On 03/30/2015 02:26 PM, That One Guy wrote:
After poking around at many different brands, it seems Mikrotik is the
right fit for our network and budget.
LOTS of good questions here. My thoughts inline.
I dont fully understand the licensing tiers
For the most part, if you are purchasing the appropriate routerboard
product (CCR vs rb750), the right license will be preinstalled. The
licensing is interesting mostly if you are installing on an X86 router.
For the most part, Level 4 is the most appropriate choice, unless you
are running large hotspots or aggregating your pppoe sessions to a
single router. I can give a more detailed answer with more specific
details of your network requirements.
Is there a sizing chart on these?
Not really. Here's the easiest way to say this, though:
RB7XX and RB9XX are CPE
RB1100 (and similar), along with CCR are intended to be infrastructure.
RB450 works well as a tower router, but the cost difference to move to
an 1100 should be considered carefully, as the 1100 is a much more
powerful solution and has the added benefit of more ethernet ports.
Is the interface similar between the router models and the switch
models? Are the mikrotik switches comparable to the HP procurve in
reliability?
CRS devices run the exact same software as the routers, so the interface
is exactly the same. If you are going to use them in switched mode,
however, I am a fan of HP and even secondary market Cisco for switching.
It would be the bees knees to see out network more universal as far as
management interfaces go, we have three purposes for routers:
our upstream routers, which we have 2, will ultimately be running OSPF
internally and BGP externally (current thought) 200mbps-1gbps projected
need through the next couple of years.
Upstream - CCR or 1100ahX2 (minimum)
Our network/POP routers ranging from 1 customer at a POP to 150
RB450 or RB1100 would fit this need. Depends mostly upon the port count
requirement. Also, the RB2100 series would work well here. Any of
these would handle this need easily.
A residential solution comparable to the UBNT AirRouters (1-25mbps rate
plans) wifi capable.
RB9XX is intended for this purpose. As much a fan as I am for RouterOS,
I cannot say that MT products compare for wireless on an equal plain
with UBNT. One possible solution would be something like the RB750 (or
rb951) + Unifi for the wireless. If the home is small enough to only
need one AP, then the RB951 is easily enough. Specifically, the
RB951-2n or the RB9511G-2HnD (higher power output). For larger homes,
the RB2100-2HnD-IN is better still.
If the switches have similar interfaces, we would look toward replacing
a combination of UBNT toughswitch POE, and a variety of HP procurves
from 1810G to 2510G and their other POE models.
If you do much with VLANs, then I'd (personally) stick with HP or Cisco.
I note alot of discussion regarding MT ethernet negotiation flakiness,
how much of an impact does this present? Right now we have imagestream
and fortigate on the network, and have zero issues with that.
This is pretty specific to certain routerboard models and other gear. I
am a fan of hard coding all interfaces on infrastructure gear, so this
is not really an issue if you do things "the right way" (yes, I know
this can start a religious war). My experience is that this does not
happen with better ethernet chipsets, such as you would install in an
X86 device.
I would like to her from people entrenched in MT who love/hate it,
anybody who turned their back on it, and anybody who moved toward it.
As you know, I am a big fan of RouterOS, but only where it makes sense.
--
Butch Evans
702-537-0979
Network Support and Engineering
http://store.wispgear.net/
http://www.butchevans.com/
