Router for small wireless ISP

[Superdust]

Hello

We are a small wireless ISP.
We have about 500 coustomers that get connection from us.
Most of them have 1 or 2 mbit connectons.

Today we use a 2626m to connect ouer backbone to fibre uplink.

But I`m locking to get better control with traffic, like bittorrent, limewire etc so that these applications don`t use to mutch bandwith.

Could I use the 7102dl router for that purpose?.

Thank you for any tips.

[Jason Luckett]

Hi,

the 2626M is a small switch which only has 10/100 ports with 2 dual personality ports at 10/100/1000 (mini-GBIC).

There are several things you will need to take into consideration if you are looking to replace this switch.

1, Do you require POE as you have stated that you are a small wireless ISP.

2, Do you require Gigabit ethernet ports.

3, I assume you are looking for layer 4 COS/QOS so that you can controll bandwidth via UDP/TCP port.

If the answer to all of the above is yes.

Then you may wish to swap the switch for a more advanced switch rather than a router.

The 3500yl-48G-PWR, this stackable switch gives you routing capability, (OSPF available with Premium licence), Full CoS/QoS to layer 4, PoE and gigabit ports throughout the switch.

Unfortunately with all the new ProCurve switches the dual personality ports take up the use of the RJ45 ports when a mini-GBIC is installed.

so to cover the port capacity of your older switch you need to go up a model.

If you are looking for more fibre ports though I would recommend using the 5406zl-48G whioch has the same features as the 3500yl but comes as a modular unit with better scalability for future planned growth.

I hope this helps,

If you have any further questions Please do not hesitate in asking.

Regards,

Jase

[Superdust]

Thank you Jason.

1.I do not need POE.
2.No, not as the situation is today, but probably in the future.
3.Yes, guess that is the way to control P2P bandwith?.

I do not need fibre ports as the fibre uplink is converted to ethernet before this stage.

......

[Mohieddin Kharnoub]

Hi

I don't think the 7102 can handle any kind of Traffic shaping functions or traffic control mechanisms.

Most of the Firewalls with IDP can control this kind of stuff by its policies.

Its like if you want to classify traffic, you create policies in the firewall and specify the amount of guaranteed bandwidth and maximum bandwidth, and the priority for each class of traffic.

If you don't want to use a Firewall, you can use QoS with DiffServ Codepoint Marking, but not with the 2600 series.

Maybe with the 3500 as Jason suggested, or with the new 2810 series.

All this in Hardware, you still can do that in Software, but it will be slow and its not a good solution for ISP :)

Good Luck !!!

[Jason Luckett · Accepted solution]

Hi,

If you require better control the 2626 does Layer 4 CoS/QoS, with the latest version of software installed.

So there is no real need to replace the Switch.

But if you are requiring better bandwith shaping ie Rate limiting and Guaranteed minimum, the new Procurve switches will do this for you, and they have a higher backplane speed an example of which is:

2626 : 9.6 Gbps Backplane with Up to 6.6 million pps.

the 5406-48G : 346 Gbps Backplane with Up to 214 million pps

Since you do not require Fibre you will not have any costly Fibre transceivers to pay out for.

But if you do not require all 26 ports from the 2626 then a 2824 will do the same with Gigabit capability.

I hope this helps,

Jase

[Superdust]

Ok.

Do you think the 2626 vil handle qos in a network like this without slowdowns?.

Basicly it`s all about getting control with P2P.

[Jason Luckett]

Hi,

You will have to monitor the network to see how much traffic you are handling, because if you set DSCP(Diffserv) policy and then configure the priority codepoints, and you don't have the bandwidth to handle the provisioning of Priorities you might find the queues might drop packets.

I would monitor the nework for a week to see how much bandwith is used to see if you have the ability to prioitize.

If you don't I would upgrade the switch to handle Gigabit, which will give you the bandwith to prioritize the traffic.

the details fro how to do this can be found:

Chapter/module 6 of the following PDF;

ftp://ftp.hp.com/pub/networking/software/2600-2800-4100-6108-AdvTraff-Oct2005-59908853.pdf

I hope this helps.

Regards,

Jase

[Matt Hobbs]

The 2626 has very limited routing capabilities, it has a host route table of only 128 entries. After this is consumed it will start routing in software and performance will suffer. For your particular setup I would definitely avoid using the 2600.

[Superdust]

Thank you for the tip Matt.

What would you recomend in this case?.

[Olaf Borowski]

Hi,

Would this device (possibly 7102dl) be deployed at the customer site or your central site? I guess what you want to do is rate-limit certain traffic coming into your network, right? Can you expand on your topology?


Thanks,
Olaf