Re: debian/cyclades .vs. cisco
On Tue, 20 Nov 2001 16:28, John Hawley wrote:
> I just priced out a Cisco to handle multiple T1's for our Internet access.
> $15K+, ack!
>
> Just wondering. Anyone have any experience using the Cyclades-PC300
> boards? I've already converted the my network services from M$ to
> Debian/Linux and have nothing against converting our router from Ci$co if
> Linux can match the stability.
Firstly I suggest reading and/or subscribing to the Portslave mailing list.
portslave@linuxrouter.org
http://www.linuxrouter.org/mailman/listinfo/portslave
Cyclades people are on the list (but they keep a very low profile).
Portslave is used on much Cyclades hardware including in the dedicated
hardware boxes they sell. There's many people there who can discuss the
down-stream use of Cyclades products (E1 == 30 analog modems), and some
people who can discuss the upstream use (E1 == 2Mb of net access).
On Tue, 20 Nov 2001 17:01, Peter Billson wrote:
> I don't have experience with the Cyclades boards but I use Sangoma
> (www.sangoma.com) cards in a POTS PIII box and it doesn't even register
> a load average saturating multiple T's and multiple NICS.
That is what you expect. Sending a few megabits of data around isn't that
difficult really.
> Sangoma's support has been fantastic and the box has never failed to
> operate properly in over a year... for 10% of the cost of a Cisco.
Yes, Sangoma and Cyclades are among the good companies that release the
source to all their drivers making it easier for us.
I installed an Emerging Technologies card for one of my clients (binary-only
kernel module) and have really regretted it. I wish the client had enough
budget to allow them to throw away that ET junk and get a Sangoma.
> We are currently working to get it running off of a CD-ROM so that we
> can eliminate the hard drive as a possible point of failure. Linux
Why do you expect a CD-ROM to be more reliable than a hard drive?
Why not just use software RAID on two hard drives?
Or if you want to be really advanced get a flash disk...
On Tue, 20 Nov 2001 17:20, Bao C. Ha wrote:
> I have used the Cyclades PC300. They are pricey
> but good stuff.
By PC pricing standards Cyclades products are expensive. They have a smaller
market and they are server products.
Compare them to Cisco products etc and they seem quite cheap!
> What Cisco routers are you
> comparing against? I need the CPU/memory that
> the low-end Ciscos, 2600/3600, don't make it.
There's lots of other issues when comparing a Cisco to a machine with a
Cyclades card. With a PC router you could easily put a web server to show
stats on the router (instead of monitoring it by SNMP and doing the stats
elsewhere). With a PC you can easily expand it etc. With a PC a buffer
overflow doesn't necessarily mean the entire machine is dead (unlike Cisco
products).
Also PCs have lots of spare CPU power which is REALLY useful for running
tcpdump type programs.
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