Date: Fri, 24 May 1996 13:48:29 -0400 From: "Louis A. Mamakos" <louie@TransSys.COM> To: dennis@etinc.com (Dennis) Cc: hackers@freebsd.org Subject: Re: The view from here (was Re: ISDN Compression Load on CPU) Message-ID: <199605241748.NAA05080@whizzo.transsys.com> In-Reply-To: Your message of "Fri, 24 May 1996 12:07:08 EDT." <199605241607.MAA01126@etinc.com> References: <199605241607.MAA01126@etinc.com>
next in thread | previous in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help
> >I'll briefly put my UUNET hat on, the one that I've worn when I was > >directly involved the design, specification and recommendation of > >hardware selections of well in excess of $10M last year. > > this is frightning...... :-) and whats the new version of the old adage > > "no-one ever got fired for recommending Cisco (IBM)" We have considerably more in the network than just Cisco routers. If you read my message again, it applies to backbone routers, customer aggregation routers, dial-up modem/idsn servers, frame relay switches, and other equipment in the network. > Most guys like you arent willing to put your ass on the line to save your > company a few bucks and i cant say i blame you.....but remember, its a > lot easier being an employee than an owner; its easy to spend someone > elses money. I used to recommend Proteons (back when Cisco was > making boxes with vacuum cleaner blowers) at Nynex and Im sure they > use ciscos now, but they're too stupid to use unix or PCs, and most small > ISPs arent. Excuse me, but I have a considerable vested interest in having the company succeed so that the stock options I have become (more) valuable. This is a powerful motivating force and focuses atttention quite effectively. Spending money wisely is very important, but there is a difference between cheap and inexpensive. If you look at the way that the network is built, it's just not the same old thing with a bunch of Cisco plugged together. Believe me, Cisco isn't pleased that we have a bunch of Ascend and Cascade hardware in the network. > >Consider that you have many, many unmanned POP locations, all over the > >planet. These are generally co-located in telephone central offices > >which are not manned 24x7. We colocate in interexchange carrier > >central offices for a variety of reasons, including cost (you don't > >need to purchase $5000/mo local loops on each of your DS3 trunks). > >There is also good environmental conditions and power available in the > >form of -48V DC power plants that run all of the telco transmission > >stuff. > [snipped in the name of bandwidth] > > you've made a good point for backbone routers, but what about the > other 95% of the world? There's no reason why the rest of the hardware on the network has to be expensive to operate. My point is that there is more to the issue to consider than the capital cost of the hardware. If the object of the excercise is to make money, well, you ought to consider all the factors. For example, when you scale things up large enough, running the equipment from a reliable -48V DC power supply becomes very attractive because of the economics and reliability. Rather than a UPS with rectifiers, batteries, inverters and control goo, you need only have rectifiers/chargers and batteries. There are fewer pieces involved which can break, which is always a good thing. As I said, the requirements which I've designed to likely differ from a lot of others in a number of dimensions. But in any application, the whole cost picture should be considered. There is almost always a "Make" vs. "Buy" decision which needs to be made, and it's important to realize the implications of each, and the technology you choose to live with and operate. louie
Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?199605241748.NAA05080>