Multivendor Data Centers

[visitor68]

I would like to present this question and take a survey of others' experience.

How often have you run into a data center switching environment that takes a multivendor approach? At least for now, I want to put aside the notion of deploying one vendor in one module of the data center (say DMZ) and another vendor in another module. I am talking about specifically within the same module. So, perhaps use one vendor for the access layer and another for the distro/core...

Is this something that you, as a network architect, are willing to do in principle? If so, under what circumstances? If not, why?

I would very appreciative to get feedback from all of you!

Thanks

[Reza Sharifi · Accepted solution]

I usually try to use the same vender whether it is data center, access layer, core, etc...unless that one vendor can't provide all the functionality I need. The reason for this is management and interoperability. Remember that not all vendor's products play with each other nicely.  In addition, when something goes wrong with the network that is build of multiple vendors products, the first thing I always here is: oh, that is not our product , it is the other vendor. This cause finger pointing between vendors and becomes a big headache for you as the integrator or the guy that has to manage the network. Now, if you are deploying a firewall stack with multiple firewall layers, maybe it is good idea to use 2 different vendors, just in case one vendor's firewall can't stop the treat, hopefully the other will.

HTH

[visitor68]

Reza, I have a tendancy to agree with you....thanks for your input.

Anyone elsE?

[sean_evershed]

Hi,

My personal preference would be to deploy a single vendor in the Data Centre:

- Single maintenance contract to deal with. If you have multiple vendors you need to deal with multiple help desks when something goes wrong.

- Administrative nightmare keeping all the different maintenance contracts from different vendors up to date when they start expiring after a year.

- Reduced cost in training. A network engineer only needs to be an expert in one vendor's product range rather than multiple products.

- Easier to deploy end to end QoS from the Access layer through to the Core with a single vendor.

- Easier to deploy an end to end security solution. Trustsec is a good example of this:

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/netsol/ns1051/index.html

- Mixing and matching different vedors in order to support VOIP complicates the overall network architecture.

- After a few years it becomes a headache keeping track of all the different products as they start to go end of sale/out of support.

- Consider how your network management software is going to keep track of the different vendors, for example monitoring, backups of configs, deploying new software updates etc.

My preference would be to deploy different vendors only for point solutions where they have proven capability/best of breed. For example WAN acceleration or proxy services.

Cheers

Sean

[visitor68]

I agree....I cant see any good reason to mix vendors like that...