Vyatta, can they really challenge Cisco/Juniper

Vyatta - Welcome to the Dawn of Open Source Networking



If you have ever used a Cisco router, you know its not exactly like baking cookies.

When I bought my first Cisco routers to run Flare's network connections I was absolutely lost. We had 4-5 network tech's who ran complex app environments and networking, but for the life of us...we couldn't figure out that Cisco box.

Setting up this box required almost $10k in consulting and even then we didn't dare touch it for fear we might bring the internet down (seriously, we thought this).

A couple years later during our expansion we went to go find alternative solutions and came across Juniper. Juniper had a smarter router design that used an ASIC for their packet movement with a standard processor for creating rules and applying logic. The design was cost effective and was scalable but those were just the icing. The real treat came when they invited us to Denver and actually trained us in how to use their equipment. This also included tickets to see the Av's in the playoffs.

Somewhere in this process I realized that the reason we had such a bad experience with Cisco was simply because they didn't have to work for customers any more. There were such limited options, you bought without a choice.

I hope Vyatta turns this industry upside down. I only wish they could have done it 5 years earlier and before I spent 100K on routing equipment that now sits unused in a warehouse