[AusNOG] Cisco 7201 vs Juniper SRX 550 for border routers

Tue Apr 15 15:05:26 EST 2014

Hi James, Tony,

Thanks for the input. Extremely valuable to hear the feedback that the 7201s would be reaching their limits, I had guessed this much. I suppose my hopes were that we could begin to approach these numbers, and by that stage, we'd upgrade to something like MX5s or ASR1Ks. Unfortunately, those newer routers are pretty much entirely out of our price range right now and the goal is really to put in place some "proper" routers to replace our router-on-a-stick setup, using static routing.

Although I would agree we'll see an upward trend in our IP transit needs, I don't see us needing 10GE any time soon (except maybe for internal traffic). Right now our IP transit needs are < 100 Mbps, so while flexibility for upgrades is a desire, my goal was mostly to put these in as a stop-gap until we can get some beefier routers.

Thanks again.

Rhys Hanrahan
Chief Information Officer
Nexus One Pty Ltd

E: support at nexusone.com.au<mailto:support at nexusone.com.au>
P: +61 2 9191 0606
W: http://www.nexusone.com.au/
M: PO Box 127, Royal Exchange NSW 1225
A: Level 10 307 Pitt St, Sydney NSW 2000
________________________________
From: James Braunegg [james.braunegg at micron21.com]
Sent: Tuesday, 15 April 2014 2:52 PM
To: Tony Wicks; Rhys Hanrahan
Cc: ausnog at lists.ausnog.net
Subject: RE: [AusNOG] Cisco 7201 vs Juniper SRX 550 for border routers

Dear Rhys

The Problem with both the Cisco 7200 and SRX550 platforms these are essential software based routers with no dedicated Asics and limited capacity for expansion and growth with 10gbit interfaces becoming more common these days I can see transit requirements increasing significantly !!

Buying a routing platform which is has hardware asics for the data and control plane will give you large amounts of flexibility and growth, however your LNS requirements makes your hardware choice limited !

Kindest Regards

James Braunegg
P:  1300 769 972  |  M:  0488 997 207 |  D:  (03) 9751 7616
E:   james.braunegg at micron21.com<mailto:james.braunegg at micron21.com>  |  ABN:  12 109 977 666
W:  www.micron21.com/ddos-protection<http://www.micron21.com/ddos-protection>   T: @micron21

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From: AusNOG [mailto:ausnog-bounces at lists.ausnog.net] On Behalf Of Tony Wicks
Sent: Tuesday, April 15, 2014 2:37 PM
To: 'Rhys Hanrahan'
Cc: ausnog at lists.ausnog.net
Subject: Re: [AusNOG] Cisco 7201 vs Juniper SRX 550 for border routers

To be frank here, with your requirements below you need better boxes. Juniper MX5 for routing and Cisco ASR1k for BNG. If you got for the EOL Cisco’s or lower end SRX Junipers you will just need to change them out when they run out of grunt. If you want cheap LNS then use Mikrotik CCR.

From: AusNOG [mailto:ausnog-bounces at lists.ausnog.net] On Behalf Of Rhys Hanrahan
Sent: Tuesday, 15 April 2014 4:21 p.m.
To: ausnog at lists.ausnog.net<mailto:ausnog at lists.ausnog.net>
Subject: [AusNOG] Cisco 7201 vs Juniper SRX 550 for border routers

Hi Everyone,

We are currently in the middle of upgrading some our network hardware, and was hoping that I could get some input on deciding on a pair of border routers.

Initially we were looking at the Juniper MX series for this role, but found it's a bit outside our price range (for now). In trying to keep it all Juniper (as we'll most likely use EX-series for our core and access layers), we have been looking at the Juniper SRX 550 routers for our border. They seem like they will do the job for our needs, but are missing LNS functionality, which is something we'd have to purchase 7201s for in the future, and so therefore I’m also looking at just buying 7201s instead.

Logically to me, since the SRX is (apparently) newer hardware, it should perform better than the 7201s. My anecdotal evidence, however, suggests otherwise, and I'm looking to confirm that in terms of real-world performance. Comparing the spec sheets between the SRX 550 and the 7201, on paper it looks like the 7201 beats out the SRX in terms of performance (mainly PPS). It also sounds like the SRXs store multiple copies of BGP routes in memory and so where a pair of full sets of internet routes for the SRX is not possible, it's still possible on 7201s.

>From all that I've read and heard from various people, it seems that generally, the Juniper SRX series is not held in a high regard in terms of reliability or performance, compared to something like the MX series (which is to be expected really). Whereas I hear a lot of good things of the 7200 series, despite the fact it's EOL, it's still being used and is a reliable range. Due to these factors, despite it being an older router, I am leaning towards the 7201s as it seems like an all-around better choice in terms of reliability and performance.

My main hesitation in going with the 7201s is that, we'll be using them for quite a lot, and I'm unsure of how quickly the performance will drop if I start using more features. So I was hoping that someone could give some real-world input so say which would likely be the better choice. Overall right now, I’m still siding with a pair of 7201s.

Here is a summary of what we'll be using the border routers for:

  *   BGP (Initially only a default route, but potentially 2xfull internet routes in future. Plus IX routes.)
  *   OSPF (Up to 50 or so routes)
  *   Static NAT (up to 100K active translations)
  *   Up to 400 Mbps IP Transit
  *   Up to around 25K ACLs (we currently firewall customer servers on the border. We're looking at moving the firewalling off to a dedicated box like an SRX or ASA, but probably not at our current size, if possible).
  *   NAT64
  *   IPSec (around 10 Mbps of AES256/SHA traffic).
  *   NetFlow
  *   HSRP / VRRP
  *   IPv6 Support
  *   LNS (Up to 200 sessions).
  *   MPLS PE
  *   QinQ Tunnel / QinQ Termination
Appreciate any insights that can be given on which path to take.

Thanks!

Rhys Hanrahan
Chief Information Officer
Nexus One Pty Ltd

E: support at nexusone.com.au<mailto:support at nexusone.com.au>
P: +61 2 9191 0606
W: http://www.nexusone.com.au/
M: PO Box 127, Royal Exchange NSW 1225
A: Level 10, 307 Pitt Street, Sydney NSW 2000

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