Alcatel

[Dan Snyder]

Anyone use Alcatel switches in their network...like the 6850
omniswitch? What are your thoughts on them?

What about Alcatel's MPLS edge routers like the 7x50 products that
came from Timetra...anyone have any experience with them? Are they a
good product?

Thanks,
Dan

[Scott Weeks]

--- ***@fusion-networks.com wrote:
From: "Dan Snyder" <***@fusion-networks.com>

Anyone use Alcatel switches in their network...like the 6850
omniswitch? What are your thoughts on them?

What about Alcatel's MPLS edge routers like the 7x50 products that
came from Timetra...anyone have any experience with them? Are they a
good product?
--------------------------------------------------


We're using the 7x50s for the core and 7710s for border routers. I'd be happy to discuss. However, there is a list for Alcatel: puck.nether.net/mailman/listinfo/juniper-nsp

I've been on it for a couple of months, but I have yet to see an email from it. I have been wanting to get discussion going there, so let's take the conversation there.

scott























------------------------------------------------

[Joe Abley]

Post by Scott Weeks
puck.nether.net/mailman/listinfo/juniper-nsp

<https://puck.nether.net/mailman/listinfo/alcatel-nsp>, I think. There
are some archives, but it's not what I would call a busy list.


Joe

[Robert E. Seastrom]

Post by Joe Abley

Post by Scott Weeks
puck.nether.net/mailman/listinfo/juniper-nsp

<https://puck.nether.net/mailman/listinfo/alcatel-nsp>, I think. There
are some archives, but it's not what I would call a busy list.

Having recently dealt with some other ALU kit, I interpreted Scott's
message as meta-humor.

---rob

[Neil J. McRae]

The Alcatel 7750 is the best MPLS edge box period. It blows away the traditional competition by a country mile. The quality of the product is really superb. Imagine life is a software release when on completion of your own type approval the software does what it says on the tin? Not even minor bugs -> no bugs nada ziltch negatory nien etc.

That life starts when you buy the 7750. The former Timetra team (and the new ALU people) are an excellent bunch of guys to work with. They listen and act but at the same time won't sacrafice the quality of the platform. And if you are still unsure I strongly recommend this box.

Neil.

-----Original Message-----
From: Dan Snyder <***@fusion-networks.com>
Sent: 13 May 2008 18:16
To: ***@nanog.org
Subject: [NANOG] Alcatel

Anyone use Alcatel switches in their network...like the 6850
omniswitch? What are your thoughts on them?

What about Alcatel's MPLS edge routers like the 7x50 products that
came from Timetra...anyone have any experience with them? Are they a
good product?

Thanks,
Dan

[Nicolas Antoniello]

Hi,

I'd rather say that 7750 (routing) & 7450 (L3 switching) are good boxes, very good for
MPLS and even better if you also build a core and get the 5620 SAM application (for
management in case of MPLS services network), non major failures... but it has bugs, who
doesn't ?

Nic.

Post by Neil J. McRae
The Alcatel 7750 is the best MPLS edge box period. It blows away the traditional competition by a country mile. The quality of the product is really superb. Imagine life is a software release when on completion of your own type approval the software does what it says on the tin? Not even minor bugs -> no bugs nada ziltch negatory nien etc.
That life starts when you buy the 7750. The former Timetra team (and the new ALU people) are an excellent bunch of guys to work with. They listen and act but at the same time won't sacrafice the quality of the platform. And if you are still unsure I strongly recommend this box.
Neil.
-----Original Message-----
Sent: 13 May 2008 18:16
Subject: [NANOG] Alcatel
Anyone use Alcatel switches in their network...like the 6850
omniswitch? What are your thoughts on them?
What about Alcatel's MPLS edge routers like the 7x50 products that
came from Timetra...anyone have any experience with them? Are they a
good product?
Thanks,
Dan
_______________________________________________
NANOG mailing list
http://mailman.nanog.org/mailman/listinfo/nanog
_______________________________________________
NANOG mailing list
http://mailman.nanog.org/mailman/listinfo/nanog

[Neil J. McRae]

Not many problems to talk about :)

-----Original Message-----
From: Joe Abley <***@ca.afilias.info>
Sent: 13 May 2008 19:28
To: ***@mauigateway.com
Cc: ***@merit.edu
Subject: Re: [NANOG] Alcatel

Post by Scott Weeks
puck.nether.net/mailman/listinfo/juniper-nsp

<https://puck.nether.net/mailman/listinfo/alcatel-nsp>, I think. There
are some archives, but it's not what I would call a busy list.


Joe

[Scott Weeks]

------ ***@domino.org wrote: -------
...Not even minor bugs -> no bugs nada ziltch negatory nien etc.
--------------------------------------

I could not agree with this statement. I recall a bug or two, but we've not been using them for over a year, so I can't speak to the long term.



---------------------------------------
That life starts when you buy the 7750. The former Timetra team (and the new ALU people) are an excellent bunch of guys to work with. They listen and act but at the same time won't sacrafice the quality of the platform....
---------------------------------------

I CAN agree that most of the ALU guys are a great bunch, but like anywhere else, some are only mediocre.

scott





































----------------------------------

[Scott Weeks]

-----Original Message-----

Post by Scott Weeks
puck.nether.net/mailman/listinfo/juniper-nsp

<https://puck.nether.net/mailman/listinfo/alcatel-nsp>, I think. There
are some archives, but it's not what I would call a busy list.
---------------------------------


--- ***@domino.org wrote:
From: "Neil J. McRae" <***@domino.org>

Not many problems to talk about :)
------------------------------------


Not problems, rather strange things I see in the logs and other different things. I'll post over there as soon as things slow down a bit at work.

scott


































-------------------------------

[Phil Bedard]

I'll chime in and say that the 7450/7750 are very nice boxes. Their
non-stop routing feature is something that other vendors are barely
starting to support, years after they started doing it. Now they are
onto features like cross-chassis 802.3ad, etc. that no one else is
doing in a SP router platform. The 7450 which is priced against
switch-like devices like the C76xx and the JMXxxx is a decent
competitor to those platforms. The 5260 is actually a decent NMS
which is something I never thought I'd say about a NMS, although the
pricing model isn't very good.

Phil

Post by Dan Snyder
Anyone use Alcatel switches in their network...like the 6850
omniswitch? What are your thoughts on them?
What about Alcatel's MPLS edge routers like the 7x50 products that
came from Timetra...anyone have any experience with them? Are they a
good product?
Thanks,
Dan
_______________________________________________
NANOG mailing list
http://mailman.nanog.org/mailman/listinfo/nanog

[Nathan Ward]

Post by Phil Bedard
The 5260 is actually a decent NMS
which is something I never thought I'd say about a NMS, although the
pricing model isn't very good.

Yeah, I'll agree with that. I've raved about the 5620SAM (not to be
confused with the 5620NM, which manage ATM etc. boxes) for a while.
It's the only NMS I've seen [1] that exposes /everything/ to the end
user. If someone updates stuff on the CLI, a trap is send, and the
graphical display updates within seconds, even for what you'd think
were really obscure things. The dev work for these products is done in
parallel I believe, instead of as a separate product line.

As with most vendor specific NMSs, you want to use 7x50 boxes
exclusively for a certain function. I.e. 7x50 only boxes on the edge.

The 7x50's have some kinda weird ways of doing things, and you really
want to do a training course to understand how they work - they are
quite a big paradigm change, and you'll end up doing things sub-
optimally unless you understand how they're supposed to function. The
major thing is the config is service oriented. I.e. on a traditional
box, you configure a bunch of parameters all over the place, and a
certain service pops out. With these Alcatel-Lucent boxes, you
configure a service, and the parameters are implied somewhat.

Interop is fine, but you'll find that many of the knobs are called
different things to what you're used to - mostly as a function of that
paradigm change.

Ask for a v6 roadmap. Last time I looked (~ a year ago) there were
some strange limitations, for example, a surprisingly small max v6
routing table.

--
Nathan Ward

[1] Admittedly, my experience with other NMS's is heavily tarnished by
Dorado RMC. Please hold while I hug myself and rock back and forward
in my chair for a bit.

[Scott Weeks]

--- ***@gmail.com wrote:

I'll chime in and say that the 7450/7750 are very nice boxes. Their
non-stop routing feature is something that other vendors are barely
starting to support, years after they started doing it. Now they are
-----------------------------------------------


This IS a very nice feature and works well. A cisco terminal server was sending lots of random data (well not so random, it looked like it was sending a MOTD) to the console on a couple of 7x50s, which caused the CPMs to reset repeatedly, but still no packets were lost. Very cool!

scott









































---------------------------

[Kevin Billings]

We have been using 7750's and 5620Sam since 2004. I believe we were one of
the first US companies to deploy in a production environment. As with most
vendors we have seen a few bug's, but TAC has always been there to help and
provide a solution very quickly. The box have been stable and what I like
most is that I have not had to upgrade any of the hardware, Just add cards
as needed to increase capacity. When a new feature comes out I only have to
upgrade the code and not the hardware.
We run our network a like different in that we use our 7750's both as edge
and core routers providing MPLS and Internet services to our customers.
Works great for us...


-----Original Message-----
From: Scott Weeks [mailto:***@mauigateway.com]
Sent: Tuesday, May 13, 2008 7:01 PM
To: ***@nanog.org
Subject: Re: [NANOG] Alcatel



--- ***@gmail.com wrote:

I'll chime in and say that the 7450/7750 are very nice boxes. Their
non-stop routing feature is something that other vendors are barely
starting to support, years after they started doing it. Now they are
-----------------------------------------------


This IS a very nice feature and works well. A cisco terminal server was
sending lots of random data (well not so random, it looked like it was
sending a MOTD) to the console on a couple of 7x50s, which caused the CPMs
to reset repeatedly, but still no packets were lost. Very cool!

scott









































---------------------------

[Paul Wall]

Post by Dan Snyder
What about Alcatel's MPLS edge routers like the 7x50 products that
came from Timetra...anyone have any experience with them? Are they a
good product?

Garbage, the 7750/7450 are complete junk boxes. Here is why...

- For fun, view a 7750/7540 router configuration file and grep for
the word "exit". Count how many times you see that word. To sum it up,
the CLI is kind of annoying. Lets just say the 7x50 rivals a Bay Annex
CLI for uselessness.

- They attempted to mimic the Juniper style of policy-statements, but
they still fall short of it. Whats up with the pseudo-commit crap?

- The majority of ALU folks supporting the 7x50 are all from former
failed router vendors (caspian, nexabit, etc). When you deal with such
teams, keep your operator hat on and realize that some of the stuff
being suggested are from people who've never worked in production.

- 7x50 is about 1-2 years behind Cisco and Juniper on any feature
functionality on the boxes.

- The ALU business unit has no comprehension why users want to
interface with the box via CLI as opposed to their SAM EMS junk. The
BU and the former Newbridge developers think folks run their network
from a Sparc via a GUI. Times have changed...NETCONF what?

- If you haven't run into any BGP scaling issues yet, you will, soon.

- Limited RSVP-TE support...nothing compared to Juniper.

There are plenty of other better options like the Cisco 6500/7600 as
well as the Juniper MX. Why settle for sub-standard CLI, weak features
and a business unit who has no operational experience and their only
claim to fame was gobbling up companies and exploiting their long-time
industry friendships to seal massive deals.

I know some will reply to talk about their great failover is and this
and that, whatever. To get the box where it is today a lot of pain was
endured by plenty of customers who had to deal with a not-so-nice
Alcatel. The box pricing is not that great and for the same money you
can find better elsewhere.

[Nicolas Antoniello]

I think we should keep this list as much neutral as we may regarding individual preferences.

Why some of you keep writing offensive mails to those who write neutral ones or to those
who know less than what you THINK you know.

Have you heard about: "All we are ignorants, the thing is that we ignore different things"?

So my recommendation for life is: try to be more modest 'cos as some one say somewhere:
life is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you're going to get.

By the way, I'm not related to any vendor, nor any manufacturer company... oh, even not
from USA... so this is as much neutral as may get!

Nic.

Post by Paul Wall

Post by Dan Snyder
What about Alcatel's MPLS edge routers like the 7x50 products that
came from Timetra...anyone have any experience with them? Are they a
good product?

Garbage, the 7750/7450 are complete junk boxes. Here is why...
- For fun, view a 7750/7540 router configuration file and grep for
the word "exit". Count how many times you see that word. To sum it up,
the CLI is kind of annoying. Lets just say the 7x50 rivals a Bay Annex
CLI for uselessness.
- They attempted to mimic the Juniper style of policy-statements, but
they still fall short of it. Whats up with the pseudo-commit crap?
- The majority of ALU folks supporting the 7x50 are all from former
failed router vendors (caspian, nexabit, etc). When you deal with such
teams, keep your operator hat on and realize that some of the stuff
being suggested are from people who've never worked in production.
- 7x50 is about 1-2 years behind Cisco and Juniper on any feature
functionality on the boxes.
- The ALU business unit has no comprehension why users want to
interface with the box via CLI as opposed to their SAM EMS junk. The
BU and the former Newbridge developers think folks run their network
from a Sparc via a GUI. Times have changed...NETCONF what?
- If you haven't run into any BGP scaling issues yet, you will, soon.
- Limited RSVP-TE support...nothing compared to Juniper.
There are plenty of other better options like the Cisco 6500/7600 as
well as the Juniper MX. Why settle for sub-standard CLI, weak features
and a business unit who has no operational experience and their only
claim to fame was gobbling up companies and exploiting their long-time
industry friendships to seal massive deals.
I know some will reply to talk about their great failover is and this
and that, whatever. To get the box where it is today a lot of pain was
endured by plenty of customers who had to deal with a not-so-nice
Alcatel. The box pricing is not that great and for the same money you
can find better elsewhere.
_______________________________________________
NANOG mailing list
http://mailman.nanog.org/mailman/listinfo/nanog

[Tim Sanderson]

Why be neutral? If something is better, then it is better. Whenever I have tried a vendor other than Cisco for a routing or switching solution, I regretted it. Now I use Cisco equipment exclusively except where they do not make that product I need [such as FatPipe MPVPN].

Tim

-----Original Message-----
From: Nicolas Antoniello [mailto:***@antel.net.uy]
Sent: Wednesday, May 14, 2008 12:53 PM
To: Paul Wall
Cc: Dan Snyder; ***@nanog.org
Subject: Re: [NANOG] Alcatel

I think we should keep this list as much neutral as we may regarding individual preferences.

Why some of you keep writing offensive mails to those who write neutral ones or to those
who know less than what you THINK you know.

Have you heard about: "All we are ignorants, the thing is that we ignore different things"?

So my recommendation for life is: try to be more modest 'cos as some one say somewhere:
life is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you're going to get.

By the way, I'm not related to any vendor, nor any manufacturer company... oh, even not
from USA... so this is as much neutral as may get!

Nic.

Post by Paul Wall

Post by Dan Snyder
What about Alcatel's MPLS edge routers like the 7x50 products that
came from Timetra...anyone have any experience with them? Are they a
good product?

Garbage, the 7750/7450 are complete junk boxes. Here is why...
- For fun, view a 7750/7540 router configuration file and grep for
the word "exit". Count how many times you see that word. To sum it up,
the CLI is kind of annoying. Lets just say the 7x50 rivals a Bay Annex
CLI for uselessness.
- They attempted to mimic the Juniper style of policy-statements, but
they still fall short of it. Whats up with the pseudo-commit crap?
- The majority of ALU folks supporting the 7x50 are all from former
failed router vendors (caspian, nexabit, etc). When you deal with such
teams, keep your operator hat on and realize that some of the stuff
being suggested are from people who've never worked in production.
- 7x50 is about 1-2 years behind Cisco and Juniper on any feature
functionality on the boxes.
- The ALU business unit has no comprehension why users want to
interface with the box via CLI as opposed to their SAM EMS junk. The
BU and the former Newbridge developers think folks run their network
from a Sparc via a GUI. Times have changed...NETCONF what?
- If you haven't run into any BGP scaling issues yet, you will, soon.
- Limited RSVP-TE support...nothing compared to Juniper.
There are plenty of other better options like the Cisco 6500/7600 as
well as the Juniper MX. Why settle for sub-standard CLI, weak features
and a business unit who has no operational experience and their only
claim to fame was gobbling up companies and exploiting their long-time
industry friendships to seal massive deals.
I know some will reply to talk about their great failover is and this
and that, whatever. To get the box where it is today a lot of pain was
endured by plenty of customers who had to deal with a not-so-nice
Alcatel. The box pricing is not that great and for the same money you
can find better elsewhere.
_______________________________________________
NANOG mailing list
http://mailman.nanog.org/mailman/listinfo/nanog

[Nicolas Antoniello]

Ok, I agree with you, may be I didn't explain myself clear: I meant "neutral" in the sense
of relation with each other (i.e. Not being hostile).

Nic.

Post by Tim Sanderson
Why be neutral? If something is better, then it is better. Whenever I have tried a vendor other than Cisco for a routing or switching solution, I regretted it. Now I use Cisco equipment exclusively except where they do not make that product I need [such as FatPipe MPVPN].
Tim
-----Original Message-----
Sent: Wednesday, May 14, 2008 12:53 PM
To: Paul Wall
Subject: Re: [NANOG] Alcatel
I think we should keep this list as much neutral as we may regarding individual preferences.
Why some of you keep writing offensive mails to those who write neutral ones or to those
who know less than what you THINK you know.
Have you heard about: "All we are ignorants, the thing is that we ignore different things"?
life is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you're going to get.
By the way, I'm not related to any vendor, nor any manufacturer company... oh, even not
from USA... so this is as much neutral as may get!
Nic.

Post by Paul Wall

Post by Dan Snyder
What about Alcatel's MPLS edge routers like the 7x50 products that
came from Timetra...anyone have any experience with them? Are they a
good product?

Garbage, the 7750/7450 are complete junk boxes. Here is why...
- For fun, view a 7750/7540 router configuration file and grep for
the word "exit". Count how many times you see that word. To sum it up,
the CLI is kind of annoying. Lets just say the 7x50 rivals a Bay Annex
CLI for uselessness.
- They attempted to mimic the Juniper style of policy-statements, but
they still fall short of it. Whats up with the pseudo-commit crap?
- The majority of ALU folks supporting the 7x50 are all from former
failed router vendors (caspian, nexabit, etc). When you deal with such
teams, keep your operator hat on and realize that some of the stuff
being suggested are from people who've never worked in production.
- 7x50 is about 1-2 years behind Cisco and Juniper on any feature
functionality on the boxes.
- The ALU business unit has no comprehension why users want to
interface with the box via CLI as opposed to their SAM EMS junk. The
BU and the former Newbridge developers think folks run their network
from a Sparc via a GUI. Times have changed...NETCONF what?
- If you haven't run into any BGP scaling issues yet, you will, soon.
- Limited RSVP-TE support...nothing compared to Juniper.
There are plenty of other better options like the Cisco 6500/7600 as
well as the Juniper MX. Why settle for sub-standard CLI, weak features
and a business unit who has no operational experience and their only
claim to fame was gobbling up companies and exploiting their long-time
industry friendships to seal massive deals.
I know some will reply to talk about their great failover is and this
and that, whatever. To get the box where it is today a lot of pain was
endured by plenty of customers who had to deal with a not-so-nice
Alcatel. The box pricing is not that great and for the same money you
can find better elsewhere.
_______________________________________________
NANOG mailing list
http://mailman.nanog.org/mailman/listinfo/nanog

_______________________________________________
NANOG mailing list
http://mailman.nanog.org/mailman/listinfo/nanog
_______________________________________________
NANOG mailing list
http://mailman.nanog.org/mailman/listinfo/nanog

[Aaron Glenn]

On Wed, May 14, 2008 at 11:11 AM, Nicolas Antoniello

Post by Nicolas Antoniello
Ok, I agree with you, may be I didn't explain myself clear: I meant "neutral" in the sense
of relation with each other (i.e. Not being hostile).

hopefully we're all big boys and girls and can identify a strong
opinion when we see one. are we supposed to be afraid of speaking our
mind because it might hurt a vendors feelings? I mean, I could take
offense to the fact you mentioned you're not from the US -- implying
that all US citizens are generally hostile in their opinions; but I
don't.

Tim's simply giving his opinion as the OP requested -- in a much more
mature manner than a few other posts on this list in the past...

[John Menerick]

I have been using the 7750/7450 in a couple of my production environments.
I have to say this: AMAZING. I have had very little problems with these
machines. Their support has been amazing. I would recommend these machines
to anyone. Beware of the price though. You def. get what you pay for with
the 7750.

John Menerick

Post by Aaron Glenn
On Wed, May 14, 2008 at 11:11 AM, Nicolas Antoniello

Post by Nicolas Antoniello
Ok, I agree with you, may be I didn't explain myself clear: I meant

"neutral" in the sense

Post by Nicolas Antoniello
of relation with each other (i.e. Not being hostile).

hopefully we're all big boys and girls and can identify a strong
opinion when we see one. are we supposed to be afraid of speaking our
mind because it might hurt a vendors feelings? I mean, I could take
offense to the fact you mentioned you're not from the US -- implying
that all US citizens are generally hostile in their opinions; but I
don't.
Tim's simply giving his opinion as the OP requested -- in a much more
mature manner than a few other posts on this list in the past...
_______________________________________________
NANOG mailing list
http://mailman.nanog.org/mailman/listinfo/nanog

[Scott Weeks]

Top posting due to lengthy email...

In my experience from the last year on Alcatel (several years on E and M Juniper before that) you couldn't be more wrong. As far as looking at the config, I back them up to a UNIX box nightly. ":1,$ s/exit//"

Not one of the support guys has ever mentioned SAM when trying to figure something with them out on the CLI, but I do have to agree SAM suks compared to self-written .pl code.

scott



--- ***@gmail.com wrote:

From: "Paul Wall" <***@gmail.com>
To: "Dan Snyder" <***@fusion-networks.com>
Cc: ***@nanog.org
Subject: Re: [NANOG] Alcatel
Date: Wed, 14 May 2008 11:57:03 -0400

Post by Dan Snyder
What about Alcatel's MPLS edge routers like the 7x50 products that
came from Timetra...anyone have any experience with them? Are they a
good product?

Garbage, the 7750/7450 are complete junk boxes. Here is why...

- For fun, view a 7750/7540 router configuration file and grep for
the word "exit". Count how many times you see that word. To sum it up,
the CLI is kind of annoying. Lets just say the 7x50 rivals a Bay Annex
CLI for uselessness.

- They attempted to mimic the Juniper style of policy-statements, but
they still fall short of it. Whats up with the pseudo-commit crap?

- The majority of ALU folks supporting the 7x50 are all from former
failed router vendors (caspian, nexabit, etc). When you deal with such
teams, keep your operator hat on and realize that some of the stuff
being suggested are from people who've never worked in production.

- 7x50 is about 1-2 years behind Cisco and Juniper on any feature
functionality on the boxes.

- The ALU business unit has no comprehension why users want to
interface with the box via CLI as opposed to their SAM EMS junk. The
BU and the former Newbridge developers think folks run their network
from a Sparc via a GUI. Times have changed...NETCONF what?

- If you haven't run into any BGP scaling issues yet, you will, soon.

- Limited RSVP-TE support...nothing compared to Juniper.

There are plenty of other better options like the Cisco 6500/7600 as
well as the Juniper MX. Why settle for sub-standard CLI, weak features
and a business unit who has no operational experience and their only
claim to fame was gobbling up companies and exploiting their long-time
industry friendships to seal massive deals.

I know some will reply to talk about their great failover is and this
and that, whatever. To get the box where it is today a lot of pain was
endured by plenty of customers who had to deal with a not-so-nice
Alcatel. The box pricing is not that great and for the same money you
can find better elsewhere.