Cisco 7200 VXR with NPE-400 (was RE: The market must be coming back)

Tue May 21 14:57:15 UTC 2002

On 2002-05-21-01:12:25, Gary <garyb at foundrynet.com> wrote:
> I used a Cisco 7200 VXR with NPE-400.  I used two different 7200's
> with the exact same results.  Bidirectional throughput on 1GbE is a
> fraction above 10%.  Unidirectional is a bit better (23%).  Singl
> line ACL drops it to 8% (permit ip any any).  FE performance doesn't
> start to drop below line rate until you put more than two in the
> box.  I have a powerpoint if you'd like it, but it is not meant to
> slander Cisco, just to convince my customers NOT to put GbE in a
> 7200!  It is not a GbE platform!

Send it over, I'd be interested in how you're conducting these tests.
I'm not trying to accuse you of lying or slandering your competitors
or anything, but well, those numbers sound a bit funny.

> > Besides, that's really an apples to oranges comparison.  
> [...]
> My powerpoint compares the 7200 with the FastIron 4802 Premium.  It
> is line rate with less than 7 us latency on the two GbE ports.  I
> tested this myself.  I can forward this to you if you like.  It is a
> bunch of SmartApps screen captures of the testing.

Not a meaningful comparison; vastly different architectures and
purposes.  I'd be more interested in seeing empirical data comparing
the FastIron 4802 to... say... a Catalyst 2948G-L3 or Extreme Summit
48i.  Maybe a Cat6k/MSFC2 as well, seeing as the pricing is roughly
comparable in the used hardware market, even if the density is not.

> I really like the 7200 VXR.  It is a good 10M and minimum FE
> platform.  It can switch DS0 on the midplane and it supports a wide
> array of interfaces!  

Sounds reminiscent of the dot.gone wastefulness that killed many
companies. :-)

-a