Product Overview: The Cisco® ASR 9000 Series represents an exciting new paradigm in the world of Carrier Ethernet transport with exceptional scalability, carrier-class reliability, environmentally conscious design, incredible flexibility, and an enticing new price-to-performance benchmark. It is Carrier Ethernet evolution-redefined. The Cisco ASR 9000 Series is being introduced in two form factors (Figure 1): the Cisco ASR 9010 Router and the Cisco ASR 9006 Router. Cisco ASR 9000 Series Routers are designed to provide true carrier-class reliability using the Cisco IOS® XR operating system, comprehensive system redundancy, and a full complement of network resiliency schemes. The Cisco ASR 9000 Series also offers service and application-level intelligence focused on optimized video delivery and mobile aggregation. Finally, the Cisco ASR 9000 Series is designed to simplify and enhance the operational and deployment aspects of service-delivery networks.

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Figure 1. Cisco® ASR 9000 Series

The Cisco ASR 9000 Series is an operationally simple, future-optimized platform utilizing next-generation hardware and software. Some highlights of this next-generation platform are:
  • Cisco IOS XR modular operating system: The Cisco ASR 9000 Series leverages Cisco IOS XR operating system made famous by the highly successful Cisco CRS-1 Carrier Routing System platform in core deployments. Cisco IOS XR operating system is purpose-built for distributed systems such as the Cisco ASR 9000 Series and uses a microkernel architecture to achieve true modularity. This modularity provides the path to nonstop operations during software image upgrades or module changes, without affecting normal platform operations.
  • Fully distributed system: “The Cisco ASR 9000 Series operates in a fully distributed fashion, that is, all packet-forwarding decisions and actions take place on the individual line cards. These high-density Ethernet line- cards are equipped with a specialized network processor that provides a flexible programming infrastructure with high-density Hierarchical Quality-of-Service (H-QoS) services, security, and integrated Synchronous Ethernet.
  • Operationally efficient and redundant hardware: The Cisco ASR 9000 Series provides an infrastructure where all common components, Route Switch Processors (RSPs), switching fabric, fans, and power supplies, are completely redundant. In addition, the platform is designed in a way that power is used on an as-needed basis depending on system requirements. Power has been modularized for a true pay-as-you-grow approach reducing capital expenditures (CapEx) and again providing an operationally efficient deployment.

●Environmentally conscious design: In today’s world of increasing awareness of human impact on the environment and the resultant fiscal implications, Cisco ASR 9000 Series Routers bring a fresh new “conscious” approach to product development. From optimal thermal design to the architecture of the power infrastructure, from the placement of line card components to the pitch of each slot, every design aspect had one goal in mind – reduced environmental impact through lowered power consumption and decreased cooling requirements. Even the product packaging process was evaluated to minimize the use of packaging material and thereby reduce waste at customer locations. The Cisco ASR 9000 Series is an example of the continued Cisco commitment to efficient and future-friendly product design. The Cisco ASR 9000 Series offers a significant added value compared to the prior generations of Carrier Ethernet routing offerings by more than doubling the switching capacity (up to 400 Gbps per line-card slot), optimizing power and cooling requirements, offering an innovative modular power architecture, incorporating a grounds-up High Availability design, and taking advantage of the Cisco IOS XR modular operating system to significantly lower the Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) for Service Providers the world over. Solving the Challenges of Tomorrow, Today

Solving the Challenges of Tomorrow, Today The Cisco ASR 9000 Series is built upon the premise of addressing the challenges that service providers face when deploying current networks and planning for the networks of tomorrow.
  • Power-efficient deployments: The Cisco ASR 9000 Series has a significantly improved energy efficient design thanks to its low Gbps/Watt ratio. This amazing breakthrough ultimately translates to lower power costs, a lower carbon footprint, and the ability to serve more customers and deliver more services in less rack space.
  • Increasing average revenue per user (ARPU): Service providers may increase the price models of existing services or increase the service offerings per user. While traditional service prices continue to decline, the Cisco ASR 9000 Series helps establish a new financial reality by facilitating reliable and scalable video, next generation mobile aggregation, and advanced Carrier Ethernet service offerings. ● Managing services efficiently: The Cisco ASR 9000 Series provides leading-edge network, device, and service management through a full complement of management solutions. Cisco Active Network Abstraction (ANA) provides a framework for service activation provisioning, assurance, and management. Combining these elements with a comprehensive set of Ethernet and Multiprotocol Label Switching (MPLS) OAM capabilities, the Cisco ASR 9000 provides an operator-friendly environment. ● Network convergence: A common objective among service providers is to migrate their networks to a single, converged infrastructure that supports all services. This goal is compelling because it ultimately results in less CapEx and operating expenses (OpEx) because of a reduction in network elements. The Cisco ASR 9000 is a critical component in optimizing service transport infrastructure because of its service flexibility, rich feature set, and emphasis on Carrier Ethernet as the foundation for service delivery.
  • Meeting tomorrow’s service requirements: The Cisco ASR 9000 has been designed to offer advanced subscriber management as well as use the QuantumFlow Processor to deliver silicon-based security services and video.
Hardware The Cisco ASR 9000 Series provides an in-place upgrade roadmap to a switching capacity of up to 400 Gbps per slot without the need for a complete chassis replacement. The modular power architecture of Cisco ASR 9000 Series (available in both AC and DC versions) is powered by three different power supplies: 3-kW AC, 2-kW DC, and 1.5-kW DC. The power supplies are housed in serviceable fields called Power Entry Modules (PEMs), which come in the AC and DC forms. Each PEM can hold up to 3 modules – of its corresponding type – with no power zones or placement restrictions (mixing of AC and DC supplies is not supported). Service Providers can add more power as their bandwidth and feature requirements increase over time, requiring addition of more line-cards to the chassis. The Cisco ASR 9000 Series also features a fully integrated timing infrastructure, allowing the routers to take in timing inputs (Synchronous Ethernet, Building Integrated Timing Supply [BITS], Data Over Cable Service Interface Specification [DOCSIS] Timing Interface [DTI] etc.) and distribute them over the backplane to each slot. This capability allows rich support for transparent mobile convergence; mobile Radio Access Network (RAN) backhaul; and Time-Division Multiplexing (TDM) circuit emulation, without sacrificing performance or scale. Software The Cisco ASR 9000 Series Router delivers exceptional scale, service flexibility, and high availability into Carrier Ethernet transport networks. It is powered by Cisco IOS XR Software – an innovative self-healing, distributed operating system designed for always-on operation with a scaling system capacity up to 6.4 Tbps. It also allows for an end-to-end IP/MPLS solution to Service Provider requirements based on the same software, thereby reducing the operational complexity of managing multiple operating systems. The CiscoASR 9000 further enhances the IP Next-Generation Network (NGN) Carrier Ethernet design for converged, resilient, intelligent, and scalable services transport of consumer, business, wholesale, and mobile services. Carrier Ethernet applications supported include residential broadband services such as IPTV, business services such as Layer 2 VPN (L2VPN) and Layer 3 VPN (L3VPN), and next-generation mobile backhaul transport.

The Cisco ASR 9000 Series Router software supports a comprehensive and robust set of services transport capabilities for Carrier Ethernet, including L2VPN, IPv4, IPv6, L3VPN, Layer 2 and Layer 3 IP Multicast, Ethernet OAM, MPLS OAM, Layer 2 and Layer 3 access control lists (ACLs), H-QoS, MPLS Traffic Engineering-Fast Reroute (MPLS TE-FRR), Nonstop Forwarding (NSF), and Nonstop Routing (NSR).