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How to Selecting Cisco Products

You must understand the business requirements of the network before buying a product. Based on the requirements, you can select the appropriate Cisco products.

Today, WAN technologies most often take advantage of high-speed connections, such as T-1 and E-1. Additional WAN technologies exist, including Frame Relay, ISDN, and dial-up asynchronous connections. ISDN or dial-up is used if infrequent connection is made. If a connection is used for more than two to four hours, you should use a Frame Relay or a leased line.Based on the different services available through the service provider, you can select Cisco products that can fulfill your office requirements.

Selecting Hubs
Cisco has various hub products. You can select hubs according to the type of connection required. Higher-end hubs offer network management port and console connections, middle-end hubs offer both 10 Mbps and 100 Mbps auto-sensing connections, and the lower-end hubs offer only 10 Mbps connections. Examples of fast hub series of Cisco are Cisco Fh100, Cisco Fh200, Cisco Fh300, and Cisco Fh400. Examples of micro hub series are Cisco MH1500 and Cisco MH1528.

Selecting Routers
Routers are the most popular Cisco products. To select a router, you must first know the port density and the interface speed required based on the LAN or WAN technologies used. In addition, you must identify the capacity and performance requirements of your business. The cost of the router varies according to the features you select.

Selecting Switches
A switch can be used instead of a hub in newer networks. Most switches are configured to limit collision domains, which often provides a limited security feature because users will not be able to sniff traffic as easily as in a standard hub-based network. This feature can cause confusion when using a network sniffer to analyze traffic. It is possible, however, to analyze packets on a switched network by enabling mirroring on the switch, or by using a dedicated port that allows authorized users to view all network traffic. It is important to consider whether you need 10, 100, or 1000 Mbps for each desktop or to connect between switches. To select a switch, you must consider various issues, such as business requirements, requirements for inter-switch links and trunking, port density, and type of user interface.

From: SemSim

Why buy used network

Whether you call it used, pre-owned or refurbished, buying IT hardware in the secondary IT market can provide significant benefits. If your organization hasn’t considered Second User equipment, then now is the best time to consider the value of what many say is ”equally reliable” equipment. Second User equipment has been a vital option for State and Federal governments as well as private and public organizations around the world. These organizations are stretching budget dollars by capitalizing on this non-traditional IT planning and in the acquisition process.

Second User equipment and new overstock is a result of terminated leasing contracts, OEM overstock, purchasing mistakes, company closures and discontinued programs, which supply the secondary market with a surfeit of current and end-of-life equipment. This surplus is comprised of primarily used equipment, although a significant portion is new, manufacturers’ surplus, open-boxed or unused (out–of-the-box) equipment. This fully functional hardware, including routers, switches, network modules, servers, server options, telephony and much more is available and priced at fifty to ninety per cent off list price. With savings in that range, IT budgets are extended significantly, while limited IT budgets can achieve superior technology through the acquisition of IT surplus that would not be possible through traditional channels.

A flourishing secondary market does raise the question “Is used as good as new?” To answer this, let’s agree that the average refresh cycle is three years for established brands such as Cisco, Foundry, HP, Juniper, IBM and tier one brands. This top of the line equipment has an extensive life span due to superior engineering, which is why it is priced higher than lower end equipment. Most high-end equipment is built to last and when it does fail it is usually due to human error as in mis-handling the hardware. The consensus is that it’s a safe to say that off-lease equipment is “as good as new.” (Consider that it is not uncommon for new equipment that is randomly tested to fail immediately or within a short time frame.)

It is also important to know that a surplus market is based on supply and demand, and it’s impossible to guarantee pricing and availability. Large orders can deplete the supply of a particular part (especially “hard to find” and “end of life”) and can also drive up prices. For instance, if there is an open order for a large order of a discontinued Cisco router or an IBM server, this order can deplete surplus inventory for several months and raise the price for a period. Unlike, traditional distribution of new, current– future availability on surplus is very rarely guaranteed as another purchase order can directly impact supply. Timing is everything and like any other commodity markets there are many variables involved. If you have interest on a large qty, especially “hard to find” hardware that is priced right and available, a prompt decision is imperative to avoid losing out to another buyer. The wait for the inventory to reappear on the market could adversely affect your IT planning. On the other hand, an over abundance of inventory is also good for the buyer as the pricing will be even more competitive.

Recognizing the value and capitalizing on some if not all aspects of the secondary market can only benefit your organization. Whether it’s buying a particular component, a portion or all of your IT equipment you’ll save money from buying at reduced pricing and eliminating maintenance contracts by having in house spares. Selling your surplus and decommissioned IT assets correctly will provide ROI dollars that can be used for additional IT equipment or spent on other areas of your organization.

BLUE COAT Equipment

BLUE COAT REAP REWARDS FROM DEMAND OF WAN APPLICATION DELIVERY SOLUTIONS IN THE ASIA PACIFIC REGION

MALAYSIA, September 26, 2007 – Blue Coat Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ: BCSI), a leader in WAN Application Delivery and Secure Web Gateway, has experienced the market demands and growth potential of WAN Application Delivery solutions across the Asia Pacific region.

Over the past year, Blue Coat’s Asia Pacific offices have seen continued growth. In the past quarter, Asia Pacific accounted for 14 percent of Blue Coat net revenue. In the Asia Pacific region, the company intends to continue focusing on sales to the education, manufacturing, financial and government sectors where there is a heightened need for WAN Application Delivery solutions. The company expects to increase its Asia Pacific staff strength to support the prospective growth and to provide quality customer care throughout the region.

The market research firm IDC predicts the total worldwide market for WAN Application Delivery will reach US$920 million in 2011. Emerging Asian trends suggest that WAN Application Delivery will revolutionize the way businesses maintain competitiveness while protecting the company from both internal and external threats.

“Malaysian businesses are beginning to understand that their WAN woes cannot be solved by merely increasing bandwidth. There are also latency issues to consider,” said Jason Ng, Country Sales Manager (Malaysia), Blue Coat Systems. “If bandwidth is the width of the road, than latency is the speed. The wide area network remains a unique challenge for enterprise network managers.”

He explained that many applications designed to be deployed in a LAN environment are not suited for the latency, congestion, and bandwidth available to remote and mobile users.

“Blue Coat offers companies an ideal solution through application acceleration. Coupled with security, our solution enables companies to ‘stop the bad and accelerate the good’,” Ng added.
It is important to accelerate the business critical applications across the WAN and not speed the risk of security threats for the organization. Security must not impede the performance of critical applications and vice versa.

Blue Coat’s customers in Asia include Nottingham University in Malaysia, Universiti Malaysia Perlis – UniMAP (previously known as Universiti Kejuruteraan Utara Malaysia – KUKUM), PT. Yutaka Manufacturing in Indonesia, Korea Stock Exchange, Philips Electronics China Group and Kagoshima University in Japan.

Blue Coat has what is considered to be the largest “public” WAN Optimization project in the world to date for the US Air National Guard, with over 200 locations throughout the United States and its territories. Other Blue Coat global customers include some of the world’s largest financial institutions, manufacturing organizations and governmental agencies. About 93 of the Fortune Global 100 companies are Blue Coat customers.

On 23 August, the company reported its financial results for its first quarter of fiscal 2008 ended July 31, 2007. Net revenue for the first fiscal quarter of 2008 was US$62.4 million, an increase of 71% compared to net revenue of US$36.4 million for the same quarter last year and a 15% increase compared to net revenue of US$54.5 million in the prior quarter.

CCNP Update: Changes in a Nutshell

CCNP will now be three exams, ROUTE, SWITCH, and TSHOOT

Exam price will increase from $150.00 to $200.00 per exam

ROUTE and TSHOOT courses (typically 1 week Cisco official courses) are now supplemented with e-learning material (nearly 8 hours for ROUTE and 9 hours for TSHOOT) which is exam material

Classes / Exams are becoming even MORE real-world (TSHOOT class is 92% hands-on)

New ROUTE and SWITCH exam is available in March, TSHOOT is available in April.

BSCI exam can substitute for ROUTE or vice versa

BCMSN exam can substitute for SWITCH or vice versa

ONT and ISCW exams can substitute for TSHOOT until end of July (ONT/ICSW exams expire then…BSCI and BCMSN are no longer offered after July 31, however can substitute for ROUTE / SWITCH for their entire 3 year expiration period).

New CCNP exams now prepare you more for the CCIE R&S

Why Huawei Wants a Part of 3Com

When it comes to big overseas acquisitions, the Chinese track record is pretty spotty. There have been some big flops – TCL’s deals with Thomson and Alcatel, for instance. Some, like Haier plan for Maytag and CNOOC’s for Unocal, never got off the ground. The best of the lot has been Lenovo’s purchase of IBM’s PC division, and the verdict is still out on that. So what to make of the news that Huawei Technologies is teaming up with Bain Capital in a $2.2 billion deal to take 3Com Corp. private? At first, this seems like a classic case of the Chinese getting suckered into buying something that nobody else wants.

Once, back in the 1990s, 3Com was important in the network equipment business and for a while the company broke out of the business page and into the sports section thanks to its naming rights for the stadium where the San Francisco 49ers played. But the glory days are long gone for 3Com, which has fallen far behind Cisco and hasn’t managed to make money this century.

So why bother? Maybe Huawei execs think that their engineers can learn something from the Americans at 3Com. The two companies did work together in a joint venture that lasted for three years, so the two sides do go back a while together. Last year, 3Com bought out Huawei’s share of the joint venture, for $886 million, and that business in China is today probably the most valuable part of 3Com.

Moreover, Huawei can certainly need the help on the other side of the Pacific. It hasn’t exactly been smooth sailing for the Chinese company as it has tried to make its way into the U.S. Huawei is privately held and its reclusive CEO, Ren Zhengfei, is a former officer in the People’s Liberation Army. In response to questions about ties with the PLA, Huawei officials say repeatedly that there is no connection between the company and the Chinese military, but the company does have an image problem that makes expansion in the U.S. difficult.

That’s one reason that Huawei has been focusing on expanding sales in developing countries in Asia, Africa, the Middle East and the former Soviet Union. Huawei has also managed to make some inroads in Western Europe. Last year, for instance, Huawei formed a partnership with Vodafone to supply the British cellular operator with Chinese-made 3G phones. (More on that in this BW story from September a year ago.)

The problem is, ZTE, the Huawei rival that also is based in the southern Chinese city of Shenzhen, has making some impressive moves in the U.S., including a deal that it announced a few months ago to sell equipment to Sprint Nextel. ZTE also signed a deal last year to cooperate with Cisco, the company that embarrassed Huawei by taking it to court for alleged intellectual property rights violations. It’s no secret that the Chinese government wants its top companies to be expanding globally, and that includes the U.S. As the top Chinese communication equipment company, Huawei couldn’t sit back and let its next-door neighbor steal a march on it in the U.S.

In a press release from last Friday, Huawei’s CEO emphasized that this deal was about business, not politics. “This is a commercial investment for Huawei. We believe the new ownership structure will help 3Com to improve its business operations, provide better products and services and bring more value to its customer,” the press release quoted Ren saying.

The big question now is whether opposition to the deal builds in the U.S. because of Huawei’s involvement – and what Ren and other Huawei execs are willing to do in order to address those concerns.

From: BusinessWeek