Pat,
At the risk of drawing Jach over to the Newbridge thread, let me give my 2 cents on the Fore ASX-1000. It is a great piece of hardware with software limitations. It has been deployed by carriers specifically to aggregate router traffic - typically maxing out at OC12 (although the latest and greatest now do OC48) - over OC48 links. Fore was first to market - just ahead of Ascend - with OC48 and OC48c interfaces and the box is much cheaper than the GX550 (or for that matter, the 36170). UUNet uses the box extensively, Internet MCI (now C&W) still uses it, there are others.
However, its service oriented software is not considered in the league w/ NN, ASND or CSCO - no one is using it for frame relay or private line emulation for example. AFAIK it has not won any multiservice contract from any sizeable telco. Over time, the ASX 1000 will be squeezed on one side by terabit routers which will not need an ATM layer to make use of the highest speed fiber links, and on the other by multi-service ATM solutions a la ASND, CSCO and NN.
Nonetheless, it is a superior hardware design with significant potential, if someone with some software skills and experience were to pick it up - but it has to happen soon IMHO or Fore will cease to be relevant in the carrier space. |
