Force10 Gear - Opinions

Thu Sep 4 00:28:29 UTC 2008

On Aug 26, 2008, at 12:18 AM, Paul Wall wrote:
>> They appear to be nonsense.  They were bought and paid
>> for by Cisco, and including nonsense things like "if you leave a  
>> slot open
>> the chassis will burn up" as a decrement, which is also true in  
>> pretty much
>> every big iron vendor.
>
> Current-generation Cisco and Juniper hardware don't seem to have  
> this problem.

Your statement doesn't match my experience.

> I don't think the "remove one SFM and all the others go offline"
> failure mode is commonplace among other vendors either.

It is neither common nor even actual on Force10.  I've pulled many an  
SFM ;-)

>> They also deliberately detuned the force10
>> configuration.  They re-ran the tests using the recommended  
>> configuration
>> and got very different numbers -- which you can request from them,  
>> but they
>> won't publish on the website.
>
> I'd be interested in seeing this.  Mind putting them up somewhere and
> sharing the URL?

Sorry, my day job doesn't include promoting anyone's gear or etc.  Got  
other things need doing.  Ask EATC and ask them about their ethics  
while you're at it.

>> Based on what?  For E and C series boxes, Cisco is never cheaper.   
>> S-series
>> are a different story.
>
> I was comparing list pricing for the E-series up against Catalyst
> 6500, Supervisor 720-3BXL, 6700 blades with CFC... which I consider a
> fair comparison.

For equivalent redundancy and ports, the Force10 is always cheaper -  
even just in list price. (on the E-series -- Cisco has some cheaper  
options than the S-series so I've heard - don't care)

>>> As a box designed with the enterprise datacenter in mind, the E- 
>>> series
>>> looks to be missing several key service provider features, including
>>> MPLS and advanced control plane filtering/policing.
>>
>> Ah, because Cisco does either of these in hardware?
>
> Yes, they do, on the s720-3B and better.

No, they don't.  There are *no* *zero* providers doing line-speed uRPF  
on Cisco for a reason.  Stop reading, start testing.

-- 
Jo Rhett
Net Consonance : consonant endings by net philanthropy, open source  
and other randomness