Web Hosting Talk : Web Hosting Main Forums : Colocation and Data Centers : IP Transit Carrier Rating

[BurstNET]

Where is PCCW on the list?...they rock.
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[djahandarie]

Originally Posted by KarlZimmer

From a purely technical angle, Level3 has unsurpassed route miles, an unsurpassed number of POPs, an unsurpassed number of customer/direct routes (originating over 40% of routes, the only one even close is Global Crossing). Simply no one can compare to the amount of data L3 is handling, pure and simple.

No disagreement here.

Originally Posted by KarlZimmer

I really don't even see how you can say on a strictly technical level someone like nLayer can even compare. nLayer leases individual pairs of fiber from other parties, Level3 constructs brand new low latency routes, globally. If you're looking for the absolute lowest latency between all global financial markets, you'd be hard pressed to find a single network better than Level3. If you're looking at a widely distributed network of facilities/offices, you'd be hard pressed to find a better network than Level3.

I'm talking about Level(3)'s transit here, not their fiber network. Their transit is not MPLS-enabled, meaning if there is a failure which causes packet loss or very high latency, it will be there quite awhile before one of the slower protocols can get it out of the way. No matter how much presence you have, this is a problem. If a financial network decided to use Level(3), they'd no doubt get their VPN or virtual private line services which leverage MPLS fast reroute capabilities to change what would be 50% packet-loss into 2ms of extra latency to route around a dead/overloaded router.

MPLS is no silver bullet, but I consider it a foundational principle of modern IP transit networks, and Level(3)'s transit is lacking it.

[flam316]

I honestly don't get why people recommend AboveNet... their routing isn't so good. I've been routed through London to reach Ashburn... I live 30 miles from NYC. That's just an example. I'm hesistant to buy from providers who use AboveNet because their network is really that horrible. I'd much rather have HE or Cogent or even Bandcon than AboveNet.

[iTom]

Originally Posted by djahandarie

No disagreement here.



I'm talking about Level(3)'s transit here, not their fiber network. Their transit is not MPLS-enabled, meaning if there is a failure which causes packet loss or very high latency, it will be there quite awhile before one of the slower protocols can get it out of the way. No matter how much presence you have, this is a problem. If a financial network decided to use Level(3), they'd no doubt get their VPN or virtual private line services which leverage MPLS fast reroute capabilities to change what would be 50% packet-loss into 2ms of extra latency to route around a dead/overloaded router.

MPLS is no silver bullet, but I consider it a foundational principle of modern IP transit networks, and Level(3)'s transit is lacking it.

Interesting input regarding the L3 transit network, is that setup consistent throughout their network?

[Spudstr]

Originally Posted by flam316

I honestly don't get why people recommend AboveNet... their routing isn't so good. I've been routed through London to reach Ashburn... I live 30 miles from NYC. That's just an example. I'm hesistant to buy from providers who use AboveNet because their network is really that horrible. I'd much rather have HE or Cogent or even Bandcon than AboveNet.

Abovenet has its uses, just like HE and Cogent have their uses. There is no silver bullet.

We have Abovenet part of our mix and we have a fantastic network according to our customers.

[Dualism]

Something that GlobalCrossing and Inteliquent (Tinet) have in common is the very few hops it takes to reach two very far locations when looking at traceroute results. Rarely will it take more than two hops to travel between two edges.

Looking at the market offering, there are a very few provider out there who are 100% Ethernet and truly “next-generation”. Many of the big players mix old and new technologies together, though they have a real depth of geographical reach.

I think that the relevant aspects of a Tier 1 are:

1) The footprint and global reach
2) The traffic engineering (link oversubscription, capacity, best paths, performance, packet loss, stability, number of planned/unplanned outages)
3) The amount of prefixes “on-net” they announce, the more the better

Finally, considering the success of Level(3) in this poll, there are some facts I’d like to share with you. I’ve continuously heard ramblings about Level(3) being partially owned by the US Govt. / Army.

Do we know who are the major investors of Level(3)? Does the US gov. have any stake in the company?

[FastServ]

Originally Posted by Dualism

Do we know who are the major investors of Level(3)? Does the US gov. have any stake in the company?

They do alot of mil contracts for hardware mostly defense stuff. Totally separate part of the company not related to the IP services.

[Dedicatedone]

Can anybody share their experiences with Peer1? I know they're not Tier-1, but I'm curious to see what people have to say about them.

[djahandarie]

Originally Posted by iTom

Interesting input regarding the L3 transit network, is that setup consistent throughout their network?

Yes, they do not run MPLS for any of their transit. (It's technically possible they could run some without anyone noticing, but at the very least they aren't using it in any way that benefits users.)

Originally Posted by Dualism

Something that GlobalCrossing and Inteliquent (Tinet) have in common is the very few hops it takes to reach two very far locations when looking at traceroute results. Rarely will it take more than two hops to travel between two edges.

That's MPLS. There are a number of hops there which you are simply not seeing (and I'd certainly hope they're not running a full mesh).

When you have a label-switched path in MPLS, none of the intermediate routers need to worry about, well, routing. All they do is some manipulation on the MPLS data and forward it to the predetermined next-hop.

This allows network providers to entirely disable TTL decrementing and remove the routing tables from their core routers, creating an MPLS-only core.

Originally Posted by Dedicatedone

Can anybody share their experiences with Peer1? I know they're not Tier-1, but I'm curious to see what people have to say about them.

My experience with them is limited, but so far it's been good, haven't noticed any serious issues.

[KarlZimmer]

Originally Posted by Dualism

Finally, considering the success of Level(3) in this poll, there are some facts I’d like to share with you. I’ve continuously heard ramblings about Level(3) being partially owned by the US Govt. / Army.

Do we know who are the major investors of Level(3)? Does the US gov. have any stake in the company?

They're a publicly traded company, their largest shareholders and ownership structure is publicly available. Here is a rundown of some of the biggest shareholders: http://finance.yahoo.com/q/mh?s=LVLT+Major+Holders

[DMDM]

Peer1 is my choice #1, except for the price