Managed global low latency network with any to any connectivity

Wed Aug 24 16:01:22 UTC 2016

The real issue in the request is that this person is looking for any-to-any connectivity which will require either a single L2 switching domain or a L3 routing domain.  While waves, SDH, and SONET might be your layer one transport there are two major factors that are going to affect latency and jitter the most.  

1. Geography - Any point to any point has a minimum latency due to simple mileage/medium constraints.  You cannot possibly go any faster than the velocity of propagation over the media of your choice.  For example, lowest latency at layer 1 would probably be P2P microwave (which has a faster velocity of propagation than light over fiber) but that would not be an effective way to cross the Pacific ocean.

2. Routing/Switching queuing latency - If you want real any to any connectivity you need routing or switching logic which takes time.

For example, lowest latency at layer 1 would probably be P2P microwave (which has a faster velocity of propagation than fiber) but that would not be an effective way to cross the Pacific ocean.

If you are doing an MPLS VPN architecture within the US, your routing/switching latency are probably going to be more significant than the layer one technology but when you go transoceanic your layer 1 latency becomes more significant.  The differences in electrical, free RF or optical (like microwave), and optical over fiber will vary by something like 30-40% of the speed of light over the mileage of the link.  The routing/switching of an any-to-any architecture will probably dwarf most of the differences in media.

Steven Naslund
Chicago IL

-----Original Message-----
From: NANOG [mailto:nanog-bounces at nanog.org] On Behalf Of Rod Beck
Sent: Wednesday, August 24, 2016 10:45 AM
To: Ryan, Spencer; Arqam Gadit; nanog at nanog.org
Subject: Re: Managed global low latency network with any to any connectivity

There are standard routes and there are low latency routes that serve mostly traders. The latter charge a big premium. He said the lowest possible latency. That is a specialty market where the SLAs are in microseconds, not milliseconds. Many carriers have a division for ultra low latency. Hibernia Atlantic built express which is just used by financial traders. No one else can afford it. And since low latency is the name of the game, it means waves or SDH or SONET. Not Ethernet switching.

Regards,

Roderick.