Value of telephone numbers

[Jeff Williams]

Karl and all,

Karl Denninger wrote:
> 
> On Mon, Jul 07, 1997 at 03:47:21PM -0400, Dana Hudes wrote:
> > Karl Denninger wrote:
> > >
> > > The generic problem isn't address space -- its router manufacturers
> > > being
> > > coddled by the Internet industry rather than being forced to produce
> > > equipment
> > > that can handle the real load out there.  Why is it that I can buy a
> > > 100 MIPS
> > > system -- a GENERAL PURPOSE system -- for well under $1,000 on the
> > > secondary
> > > market (this pretty much establishes the price on the CPU, by the way)
> > > while
> > > that same class of processor isn't at the core of any existing major
> > > router
> > > doing BGP computations?
> > >
> > > Why is it that nobody is producing a router where there is a
> > > *dedicated*
> > > CPU that does NOTHING OTHER than recompute BGP tables?  (I don't count
> > > prototypes, and yes, I am aware that there is *one* such device in
> > > that
> > > phase right now) Again, we're talking about something that isn't very
> > > expensive to do from a design perspective, and would obviate many of
> > > these discussions.
> > >
> >
> > I don't recall whether the Netstar Gigarouter cum Ascend GRF has smart
> > cards. I know it runs GateD.
> >
> > Even if we have routers capable of running 150K routes, that costs money
> > and it doesn't matter that its cheaper now to have a Big Fat Router
> > than it was 8 years ago when the only thing around was the NSS at
> > around $150K to run the NSFNET full T3 backbone. Its a competitive
> > business enviornment out there and money spent on router memory is money
> > that could be spent paying engineers. Or stockholders.
> 
> That's funny - - the ASCEND GRF is about half the cost of a comparably-equipped
> CISCO 7513.
> 
> And yes, it does have smart cards and a Pentium main processor, runs a
> BSDI Unix derivitive on the host processor with GATED for routing, and can
> handle 150,000 routes (3x+ today's real load).
> 
> It works too (we've tested it under VERY heavy loads; I didn't care for their
> ATM cards and have heard of problems with them, but the HSSI boards work
> great, and the 100BaseTX interfaces -- great for local interconnect between
> backbone routers in a data center -- are fantastic).

  I agree with Karl here.  I have had the same experiance with Ascend
equipment.
> 
> One has to wonder why it is that CISCO can get 2X the price for less than
> 1/2 of the performance..... and why the industry has coddled a company which
> has produced products of this type.
> 
> My beef with CISCO on this matter goes back many years.  The blunt truth -
> their architecture has consistently failed to take advantage of the commodity
> relationships within the high-tech sector, and the Internet industry has not
> only condoned that failure, but allowed their engineers and employees to
> write many of the specifications which we now accept as "gospel" in the
> community.
> 
> If this were any other industry, the fur would be flying.  Its only a matter
> of time before it flies here, and the faster we wake up to this fact and fix
> it, the better off we will be.
> 
> Ps: Anyone else hear a rumor about WCOM/UUNET doing a big deal with ASCEND?
> Is this related to the GRF?  I'd be surprised if it wasn't.

  I had heard rumors only.
> 
> --
> --
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Regards,
-- 
Jeffrey A. Williams
DIR. Internet Network Eng/SR. Java Development Eng.
Information Eng. Group. IEG. INC. 
Phone :913-294-2375 (v-office)
E-Mail jwkckid1 at ix.netcom.com