, which makes > provisioning an absolute nightmare. From my experience with Cisco and MRV, > you only have to configure the EoMPLS vc. On the EX4200, you have to create > the LSPs as well. To get a ccc working, the JunOS code block was far larger > and much more involved per vc than the single line Cisco equivalent. To > create the LSPs was, I believe, two more equally large sized code blocks. > At the end of the day, it was just too involved. We needed something > simpler. > >> > >> About the same time that we started to evaluate the EX4200, Cisco had > pitched us on their (then alpha) Whales platform. It looked promising (MRV > still had the best form factor) and we expressed our interest in getting a > beta unit in as soon as we were able to. This is now known as the ME3600 > and ME3800 platform and we've been testing a beta unit in our lab for the > past few months. This is the platform we have chosen. It's not perfect, > but our gripes have more to do with form factor (it's 1RU, but it's a bit > deeper than what we'd like) and port densities (no mixed mode ports) than > software or features. We've been pretty pleased with it's feature set and > performance, but this hasn't seen any real world action, so who knows how > that will turn out. > >> > >> If you're asking more about a P router or P/PE hybrid, we've also just > ordered a few ASR9000s under try-and-buy as P/PEs to close up the chains of > ME3600s that will start to be deployed in our remote sites. A Juniper MX > would certainly work well here too, and it seems to interoperate rather well > with the ME3600s, so that's certainly an option, but for us, we think it > will work more in our favor to go with the ASRs in the core, but if not, > we'd ship them back under the try-and-buy and get Junipers instead. > >> > >> Hope that helps. > >> > > > > > > >