Network pics thread

RavinDJ said:
DSC09745.JPG



DSC09746.JPG
Click to expand...

Here are the specs for the 3 servers (all SuperMicros) that are NOT being used AT ALL. What should I tell them?

TOP (KVM #1)
SuperMicro
Intel Pentium 4 @ 2.4Ghz (1 CPU)
512MB DDR266 RAM
80GB Hard Drive (ST380811AS)
CD ROM
Floppy

BOTTOM (KVM #2)
Supermicro P8SC8 / P8SC8i
Intel Pentium 4 @ 3.0Ghz (CPU #1)
Intel Pentium 4 @ 3.0Ghz (CPU #2)
1024MB RAM
3ware 9500S-4LP SATA RAID Controller (RAID 5)
250GB Western Digital WD2500YS SATA Hard Drive #1
250GB Western Digital WD2500YS SATA Hard Drive #2
250GB Western Digital WD2500YS SATA Hard Drive #3
250GB Western Digital WD2500YS SATA Hard Drive #4
CD Rom
Port #9 on Dell 5324 Switch

CentOS release 4.2
Checking root file system.

iNodes that were part of a corrupted orphan linked list found.

UNEXPECTED INCONSISTENCY; RUN fsck MANUALLY [FAILED]

* an error occurred during the file system check.
* dropping you to a shell; the system will reboot.
* when you leave the shell
Give root password for maintenance
or type Control-D to continue


MIDDLE (KVM #3)
Supermicro
Intel Pentium 4 @ 2.4Ghz (1 CPU)
512MB DDR266 RAM
80GB Hard Drive
CD ROM
Floppy
 
Horray for Progess today. Finally getting things together and such.

Overview of the servers and stuff:

100_1218.jpg


Servers racked up today:

100_1216.jpg


100_1217.jpg


Networking Stuff:

100_1219.jpg


Where the computers / towers that wont fit in the rack will be going:

100_1220.jpg


Test bench and white board:

100_1221.jpg


Going all out esx with vcenter, vmware view, consolidated backup, iSCSI attached nas. Hopefully I can possibly get a visio together soon of how this is all going to happen. There are a few undecided things right now though.
 
hardware-smaller786.jpg


Both of the 5509's are functional, there were some issues with the lower one but we got them resolved (must have been a loose connection or something).

Pics were taken at a LAN, about 20 people, but around 300 ports. We actually had BGP set up on those routers for a bit of a laugh. Ended up having issues with the school's main network (we always have issues with the internet connection, they've got one 2621 for the whole school) so we just unplugged the routers.
 
Yay! Got myself a new gift. Guess what it is. :p
IMG_0120-1.jpg


EDIT: I just replace it's memory from DDR333 256MB to DDR400 512MB. It did help a little. :eek:
Info:
Intel 1.2Ghz Mobile Celeron
Intel Nics
Intel NB/SB.
220W PSU
2GB SanDisk Ultra II CompactFlash
512MB DDR400.

IMG_0121.jpg



 
Last edited:
xphil3 said:
Heres another contrib:
http://i25.photobucket.com/albums/c58/xphil3/Networking/9k.jpg
ASR+494810GE
Click to expand...

Tell me honestly: how's the code on these things w.r.t. regular IOS? We're contemplating running the ASR1000 for smaller branches (replacing 7200s), an ASR9000 for larger branches (replacing 7600s), to all tie into some CRS-1s at the core.

From my understanding, XR is more mature than XE. XR runs on CRS-1 and ASR9000, while XE runs on ASR1000. Why is that, anyway?

Let me reiterate that we're just looking into it... not sure yet. No commission for you :D
 
hmmm.. mini pci slot... that PCI backplane connector with the right board might allow you to add nics or stuff too.. that would be fun to toy with.

how long is the warranty? after its out i'd use a second CF card to toy with other stuff.
 
OmegaAvenger said:
hmmm.. mini pci slot... that PCI backplane connector with the right board might allow you to add nics or stuff too.. that would be fun to toy with.

how long is the warranty? after its out i'd use a second CF card to toy with other stuff.
Click to expand...

A year. but I think I seen this main board somewhere.
 
just2cool said:
Tell me honestly: how's the code on these things w.r.t. regular IOS? We're contemplating running the ASR1000 for smaller branches (replacing 7200s), an ASR9000 for larger branches (replacing 7600s), to all tie into some CRS-1s at the core.

From my understanding, XR is more mature than XE. XR runs on CRS-1 and ASR9000, while XE runs on ASR1000. Why is that, anyway?

Let me reiterate that we're just looking into it... not sure yet. No commission for you :D
Click to expand...
can't post the answers on a public forum as some of it is privileged information but ill answer a few. PM me(on AIM) and we can talk about it. You're a paying customer so you could always say that you're engineer gave it to you.

Yes, IOS-XR is more mature than XE but they're are almost identical is many many ways. My CU's dont use the ASR nor CRS-1 so I really can't tell you how they are from a reliability standpoint first hand nor from our collection agents as thats very privileged. I can tell you that they are hella stable though :D
 
I'll just say that IOS XE is a new iteration of the OS and there are some bugs out there. Just make sure you do some research on the Cisco bug report tool before purchasing to make sure that none of your critical functionality will be affected.

I'm waiting on the XE 2.4.x release right now to fix some bugs related to SIP/NAT traffic :(
 
Going to throw up a few before/after pics of a few different MDF closets :

Here's the first one. This used to house a DS3 over OC-3 WAN connection, and aggregated fiber from 13 buildings. We had the DS3 circuit shut down recently, and this closet now acts as a distribution layer aggregation stack back to another building that now hosts the new WAN link. If you look carefully, you'll see a bunch of T1 lines from many years ago :p

uv1.jpg
uv2.jpg


uv3.jpg


We removed the old 7200 series router, replaced the 7 foot patch cables with short ones and cleaned the area out. The fiber still looks terrible but its such a mess that we're not even touching it until we replace the 3550 switches with 3750G's next year :eek:

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Next up, is another closet, again with oversized patch cables. About 12 buildings aggregate to this closet.

All the equipment on this rack was torn out (except for the UPS) and replaced. The switches were 3548XL's, 3524XL's and 3508XL's, router was a 3745 that couldn't handle the WAN bandwidth upgrade. This rack was redone after moving from a 20MB ME fiber link to a 100MB link. New equipment includes 3560 and 3750 switches, and a 3845 router.

up1.jpg
up2.jpg


This setup is pushing the performance envelope of this router as a NAT/Firewall box, but it's within reason for now. As the network in that area grows, we will probably replace it with an ASR1000.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

This is the same rack as the picture I posted earlier but zoomed out a bit. Originally this closet only aggregated 2 buildings and about 900 users with a 3845 router and a 3750G switch at the core. It now pulls together 18 buildings and around 3,000 users and pushes them out one big ME Fiber WAN link connected to an ASR1000 and a stack of 3750G's for core L3 switching.

vs1.jpg
vs2.jpg


Yes I know the servers are ridiculous, they are being replaced by twin rackmount virtualization rigs this fall hopefully :)

Sorry for all the pics and the long post, enjoy :cool:
 
Lightworker said:
I'll just say that IOS XE is a new iteration of the OS and there are some bugs out there. :(
Click to expand...

This is exactly what is it just2cool, couldn't have said it better. Its almost a direct copy of XR. This doesn't mean Cisco isn't going to stop releasing XR though ;)

Lightworking, more bugs that you know :p
 
Lightworker said:
Going to throw up a few before/after pics of a few different MDF closets...

...Sorry for all the pics and the long post, enjoy :cool:
Click to expand...

Don't apologize!! I LOVE those type of pics. I just don't see enough of them. I especially like the before/after shots!! Thx so much for sharing your work with us here.
 
Thanks guys, as time goes on, I'll get some pics of some access-wiring closets and throw them up. This is for residential areas at a school, purely internet access for students and supporting a mid-sized office to run the place.

xphil: I've already reported about 4-5 undiscovered bugs to Cisco already, and the worst bugs are the ones that Cisco thinks they've fixed 3 software revisions ago...but still happen =/
 
they likely couldn't replicate it in their labs and therefore considered it fixed. Sometimes its environment dependent
 
Lightworker said:
xphil: I've already reported about 4-5 undiscovered bugs to Cisco already, and the worst bugs are the ones that Cisco thinks they've fixed 3 software revisions ago...but still happen =/
Click to expand...
yeah, I hit bugs on a daily basis though its much easier for me to get them reported/fixed. Also, Cisco is quite crazy about their regression testing so if you're seeing something that you think is a bug that was fixed it might be something completely new. Open a TAC case and they will be able to tell you if its a new/old bug that may not have been caught in the reg. tests.

The public bug tool is okay, but has maybe 1/10000 of what internal tools hold. Omega also hit the nail on the head, if it can't be *easily* recreated in a sufficient(how much money you pay) amount of time its not considered a bug until its reported a number of times by different customers. Root cause is key(obviously) for it to be a bug.
 
^Yep definitely agree, TAC is a crap shoot sometimes though. About a month ago I was fighting over a bug that was dropping all my incoming VOIP traffic that was fixed by moving to a release that was 2-3 revisions prior, but then that version brought a handful of more serious bugs that crippled other parts of my network.

That's what we get for picking the shiny new model router I guess :eek:

Even with all the little things we've had to work around, it's still pretty sweet and does a great job :cool:
 
Here's a quick one of a wiring closet I did some work in today

DSC_4700_DxO2_raw.jpg


And a few shots from an MDF rack I posted earlier:

DSC_4694_DxO2_raw.jpg


DSC_4686_DxO2_raw.jpg


DSC_4685_DxO2_raw.jpg


Enjoy :cool:
 
Not to be an ass, but I'm curious as to why do you have an enterprise router like the ASR combined with a 3560? I'd at least expect some 4948s or some sort of chassis switch.

Is that for next years budget/project? :D

Nice wiring, though.
 
One of the companies I work at:

IMG00041.jpg

IMG00042.jpg


Needs to be cleaned up very badly. Unfortunately, we need at least one more IT person so I can do tackle this project. :(
 
CaseyBlackburn said:
Here we see two opposite lifestyles of the networking creature. The top photo is a network that likes to look at itself in the mirror, and cares about what it eats. The bottom photo is a network that....well...pretty much just let itself go... :p
Click to expand...


Haha. When I was hired 3 months ago, it was worse. I cleaned up the hanging unused wires at least! :p
 
just2cool said:
Not to be an ass, but I'm curious as to why do you have an enterprise router like the ASR combined with a 3560? I'd at least expect some 4948s or some sort of chassis switch.

Is that for next years budget/project? :D

Nice wiring, though.
Click to expand...

Well, let's not get the impression that the entire network runs through that 3560 in the picture, because it doesn't. That switch just supports 48 end users and that's it. The 3750 stack is the core switching gear and has fiber links out to other 3750's on the distribution layer, which in turn have fiber going to the 3560 access switches in the wiring closets.

But for argument's sake, it's all about what you "need" and not what you "want."

I would love to have a pair of redundant 6500's as my core switching gear, but it's not necessary. I'd like to have stacks of 3750g's in my access closets, but it's not necessary. I'm sure you get where this is going...

The primary goal of the network is to provide internet access, we don't need 4500's or Nexus switches to push 10-15mb down to a resident's port. 3560's are just about perfect for the access layer though, the forwarding performance is where it needs to be, and they have all the features we require to maintain a secure and stable network.

The ASR is technically overkill for the network, but the next step down would have been a 7200/7300 series that wouldn't scale with our anticipated growth throughout the useful lifecycle of the device. Because of the 40-core CPU in the ASR, we can also run any number of services (firewall, ips/ids, etc) without the same performance hit you see in traditional single-cpu Cisco gear. It's a powerful router that will stay with us for a while. As we grow, our core switching gear will most likely be replaced with a 6500 (or it's replacement) the next time we add a few new buildings...but for now it meets the requirements and performs fine.

CaseyBlackburn said:
Here we see two opposite lifestyles of the networking creature. The top photo is a network that likes to look at itself in the mirror, and cares about what it eats. The bottom photo is a network that....well...pretty much just let itself go... :p
Click to expand...

I might have to post some pictures of the "bad" closets :D
 
Last edited:
Im with just2cool on this one lightworker. This seems like a poor architectural decision for many reasons and and better switch is something that you need, maybe not now but in the near future. Ill list a few that come to mind and maybe you can explain why you indeed didn't consider these.

1. This switch is NOT non-blocking and minority oversubscribed at the port level. Non-blocking is essential at the distribution/agg especially in an SP environment. Buffers get full fast and intern lots of packet loss. There goes your good rep and possible SLA.

2. The switch can only forward a possible 4.8Gpbs of traffic through the ASIC for ALL 24 ports or in your case 9Gbps. Depending on how new the switch is the number of ASICs may varry(1-2, newer gear 4), which still is a HUGE bottle neck with how many users you said was on this network(3000+). Maximum of 32Gpbs forwarding to the supervisor with dual ring, and older 3560's will have a 16Gbps ring to the supervisor.

3. If you are indeed shaping/policing your customer traffic to 10Mpbs, thats still a total of ~30Gbps *potential* total traffic through that distribution/agg 3560 switch, this is a clear problem. If even half your customers are maxing out their bandwidth(not uncommon at all) you're HOSED :eek:

4. That looks like a 10/100 switch, so you're total bandwidth is still only about 11Gpbs with the ASIC limitations I mentioned. How are you going account for scalability when you start adding new customers?

Any way that you look at it, that switch probably should be there with the *potential* problems, its not scalable and a risk. This is now a SP network, and accordingly it should be built like one(you have the right idea with the ASR 1k:D). I still love your posts, sexy ass gear and very nice cabling! I wish I could post of some of the stuff I work with, people would be nutting for years.
 
Last edited:
Just in the interest of discussion, how is the forwarding performance on a 5509? I've got one with dual SupIII and I'm wondering if getting the WS-X5403 is worth it for a fileserver. It's mildly ridiculous, however, i guess it's somewhat [H], right?
 
cymon said:
Just in the interest of discussion, how is the forwarding performance on a 5509? I've got one with dual SupIII and I'm wondering if getting the WS-X5403 is worth it for a fileserver. It's mildly ridiculous, however, i guess it's somewhat [H], right?
Click to expand...
the 55xx has the capability to forward up to 50Gpbs total with well over 1Mpps. This is all dependent on card configuration and supervisor selection obviously. The SUPIII that you have has the full fabric crossbar interface, which is key and can forward over 1Mpps. The slots should be about 5Gbps(full duplex) per slot theoretically, so that 3 port card is oversubscribed but not too much.
 
I believe the Sup3 supports around 3.6Gbps of backplane forwarding performance, you might want to check on the line cards too though
 
WesM63 said:
Puke.. CatOS.

One of the first school jobs I did.
Click to expand...

CatOS isn't that bad to manage. After have started IOS and learned the CatOS through cisco's website almost think it's quicker to do CatOS commands than IOS.


Also Nice job on the picture. What is the Cisco box that looks like the 1u Server?
 
calvinj said:
CatOS isn't that bad to manage. After have started IOS and learned the CatOS through cisco's website almost think it's quicker to do CatOS commands than IOS.


Also Nice job on the picture. What is the Cisco box that looks like the 1u Server?
Click to expand...

I've played with CatOS, but a little hard for me to understand. Guess i'm spoiled by IOS.

That is a Cisco WLSE. Old school autonomous ap management. (WLC replaced it when lightweight AP's were introduced)

FYI, The rest of the stuff in that pic:
4507R
2x Sup II's
3x 4418's
1x 4148
2x 1400w PSU's

2x 3750-48TS
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top