|
North American Network Operators Group Date Prev | Date Next | Date Index | Thread Index | Author Index | Historical Frame Relay encap vis-a-vis point-to-point at UUNET
Hey all, We just got a third T1, this time through UUNet and when I looked at their router configuration I got a little surprise. We ordered a point-to-point circuit that is being terminated at their detroit POP. The configuration, however, sets up the line as a frame relay encap on a sub-interface (on a Cisco, of course :). When I talked to my UUNet rep he advised that this was the way "every large ISP did it" which I knew wasn't exactly true since our MCI and AT&T (just recently transitioned from the BBN backbone to the AT&T network) does not use this configuration. He insisted that it was still a point to point and that the frame relay encapsulation was used to enhance the connection. Well, I had him grab an engineer (he was an SE) that could possibly explain it better to me (since the SE said F/R was used to decrease RIP broadcasts across their backbone) and the engineer said this (basically): the circuit is terminated in a cascade 9000 f/r switch (used for port density) which went to a HSSI interface in a Cisco 7xxx series router which connected directly to their ATM network. Therefore, the f/r encaps were needed to speak with the cascade. The engineer advised we had a full CIR and would not suffer any bandwidth loss from using f/r encap. Now, I guess my question is: am I getting sold the brooklyn bridge here? I mean, not that I wouldn't like to *own* the brooklyn bridge (well, I'd rather have the triboro or the washington, but anyway...). Is this f/r encap going have any adverse affect on the quality of this connection (assuming that this is *NOT* a point-to-point into a frame cloud) or am I getting shoveled a load of copralite? Thanks! Barry Barry L James | Mikrotec Internet Services, Inc (AS3801) Director R & D | 1001 Winchester Rd [email protected] | Lexington KY 40505 http://www.mis.net/ | 606/266.5925 800/875.5095 Member AAAI, IEEE # 40277528 --- Man will occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of the time he will pick himself up and continue on. -- Winston Churchill
|