RINA - scott whaps at the nanog hornets nest :-)

Sun Nov 7 08:07:17 UTC 2010

> >
> > Yes, I really don't understand that either.  You would think that
the
> > investment in developing and deploying all that SONET infrastructure
> > has been paid back by now and they can lower the prices
dramatically.
> > One would think the vendors would be practically giving it away,
> > particularly if people understood the potential improvement in
> > performance, though the difference between 1500 and 4000 is probably
> > not all that much except on long distance ( >2000km ) paths.
> 
> Careful, you're rapidly working your way up to nanog kook status with
> these absurd claims based on no logic whatsoever.

My aploligies.  It just seemed to me that the investment in SONET,
particularly the lower data rates, should be pretty much paid back by
now.  How long has OC-12 been around?  I can understand a certain amount
of premium for something that doesn't sell as much but the difference in
prices can be quite amazing in some markets. Some differential might be
justified but why so much?

An OC-12 SFP optic costs nearly $3,000 from one vendor, list.  Their
list price for a GigE SFP optical module is about 30% of that.  What is
it about the optic module that would cause it to be 3 times as expensive
for an interface with half the bandwidth?  A 4-port OC-12 module is
37,500 list.  A 4-port 10G module is $10,000 less for 10x the bandwidth.

In other words, what is the differential in the manufacturing costs of
those?  I don't believe it is as much as the differential in the selling
price.