Redundancy in High Performance Networks

1. Redundancy in High Performance Networks Fall 2005 Internet2 Member Meeting

2. Cable Plow: Friend or Foe?

3. Need for Network Redundancy in R&E • Though Research and Education institutions are focused on experimentation and research efforts, their work demands production level network services and availability. • Increasing data transfer and processing rates magnifies the impact of a network disruption on a researcher. • A couple of 9’s is not enough.

4. Factors that Impact Availability • Equipment Failure • Chassis, Cards, Slots, Ports, etc. • Facility Events • Power, HVAC, Natural and Human Disasters, etc. • Fiber Events • Cuts, Pinches, Splice Failures, Relocations, etc.

5. Levels of Redundancy • There are varying levels of redundancy with associated cost implications. • The level of redundancy required will be determined by the needs and resources of each institution.

6. Levels of Redundancy

7. Levels of Redundancy, cont’d

8. Levels of Redundancy, cont’d

9. Case Study: Hurricane Katrina • Hurricane Katrina strikes the Gulf Coast on August 29th, 2005. • Abilene’s unprotected lambda network link from Houston to Atlanta goes down. The IGP (IS-IS) routes around the fault. • On September 1st, 2005 the damage to the carrier network is fully assessed and estimated to take days to completely repair. • During this time, Abilene is operating with the risk of network isolation if there is a loss of the Indianapolis to Kansas City link. • A redundancy plan has been formulated and approved by Internet2 to have Abilene traffic route over the HOPI wave from Chicago to Seattle in the event that Chicago to Kansas link fails. The Abilene NOC engineers implement the redundancy plan. • Service is restored to the Houston to Atlanta link on September 8th, 2005. No other Abilene outages occurred during this period.

10. Abilene / NLR Map

11. How Internet2 May Help You • In light of both the recent events and a growing demand within the membership, Internet2 has pursued redundancy options with our partner Qwest Communications. • Qwest has agreed to provide on a per port basis, redundant connections to the Abilene router, at the node, for a cost of $400 per month regardless of speed as long as the redundant circuit speed is equal to or less than the primary circuit. • This option is available to any active Abilene Connector who delivers their redundant circuit to the Abilene node. SONET and Ethernet framing methods would be supported under this option.

12. Internet2’s Redundancy Offering • Internet2 is making the following redundant connections available to its members who bring their circuits to the Abilene node: • VLAN connections through an existing exchange point: • 1 GE $50,000.00 • Physical connections to the router: • OC3 $70,000.00 • OC12 $75,000.00 • OC48 $90,000.00 • OC192 $125,000.00 • 1 GE $80,000.00 • 10GE $125,000.00 • A redundant circuit must be equal to or less than the primary circuit in speed and will not carry traffic unless the primary circuit fails. • Each request will be evaluated on a case basis. The above figures are for budgetary purposes and are subject to change.

13. Internet2’s Redundancy Offering • Member’s requests for redundant circuits that are carried back to an Abilene node over the Qwest network will have their requests evaluated on a case basis for available capacity and pricing. • These types of connections currently must be SONET.

14. Contacts • For more information and other inquiries, please contact: • Steve Cotter, Director, Network Services, Internet2: scotter@internet2.edu • Christian Todorov, Network Engineer, Internet2: ctodorov@internet2.edu

15. Acknowledgements • We would like to thank Qwest Communications for making available to the membership a cost structure that facilitates the acquisition of redundant connectivity on the Abilene network.

16. Questions?