So Cisco's much touted March 4 big announcement is of the Cisco Aggregation Services Router (ASR) 1000 series, designed for multiservice and broadband aggregation, applications 
traditionally handled by Cisco’s aging 7200, 7300 and 10000 series routers. According to a story by Network World's Jim Duffy, Cisco stopped short of saying the ASR 1000 would eventually replace those platforms but observers expect that to be the case, especially given that Cisco spent five years and $250 million developing the new line, which features the new QuantumFlow processor that Cisco announced last week, and operating system. Analysts say that the router will attack the sweetspot of Juniper's E-series and Redback’s SmartEdge systems.
Full details of the Cisco ASR 1000 series here.
See a slideshow of the product line here.
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JunOS has always been modular.
Cisco now has Linux kernel. Juniper has been running on FreeBSD since day one. Yet another version of IOS for Cisco? Dual versions of IOS running in case of a problem. Juniper can do that with separate routing engines and the ability to roll back to the older code. Cisco 'yet another' IOS XE is modular, JunOS has always been modular.
No doubt. It would've a lot
No doubt. It would've a lot smarter and less costly if Cisco introduced rebadged Juniper routers instead of trying to copy what Juniper have been doing since 1998. That way those that have already standardized on Juniper, such as most of Europe and Asia and surely North America, don't have to learn an inferior clone of JUNOS. Out of the gate I see the ASR 1000 as second class up against Juniper since it's based on a Linux OS that's not as well structured, proven and stable as BSD that JUNOS is built on. I remember when Cisco migrated their IDS' from SunOS to Linux and it turned the appliance into a memory leaking, underperforming and self corrupting piece of garbage. It wasn't until later versions of 5.x where it would run continuously more than week. So, it's questionable how long it'll take Cisco to iron out the bugs in the new hardware and software but anything other than the braindead and security vulnerable IOS is an improvement.
Linux morons ...
Where was Juniper 23 years ago when Cisco was founded. Cisco was dominating the LAN and WAN before Linux was evem a word. Even after 23 years of running on a monolithic architecture, they still dominate. Keep in mind, modular IOS has been out for 3 years and Cisco, as usuaal, adopts new technologies as they develop new architectures. You Linux/Juniper folks seem to think Linux is some sort of savior. It was a free OS which required ZERO innovation on Juniper's behalf. Juniper has a small niche, but they provide very little that Cisco can do a well if not better in most cases.
Hardware the issue on this one
The Linux/IOS issue is far less important than Cisco's decision on integrating all control-plane and datapath functions into one ASIC, meaning on one central board in a small router. Juniper, through its T Matrix, T 1600, and JCS 1200 products, has opted for a more distributed, virtual approach, with separation of control-plane hardware so complete, it's implemented in a separate box in the JCS 1200. The key is which will be cheaper to implement at the edge. Since Cisco's ARS prices start at $35,000, it seems they're willing to make it a loss-leader to gain market share, since it's not clear Cisco could recoup all the costs of developing the Quantum Flow Processor at that price.
Re: Linux morons
Before you make a fool of yourself go understand the difference between Linux that runs Cisco IOS XE and BSD which is what Juniper JUNOS is based on. Even though they're both classified as unix they're a world apart in regards to structured development, stability and security. Anybody who knows operating systems will prefer BSD and those who know good hardware architecture and appreciate no compromise performance, stability, security and survivability use Juniper. Keep drinking the Cisco coolaid until one day someone decides to direct a small amount traffic that disables your 7600/6500 with Sup720-3BXL and disconnect you from the internet. Or, they can alter the traffic to bring down your core and disrupt internal networking. Juniper is immune out of the box.
From a former Cisco customer who has seen the light.
Software and security key to Cisco ASR 1000 router series
Two of the key aspects of Cisco's new ASR 1000 routers is its security and software capabilities. According to Jamey Heary, Cisco Subnet's Cisco security expert, the 40 core, quantum flow process engine of the router could be considered as an autonomous combat information center that "hyper-accelerates the various security features using advanced hardware acceleration and queuing techniques." This means that the platform can employ all of its security features simultaneously without incurring a massive loss in the combat effectiveness of any one feature or the system as a whole, writes Jamey. Meanwhile, a story in eWeek.com points to the software's ability to upgrade the routers without having to take them out of service.
Read the full post here.
Linda Leung
Cisco Subnet Editor
Cisco can be very creative with marketing and specs but 40 cores
Cisco can be very creative with marketing and specs but 40 cores is ridiculous. From a CPU point of view it's known that fewer faster cores are better than more slower cores due to overhead with managing all those cores. I wonder if 40 cores is Cisco marketing speak for 40 daemons or processes running on their Linux based Cisco IOS XE? Silly nevertheless.
test2
another test
Any business using Cisco
Any business using Cisco 10K, 7600, 6500, 7300, 7200 and lower model routers at the internet edge and inside the network at the core should be very concerned. One of the known underground attack arsenals targets the vulnerability of these platforms and with little transit traffic can disable any business riding on these hardware. It's just a matter of time. The internet has become increasingly hostile and only the fittest survive. Cisco have finally festered up to the weaknesses and seem to be addressing the issue with the ASR 1000 line. It's yet to be seen and tested if they got it right like their competitor.
The ASR 1000 is going to
The ASR 1000 is going to deliver a severe spanking to Juniper -- ouch -- I would be very concerned if I worked at Juniper.
Any businesses using Cisco? Yeah -- try 85%. Juniper remains at a flat 5%.
If there is one place you will never beat Cisco it is Enterprise Routing and Switching. It will be fun to watch Cisco crush Juniper's hopes for growth in this market.