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Juniper has chance to fend off Cisco's monster core router
Published: 7 February, 2010
Tags >> Juniper Networks | Cisco Systems | Core Network
The battle to move the goalposts for core routers is heating up, with Juniper targeting high end telco and cellco deployments with the latest extension to its T-Series architecture. But Cisco may be hard on its heels, with an update for its CRS-1 said to be imminent.
This update, the MSC 120, would leapfrog Juniper's T1600 and Alcatel-Lucent's 7750 Service Router, the main players in this sector, according to Network World. The Cisco product would deliver 120Gbps per slot, compared to 100Gbps on the other two systems, so a 24-port implementation would deliver 2.88Tbps of capacity.
However, Juniper may have breathing space - as it unveils its own new silicon for the T-Series, Cisco is rumored to have hit problems with ASIC design, which could delay its own launch into 2011, according to a research note from Ittai Kidron, an analyst at Oppenheimer. "We believe Cisco has recently discovered issues with the supporting ASIC design, which could require a material redesign of the platform," wrote Kidron.
And if Juniper can get in first with routers, it could beat the MSC 120 before it even appears. Its new generation of silicon aims to upgrade existing T-Series products to a full duplex slot capacity of 250Gbps, the main aim being to ease the migration from 10Gbps to 100Gbps IP cores. The 45nm chipset will eventually support total capacity of 4Tbps in one half-rack system, says Juniper. Products should ship early next year.
Carriers are starting to make firm plans to upgrade most of their wireless and wireline core networks to 100Gbps from this year.
