Would you consider Deploying the Vyatta open-source router over cisco in a small business environment?

At first glance there seems to be lots of pros but are there any cons?

Sure, I'd probably use it in a small business environment. I don't really like the interface, it's sort of like learning to walk again, but it seems like a decent routing platform for cheap.

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Reasonably un-nerdy blog:
americanwerewolfinbelgrade.wordpress.com/

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Reasonably un-nerdy blog:
americanwerewolfinbelgrade.wordpress.com/

Not to speak ill about our new source of funds, but has anyone ever tried to by POS interfaces for PC? If you can find them, they are stupid expensive... Which leads me to the point, ethernet is no problem on PC's but any of the one-off's (ATM, T1/E1, etc) are quite expensive and hard to integrate properly (especially into God know's what stripped down Linux version/kernel they are running)

Also, look at the other risks, you primary routing environment is now running on "commodity" equipment. The Cisco hardware is hardened against environ and other things like that. I know that the hardware is going to work beyond what a hard drive, ram, cpu fan, etc will. Even if you do purchase higher end equipment, look at how often you are having to replace system components in IBM, HP, or Dell hardware? And look at your reboot counts. W/ swap files getting fragmented, buffers overflowing inside of unknown kernel paramaters/functions, and other misc "ghost in the machine" issues, is it really worth the risk?

This is the same reason why I use the best of breed approach to my R&S platforms. Cisco for routing (in my opinion, still better then Juniper) and Foundry for switching (because I can't afford the Force10 Hammer of Dawn & they make incredible equipment).

Sorry, I will get off my soap box now.

Thanks!

you were able to find a POS interface for a pc? i cant find one...

anyhow, it seems that this is more geared for an ethernet shop - smaller schools, small to mid-sized business...it might actually work well for folks who get ethernet WAN/MAN circuits. once you're spending the money to have an oc3/oc12 dropped off in your building, you probably have the money for a more traditional router. i wouldnt try to get a channelized ds3 card for this platform either.

That's what I'm thinking... it'd be nice for a small deployment, but not much more than that I'd think.

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Reasonably un-nerdy blog:
americanwerewolfinbelgrade.wordpress.com/

As the guy who placed the ad on this forum, I thought I'd take minute and reply to some of the questions being raised about Vyatta.

1. Vyatta is an excellent small business solution using our appliances or software. We have hundreds of small & medium business customers today using Vyatta for edge routing, VPNs and firewalling. We also have several large worldwide enterprises and Tier 1 and Tier 2 ISPs and hosting providers using Vyatta as their edge routers (T3 and 10Gig E).

2. There are WAN interfaces available DSL thru T3 and they are less expensive than Cisco cards. We have already done the work to integrate drivers for Sangoma cards (and we resell them)

3. If you prefer a web interface over the command line, the web GUI will be available again in the next release which is currently in beta.

4. Commodity server hardware is generally faster and more scalable than most mid-range proprietary routing & security equipment.

5. If you ever have questions about hardware, performance, configs, or anything else... we have a very active user community on our Vyatta.org forums who will be happy to help you out.

Cool, I was hoping somebody from Vyatta would come in and perhaps answer a few of these questions. Thanks!

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Reasonably un-nerdy blog:
americanwerewolfinbelgrade.wordpress.com/

I am going to have to disagree w/ you on this one. With ASIC technology, you are able to develop a much faster and more focused platform for whatever application you are hosting. Commodity hardware is like using a sledge hammer to hang a picture. Although, yes it will work, it isn't going to be as specialized as a tack hammer (ok, really bad analogy, but, you get what I am saying??).

The small to medium business side, yes I can see where the firewalling or something like that would be nice (as long as you are running ethernet, or some subset of a T3/E3).

Thanks for responding to my banter though. I'm glad to see that the sponsor is somewhat active in the forum community. And who knows, if I get some free time, I'll try out your gear and you have a convert.

rfn_jhardy - I agree completely on the value of ASICs, just that their need is focused much higher up the food chain. That's why I qualified my statement as "mid-range routing & security".

Looking forward to having you join the Vyatta community.

-Tom

Hey that's awesome of you to join Tom. Cheers for posting.