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North American Network Operators Group Date Prev | Date Next | Date Index | Thread Index | Author Index | Historical Re: Yankee Group declares core routing obsolete (was Re: Anybodyusing GBICs?)
Thus spake "Daniel Golding" <[email protected]> > Hmm. Don't you just love it when folks say things like "Layer 3 Switches are > better than routers". Its very illuminating as to clue level. > > I suppose what they were trying to say, is that products that were designed > as switches, but are now running routing code, are superior to products that > were designed as routers, and are running routing code. Of course, this is > demonstrably false. > > "Layer 3 Switch" is like "Tier 1 ISP" - meaningless marketing drivel, > divorced from any previous technical meaning. I've always stated that "switch" is a marketing term meaning "fast". Thus a "L2 switch" is a "fast bridge" and a "L3 switch" is a "fast router". In this light, the Yankee Group is just now catching on to something we all knew a decade ago -- slow (i.e. software) routers are dead. There's a more interesting level to the discussion if you look at what carriers are interested in for their backbone hardware today; while I'm obviously biased based on my employer, I've seen a lot more emphasis on $20k-per-10GE-port "L3 switches" than $200k-per-10GE-port "core routers" in the current economic climate. S Stephen Sprunk "God does not play dice." --Albert Einstein CCIE #3723 "God is an inveterate gambler, and He throws the K5SSS dice at every possible opportunity." --Stephen Hawking
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