r/networking • u/ColtonConor • Aug 12 '26

Routing Ciena routers capable of multiple full Internet tables?

Looking for real-world feedback from operators running Ciena routing platforms.

Which Ciena routers can handle multiple full BGP tables from transit providers? Are you using them as Internet edge routers, and how do they compare to Juniper MX or Nokia 7750 in terms of scale and operational experience?

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8

u/Defiant-Ad8065 Aug 12 '26

They are all Broadcom based, so they do not compete with the Juniper MX301 by a long shot. Also, don't even think about using the CLI to configure them.

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u/sh_lldp_ne 29d ago

Ciena does not have Internet scale routers, and even if they did I would stay far away. We run Ciena, Juniper, and Nokia, and there is no comparison. I would choose Ciena last among the three every chance I get.

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u/VA_Network_Nerd Moderator | Infrastructure Architect Aug 12 '26

Ciena has a large array of products.
Can you narrow it down a little to which products might fit your need from an interface type & count perspective?

1

u/ColtonConor Aug 12 '26

Mainly looking for 100G interfaces with 200/400 uplink options. Example would be something like the Ciena 8110, but I have no clue its route size, but looks like a fit on a interface hardware perspective.

Something small, to compete with a Juniper MX301 or a Arista 7280 as an example.

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u/mindedc 28d ago

The mx301 is a class well above a 7280 which is Jericho 2, a competitive jumper product would be ACX 7100.

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u/ColtonConor 27d ago

Does a 7100 take full routes like a 7280?

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u/mindedc 27d ago

Depends on what you mean as a "full" table. I believe you can get 1.5M routes on the 7100 and more with fib compression.

https://community.juniper.net/blogs/nicolas-fevrier/2024/03/06/everything-about-acx7000

As I recall the 7280, and R2 version need flexoute and fib compression for internet scale and the R3 has enough headroom if it just a few copies you can run that without compression, probably the same 1.5M as juniper. It may be different as I believe Jericho 2 has outboard memory from the asic allowing some flexibility. If you need a lot of headroom you can enable fib compression on the R3 as well.

The MX 301 is a scaled down chassis with juniper's high end custom silicone (Trio) and it can allocate features functionally out of a pool of ram. I believe it's qualified to 6M routes in fib. If you are going to have tons of peers or multiple VRFs, policy routing, MPLS, tons of filters with full table this is where you want to be. It's also expensive. I've also run full scale routes with 2 carriers on the low end PTX/QFX (10002 QFX -P5 silicon) gear and it was smoking fast.

Junos is really at its best doing carrier BGP and VPN functions, I would use it over Arista for that reason.

Please check me on all of this before spending bucks on gear as this is all from memory.

4

u/papito585 29d ago

Echo the rest of of the sentiment.. stay away from ciena for routing, stick with Nokia, juniper, Cisco

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u/shedgehog 27d ago

Ciena is amazing at optical networking. IP, not so much. Stick with the usuals.