Re: How to choose a transit provider?

[Mehmet Akcin]

thanks everyone watching the video, working on some more new ones. I am
also working on a ranking system for transit providers. The way ranking
will work is going to be limited to a Metro

Do you guys have any recommendations what technical aspects to look for
when ranking ISPs? it's quiet hard to rank them fairly without having their
routing table views, i think, please let me know your thoughts on this and
any recommendation is welcome.

On Thu, Feb 14, 2019 at 3:05 PM Mehmet Akcin  wrote:

> thanks for all feedback, I have tried to summarize my thoughts in a video,
> hoping this is useful set of notes https://youtu.be/4gihKxb6uys
>
> On Sat, Dec 15, 2018 at 9:46 AM Mark Tinka  wrote:
>
>>
>>
>> On 15/Dec/18 19:37, nanog-...@mail.com wrote:
>>
>> >
>> >   I certainly subscribe to the notion that transport + transit is
>> usually less expensive than DIA, but this does depend on the market and
>> location.
>>
>> ... and the type of customer.
>>
>> DIA for a high-value "Enterprise" customer (think of a large
>> conglomerate) is typically more costly than DIA for a low-value
>> "Enterprise" customer (think of a family-owned travel & tour company).
>> The large global ISP's are making more money from "enterprise" business
>> than typical wholesale/transit services. This can support the idea that
>> DIA can be pricier than transit.
>>
>> Mark.
>>
>

Re: How to choose a transit provider?

[Mehmet Akcin]

thanks for all feedback, I have tried to summarize my thoughts in a video,
hoping this is useful set of notes https://youtu.be/4gihKxb6uys

On Sat, Dec 15, 2018 at 9:46 AM Mark Tinka  wrote:

>
>
> On 15/Dec/18 19:37, nanog-...@mail.com wrote:
>
> >
> >   I certainly subscribe to the notion that transport + transit is
> usually less expensive than DIA, but this does depend on the market and
> location.
>
> ... and the type of customer.
>
> DIA for a high-value "Enterprise" customer (think of a large
> conglomerate) is typically more costly than DIA for a low-value
> "Enterprise" customer (think of a family-owned travel & tour company).
> The large global ISP's are making more money from "enterprise" business
> than typical wholesale/transit services. This can support the idea that
> DIA can be pricier than transit.
>
> Mark.
>

Re: How to choose a transit provider?

[Mark Tinka]

On 15/Dec/18 19:37, nanog-...@mail.com wrote:

>
>   I certainly subscribe to the notion that transport + transit is usually 
> less expensive than DIA, but this does depend on the market and location.

... and the type of customer.

DIA for a high-value "Enterprise" customer (think of a large
conglomerate) is typically more costly than DIA for a low-value
"Enterprise" customer (think of a family-owned travel & tour company).
The large global ISP's are making more money from "enterprise" business
than typical wholesale/transit services. This can support the idea that
DIA can be pricier than transit.

Mark.

Re: How to choose a transit provider?

[Mike Hammett]

Of course YMMV. 


I'm speaking from the perspective of ISPs between say 300 and 10k customers. 
I'm knee deep in that community. 

I'm also generally speaking of facilities that don't have astronomical cross 
connect charges (so not Equinix, DRT, etc.). In some places, the cross connect 
cost is nominal, so we just cover it in the IX fee. 




- 
Mike Hammett 
Intelligent Computing Solutions 

Midwest Internet Exchange 

The Brothers WISP 

- Original Message -

From: nanog-...@mail.com 
To: nanog@nanog.org 
Cc: "Mike Hammett"  
Sent: Saturday, December 15, 2018 11:37:28 AM 
Subject: Re: How to choose a transit provider? 

Mike Hammett wrote: 
> Usually, DIA (as transit delivered to a customer) is more expensive than 
> transport + transit + small colo 
> (1U\2U stuff) + IX... at least as observed by many of my brethren. 

Is this really true in the general case? 

Adding colo and IX to transport and transit involves at least one additional 
cross connect and an IX port fee. This is likely to push the total above the 
pure DIA price. 

However, regardless of how the numbers pencil out, this isn't really a fair 
comparison. For small ISPs, the yardstick against which adding an IX to the mix 
is usually measured against is the marginal cost of IP transit. Given that the 
cost of transport is fixed, is it more economical to buy more IP transit or to 
join an IX? 

Transit being so cheap means that joining an IX isn't always so enticing from a 
financial perspective, although there are other non-monetary benefits. 

I certainly subscribe to the notion that transport + transit is usually less 
expensive than DIA, but this does depend on the market and location. 

Jared 

Re: How to choose a transit provider?

[nanog-isp]

Mike Hammett wrote:
> Usually, DIA (as transit delivered to a customer) is more expensive than 
> transport + transit + small colo 
> (1U\2U stuff) + IX... at least as observed by many of my brethren. 

  Is this really true in the general case?

  Adding colo and IX to transport and transit involves at least one additional 
cross connect and an IX port fee. This is likely to push the total above the 
pure DIA price.

  However, regardless of how the numbers pencil out, this isn't really a fair 
comparison. For small ISPs, the yardstick against which adding an IX to the mix 
is usually measured against is the marginal cost of IP transit. Given that the 
cost of transport is fixed, is it more economical to buy more IP transit or to 
join an IX?

  Transit being so cheap means that joining an IX isn't always so enticing from 
a financial perspective, although there are other non-monetary benefits.

  I certainly subscribe to the notion that transport + transit is usually less 
expensive than DIA, but this does depend on the market and location.

Jared

Re: How to choose a transit provider?

[Mike Hammett]

The type of customer on the network is important here. 

Most traffic on residential eyeball networks goes to IXes. I know guys pushing 
85% of their traffic to IXes. Even small IXes like ours are capturing well over 
50% of an ISP's traffic. Netflix, Google, Akamai, Cloudflare. That's what, 
2/3rds of the traffic an eyeball has? 

Now if you're not predominately serving residential customers, then I agree and 
briefly stated so before. 

Flow monitoring is indeed important. 


Usually, DIA (as transit delivered to a customer) is more expensive than 
transport + transit + small colo (1U\2U stuff) + IX... at least as observed by 
many of my brethren. 

That's before you get to the fact that a lot of transit is sub-optimal. Most 
ISPs we've hooked to our IXes have seen an immediate increase in network 
utilization because upstream congestion and whatever latency is gone. 





- 
Mike Hammett 
Intelligent Computing Solutions 

Midwest Internet Exchange 

The Brothers WISP 

- Original Message -

From: "Matt Erculiani"  
To: "Mike Hammett"  
Cc: "Mehmet Akcin" , "nanog@nanog.org list"  
Sent: Saturday, December 15, 2018 9:49:21 AM 
Subject: Re: How to choose a transit provider? 



I would actually venture to say the contrary. An IX should be the last item on 
your list since it only really makes sense at a certain scale and if you can 
make use of the providers on it. 


Most of the networks you'll have trouble getting to via transit providers are 
that way because of how they do business, which also means hardly any of them 
peer at IXes. I'd say a network should have a least 3 good transits before 
considering an IX. Even then it's not so black and white. If after your first 
transit provider is installed and you set up your flow monitoring, you notice 
most of your traiffic is going to/coming from ASNs that peer on your local 
exchanges, then it absolutely makes sense to open a connection right then. 


IX links aren't a whole lot cheaper than transit (sometimes they cost more 
depending on how hard it is to get to them) and many networks will benefit from 
a more diverse blend of transits than IX peering regardless of what they're 
doing. IXes are extremely important to the internet at large, but they're not 
for everyone. 


-Matt 



On Dec 15, 2018 10:27, "Mike Hammett" < na...@ics-il.net > wrote: 




I think it'll depend on your target customer. Residential eyeball? Being on an 
IX is more important at nearly any size than which transit you choose. Even a 
good-sized residential eyeball (say 10k and up subs) can be good with 
Cogent\IX\one other transit. 

Hosting and enterprise-focused ISPs will need to diversify their transit 
providers more. 




- 
Mike Hammett 
Intelligent Computing Solutions 

Midwest Internet Exchange 

The Brothers WISP 



From: "Mehmet Akcin" < meh...@akcin.net > 
To: "nanog" < nanog@nanog.org > 
Sent: Friday, December 14, 2018 9:21:59 AM 
Subject: How to choose a transit provider? 



Hello there, 


I have started writing a blog which I hope it would help buy transit services 
from providers by doing various due diligences(technical) i wanted to reach out 
and ask nanog community’s thoughts on this. 


What are some of your checklist items ? Price? Their directly peered networks? 
If they are tier 2,3 who they use as tier 1-2? Are the onnet? I am sure list 
goes on and on on... 


Thanks a lot for your help. I plan to write the blog this month and publish. 


Mehmet -- 

Mehmet 
+1-424-298-1903 

Re: How to choose a transit provider?

[Matt Erculiani]

I would actually venture to say the contrary. An IX should be the last item
on your list since it only really makes sense at a certain scale and if you
can make use of the providers on it.

Most of the networks you'll have trouble getting to via transit providers
are that way because of how they do business, which also means hardly any
of them peer at IXes. I'd say a network should have a least 3 good transits
before considering an IX. Even then it's not so black and white. If after
your first transit provider is installed and you set up your flow
monitoring, you notice most of your traiffic is going to/coming from ASNs
that peer on your local exchanges, then it absolutely makes sense to open a
connection right then.

IX links aren't a whole lot cheaper than transit (sometimes they cost more
depending on how hard it is to get to them) and many networks will benefit
from a more diverse blend of transits than IX peering regardless of what
they're doing. IXes are extremely important to the internet at large, but
they're not for everyone.

-Matt


On Dec 15, 2018 10:27, "Mike Hammett"  wrote:

I think it'll depend on your target customer. Residential eyeball? Being on
an IX is more important at nearly any size than which transit you choose.
Even a good-sized residential eyeball (say 10k and up subs) can be good
with Cogent\IX\one other transit.

Hosting and enterprise-focused ISPs will need to diversify their transit
providers more.



-
Mike Hammett
Intelligent Computing Solutions 




Midwest Internet Exchange 



The Brothers WISP 


--
*From: *"Mehmet Akcin" 
*To: *"nanog" 
*Sent: *Friday, December 14, 2018 9:21:59 AM
*Subject: *How to choose a transit provider?


Hello there,

I have started writing a blog which I hope it would help buy transit
services from providers by doing various due diligences(technical) i wanted
to reach out and ask nanog community’s thoughts on this.

What are some of your checklist items ? Price? Their directly peered
networks? If they are tier 2,3 who they use as tier 1-2? Are the onnet? I
am sure list goes on and on on...

Thanks a lot for your help. I plan to write the blog this month and publish.

Mehmet
-- 
Mehmet
+1-424-298-1903

Re: How to choose a transit provider?

[Mike Hammett]

I think it'll depend on your target customer. Residential eyeball? Being on an 
IX is more important at nearly any size than which transit you choose. Even a 
good-sized residential eyeball (say 10k and up subs) can be good with 
Cogent\IX\one other transit. 

Hosting and enterprise-focused ISPs will need to diversify their transit 
providers more. 




- 
Mike Hammett 
Intelligent Computing Solutions 

Midwest Internet Exchange 

The Brothers WISP 

- Original Message -

From: "Mehmet Akcin"  
To: "nanog"  
Sent: Friday, December 14, 2018 9:21:59 AM 
Subject: How to choose a transit provider? 


Hello there, 


I have started writing a blog which I hope it would help buy transit services 
from providers by doing various due diligences(technical) i wanted to reach out 
and ask nanog community’s thoughts on this. 


What are some of your checklist items ? Price? Their directly peered networks? 
If they are tier 2,3 who they use as tier 1-2? Are the onnet? I am sure list 
goes on and on on... 


Thanks a lot for your help. I plan to write the blog this month and publish. 


Mehmet -- 

Mehmet 
+1-424-298-1903 

Re: How to choose a transit provider?

[Karsten Elfenbein]

Some points I have not seen so far are:
- how do you connect? local cc in the dc or several other fiber runs
to reach a different dc/city? (affects price, setup time, maintenance
and debugging)
- where is your traffic going to/from? how many intermediate ASs or
long transfers are involved?
- bgp community support to influence routing (including the already
mentioned blackhole)
- flowspec support
- additional services like ddos mitigation
- how many ports/locations per committed bandwidth
- your own experience with the company (sales/support)
- I assume IPv6 support does not need to be mentioned anymore :)


Karsten
Am Fr., 14. Dez. 2018 um 16:24 Uhr schrieb Mehmet Akcin :
>
> Hello there,
>
> I have started writing a blog which I hope it would help buy transit services 
> from providers by doing various due diligences(technical) i wanted to reach 
> out and ask nanog community’s thoughts on this.
>
> What are some of your checklist items ? Price? Their directly peered 
> networks? If they are tier 2,3 who they use as tier 1-2? Are the onnet? I am 
> sure list goes on and on on...
>
> Thanks a lot for your help. I plan to write the blog this month and publish.
>
> Mehmet
> --
> Mehmet
> +1-424-298-1903

Re: How to choose a transit provider?

[Ross Tajvar]

Agreed. My biggest frustration buying carrier services is the lack of
transparency in pricing.

On Fri, Dec 14, 2018, 12:40 PM Brian Kantor  On Fri, Dec 14, 2018 at 03:26:56PM -0200, Mehmet Akcin wrote:
> > Probably you also have never got the best possible pricing ;-)
>
> Ugh.  Requiring an NDA to get best pricing is a  business practice
> that makes me feel I need to wash my hands after dealing with them.
> - Brian
>
>

Re: How to choose a transit provider?

[Brian Kantor]

On Fri, Dec 14, 2018 at 03:26:56PM -0200, Mehmet Akcin wrote:
> Probably you also have never got the best possible pricing ;-)

Ugh.  Requiring an NDA to get best pricing is a  business practice 
that makes me feel I need to wash my hands after dealing with them.
- Brian

Re: How to choose a transit provider?

[Mehmet Akcin]

Probably you also have never got the best possible pricing ;-)

On Fri, Dec 14, 2018 at 15:21 Aaron  wrote:

> I've never signed an NDA to receive a quote.  Some of my contracts have
> NDAs in them after the fact but I've never been asked to sign one before
> I received pricing from a transit provider.
>
> Aaron
>
> On 12/14/2018 11:12 AM, Brian Kantor wrote:
> > On Fri, Dec 14, 2018 at 04:07:08PM +, David Guo via NANOG wrote:
> >> First of all, sign NDA if possible, then ask the following questions:
> > Why in heaven's name would you *want* to sign an NDA?  Aren't you better
> > off without one?
> >   - Brian
> >
> >
>
> --
> 
> Aaron Wendel
> Chief Technical Officer
> Wholesale Internet, Inc. (AS 32097)
> (816)550-9030
> http://www.wholesaleinternet.com
> 
>
> --
Mehmet
+1-424-298-1903

RE: How to choose a transit provider?

[David Guo via NANOG]

No provider wants you disclose the information. Hmm someone posted on LINX 
that he can get $500 for a 10 Gbps unmetered port from a Tier 1 ISP, do you 
believe it?

-Original Message-
From: NANOG  On Behalf Of Brian Kantor
Sent: Saturday, December 15, 2018 1:13 AM
To: NANOG 
Subject: Re: How to choose a transit provider?

On Fri, Dec 14, 2018 at 04:07:08PM +, David Guo via NANOG wrote:
> First of all, sign NDA if possible, then ask the following questions:

Why in heaven's name would you *want* to sign an NDA?  Aren't you better off 
without one?
- Brian

Re: How to choose a transit provider?

[Aaron]

I've never signed an NDA to receive a quote.  Some of my contracts have 
NDAs in them after the fact but I've never been asked to sign one before 
I received pricing from a transit provider.


Aaron

On 12/14/2018 11:12 AM, Brian Kantor wrote:

On Fri, Dec 14, 2018 at 04:07:08PM +, David Guo via NANOG wrote:

First of all, sign NDA if possible, then ask the following questions:

Why in heaven's name would you *want* to sign an NDA?  Aren't you better
off without one?
- Brian




--

Aaron Wendel
Chief Technical Officer
Wholesale Internet, Inc. (AS 32097)
(816)550-9030
http://www.wholesaleinternet.com

Re: How to choose a transit provider?

[Brian Kantor]

On Fri, Dec 14, 2018 at 04:07:08PM +, David Guo via NANOG wrote:
> First of all, sign NDA if possible, then ask the following questions:

Why in heaven's name would you *want* to sign an NDA?  Aren't you better
off without one?
- Brian

RE: How to choose a transit provider?

[David Guo via NANOG]

Hi Mehmet,

We usually ask the sales director from a neutral datacenter to introduce a 
sales rep from Tier 1 - 2 ISPs to bargain.

First of all, sign NDA if possible, then ask the following questions:

1. Price for 100 Mbps on 1 Gbps port to 1 Gbps unmetered or 1 Gbps on 10 Gbps 
or 10 Gbps unmetered
2. Contact term, from 12 months to 36 months, or even 60 months.
3. BGP community or RTBH for blackhole
4. AS-SET or LOA for BGP filter updating
5. SLA and network delay (latency) guarantee
6. Price for NRC and MRC and VAT or tax in some countries

For their peering networks and IX, you can do research on different network 
using looking glass, mtr, traceroute, etc. And ask your friend if they are 
already using the service.

Cheapest transit service will not always have good performance, but the most 
expensive one may not be the best choice. You should choose the suitable 
provider for your audience.

Regards,

David


From: NANOG  On Behalf Of Mehmet Akcin
Sent: Friday, December 14, 2018 11:22 PM
To: nanog 
Subject: How to choose a transit provider?

Hello there,

I have started writing a blog which I hope it would help buy transit services 
from providers by doing various due diligences(technical) i wanted to reach out 
and ask nanog community’s thoughts on this.

What are some of your checklist items ? Price? Their directly peered networks? 
If they are tier 2,3 who they use as tier 1-2? Are the onnet? I am sure list 
goes on and on on...

Thanks a lot for your help. I plan to write the blog this month and publish.

Mehmet
--
Mehmet
+1-424-298-1903

Re: How to choose a transit provider?

[Matt Erculiani]

Tier 1s are just as succeptible to outages and peering issues as anyone
else. Not to say they're any less, I work for one after all, but one
shouldn't assume they're always the best for every application. As an
example, Hurricane is decidedly not a Tier 1, but have one of the best
peered networks out there.

Well peered is a huge plus but that's hard to measure. Cogent, peers with
Google in just a few spots so if you want to get to 8.8.8.8 from Dallas
you're going to go via Atlanta even though they could peer right in TX.
That's a bummer if you've hardcoded Google DNS into anything. But how would
you know that unless you do a lot of testing with looking glasses?

The choice also depends on what you're doing with the bandwidth:

If you're a content provider, for example, you may want to buy transit from
AT, Comcast, or Charter, not because they're the best, but because they
have better access to the eyeballs. Voice guys may want a "performance
optimized" blendwidth for lower latency. Etc.

-M

On Fri, Dec 14, 2018, 10:23 Mehmet Akcin  Hello there,
>
> I have started writing a blog which I hope it would help buy transit
> services from providers by doing various due diligences(technical) i wanted
> to reach out and ask nanog community’s thoughts on this.
>
> What are some of your checklist items ? Price? Their directly peered
> networks? If they are tier 2,3 who they use as tier 1-2? Are the onnet? I
> am sure list goes on and on on...
>
> Thanks a lot for your help. I plan to write the blog this month and
> publish.
>
> Mehmet
> --
> Mehmet
> +1-424-298-1903
>

Re: How to choose a transit provider?

[Baldur Norddahl]

Hi

This depends a lot of who you are and where you are. For example apparently
Cogent is better in the USA compared to Europe. This would make them mostly
useful in Europe only if you have the traffic to be multi homed, while
someone in USA might be able to use them as their only provider.

If you are going to have only one provider, I would recommend to stay away
from the so called Tier 1 providers. You want a smaller local provider,
which has multiple upstreams and at least some local peering. Sometimes the
tier 1 can get you the best quote and their sales people will certainly
tell you all about their superior network and how many global connected
customers. But more often than not, the interconnect between the various
tier 1 providers is not good and you end up with bad connectivity to
whoever they are at war with at the moment.

If you have enough traffic to justify multiple upstreams, you can do the
tier 1 game. But you still have to be careful to have good local peering.
At least if your customers are close to your own physical location. In my
country there are several of the big american transit providers. They only
have good connectivity to other local companies, that happens to also buy
directly from the same transit provider. The tier 1 will refuse to peer
with just about anyone and this makes their local connectivity poor.

Also consider the wildcard called HE.net. They are the opposite to the old
tier 1 in that he.net peers with everyone locally. On the other hand, their
global network might not be as good (although my experience is that they
are pretty good). I am using he.net as an alternative to joining the too
expensive local internet exchanges. It is cheaper to get he.net and he.net
will be able to get all the peerings that I can't.

Another interesting player is NL-IX. I know this is an european thing. I
believe their concept could spread. They take distributed IX to the next
level with a IX network that covers large part of Europe.

If you are an eyeball ISP you also need to consider caches and direct
peerings with the big content providers. Akamai, Google, Netflix, Apple,
Microsoft etc. If you are hosting provider, those same peerings are
completely irrelevant.

 Regards,

Baldur