Direct answer: what are Cisco ASR 9000 Series Routers?

Cisco ASR 9000 Series Routers are a family of carrier-class aggregation and edge routing platforms running Cisco IOS XR. Cisco positions the family for highly demanding edge markets, including Layer 2 and Layer 3 Ethernet aggregation, subscriber-aware broadband aggregation and other service-provider roles. The portfolio ranges from compact systems with integrated interfaces to large modular chassis with multiple routing processors, fabric cards and line-card slots.

Main use: high-capacity IP/MPLS routing, Ethernet aggregation, provider edge, broadband aggregation, peering, metro and core-adjacent edge roles where service scale and availability are critical. Who should consider it: telecom operators, ISPs, carriers, large data-centre or cloud edge networks, content networks and enterprises operating provider-like routing environments. Most important factor to confirm: the exact model and component bill of materials, because capacity, port density, power, rack size, redundancy, supported optics, feature entitlement and lifecycle vary materially across the family.

FourTeck can help determine whether an ASR 9902, ASR 9903, modular ASR 9904/9906/9910/9912/9922, an installed-base ASR 9006/9010, or another Cisco routing platform better fits the UAE requirement. That determination should start from measured traffic, growth, interface types, routing-table scale, service features, high-availability targets, rack and power constraints, software policy and the desired support horizon rather than from chassis capacity alone.

Why buyers choose the ASR 9000 family

The ASR 9000 family has remained important because it covers a wide range of edge capacities while preserving a common IOS XR operational model. Cisco’s current family page highlights support from 1G through 400G, coherent optics options, high-density forwarding, flexible licensing and a scale-up path from compact routers to very large chassis. Those capabilities are useful only when translated into the actual service architecture, so the points below describe the purchasing significance rather than simply repeating feature names.

ASR 9000 model range: capacity is only the starting point

Cisco’s current comparison information illustrates how broad the family is. The figures below are family-level published maximum capacities and physical summaries, not guaranteed application throughput for every configuration. Actual usable design capacity depends on installed cards, optics, feature mix, packet profile, redundancy, software release and licensing. Lifecycle also differs by model; for example, ASR 9001 and ASR 9901 have end-of-sale status on Cisco support pages even though they remain visible in broader model comparisons.

A published chassis maximum should never be used as the sole sizing figure. A 160 Tbps chassis does not automatically make the ASR 9922 the right answer, just as a compact 2-RU platform should not be selected only because rack space is limited. The correct model is the one that has sufficient forwarding headroom, compatible interfaces, acceptable failure domains, feasible power and cooling, appropriate software and licensing, and a support horizon aligned with the expected life of the network.

Platform architecture: distributed forwarding with resilient control options

ASR 9000 modular systems are built around a distributed router architecture. Line cards provide the data-plane resources that forward traffic, while routing processors or route switch processors provide chassis control, provisioning and management functions. A switch fabric interconnects the relevant slots. This architecture matters to a buyer because it separates several sizing questions that are often incorrectly combined into one number: chassis fabric capacity, line-card forwarding capacity, port density, control-plane scale and the redundancy level all need to be considered independently.

For a provider edge carrying internet routes, MPLS services and multiple customers, the control plane has to cope with routing adjacencies, policy, route churn and operational tooling while the forwarding plane sustains traffic at the required rates. For an aggregation node with a large number of access-facing interfaces, port density and service scale may be more limiting than total fabric bandwidth. For a data-centre edge, the design may be dominated by 100G or 400G connectivity, optical reach, route-policy complexity and maintenance behaviour. Two sites with the same peak traffic can therefore need different ASR 9000 configurations.

Redundancy is also chassis-dependent. Cisco documents active/standby RSP or RP operation on applicable systems, fabric redundancy on supported modular platforms, redundant power arrangements and cooling redundancy. High availability features such as stateful switchover, non-stop forwarding, process restartability and fault detection can reduce service impact when properly configured. They do not create immunity from every fault. A software defect, common upstream dependency, shared power source, incorrectly designed link aggregation or maintenance error can still affect both redundant components.

When preparing a UAE design, treat the chassis as one layer of a broader resilience plan. Define which failures must be survived without customer impact, which failures may cause sub-second or short reconvergence, which maintenance operations must be in-service, and whether geographic diversity is required. That decision determines whether the design needs one chassis with internal redundancy, two routers in one location, diverse routers across two locations, or a more distributed edge architecture.

Cisco IOS XR: software is part of the router decision

The ASR 9000 family uses Cisco IOS XR, a network operating system designed for large-scale routing environments. That is significant for operators that value process isolation, modular software behaviour, operational consistency across provider-grade platforms and automation. Cisco continues to publish current IOS XR system setup material for ASR 9000, including recent 26.x release documentation, which shows that the platform remains part of an actively documented software ecosystem. The right release, however, is not simply “the newest one.”

A production release policy should take account of exact hardware support, feature requirements, defect exposure, interoperability, operational tooling and the organisation’s validation process. A release that supports the newest capability may not be the release already proven across an installed network. Conversely, freezing indefinitely on an old release can create security, support and compatibility problems. The practical approach is to maintain an approved software train with a defined upgrade cadence, lab validation or staged rollout, configuration backup, rollback planning and clear maintenance responsibilities.

IOS XR installation and upgrade workflows also influence implementation planning. Cisco documentation covers capabilities such as image packaging, system setup, dependency handling, customised installation images and zero-touch provisioning approaches. Large operators can integrate these functions into controlled provisioning processes, but automation should not remove basic deployment safeguards. Inventory the exact product identifiers, preserve golden configurations, validate management reachability, confirm console access, record current and target software states, and test key routing and service protocols after each change.

For organisations migrating from IOS XE, NX-OS, Junos or another network OS, the main cost is not just command syntax. Operational teams need to understand XR configuration semantics, software packaging, commit behaviour where applicable, process-level troubleshooting, platform-specific show commands, telemetry, licensing and the support workflow. Training, runbook updates and change-control design should therefore be included in the deployment scope rather than left as an informal post-install activity.

Where ASR 9000 fits in UAE network architectures

The family is most valuable where the router is expected to perform a provider-grade edge or aggregation role. The examples below are decision patterns, not claims that every ASR 9000 model supports every service in the same way. Exact protocols, scale values, line cards and software entitlements must be checked for the chosen configuration.

Interface and optics planning: match the line side to the real network

Cisco’s current ASR 9000 positioning covers interfaces from 1G through 400G and mentions coherent optics support. That headline range is useful because it shows the family can span legacy and modern Ethernet rates, but it should never be converted into a blanket statement that every chassis has every speed natively. ASR 9000 systems use different generations of fixed ports, modular line cards, port expansion or adapter approaches and optics. Compatibility must be checked at the exact product-ID and software-release level.

Start by building an interface schedule. For every circuit, record speed, media type, connector, fibre type, wavelength or reach requirement, whether the link is provider-supplied or customer-supplied, and whether link aggregation is required. Then separate “day-one” ports from forecast ports. This prevents a common design error in which a chassis has adequate throughput but not enough deployable ports of the required type. It also exposes where breakouts, adapters or additional line cards might be needed.

Optics deserve their own compatibility review. A 100G or 400G port is only useful when the optical module, fibre plant, patching, loss budget and remote endpoint all match. Coherent connectivity adds further design questions around reach, line system, wavelength planning and operational ownership. Buyers should avoid assuming that a chassis quotation automatically includes every transceiver. Optics are often separate line items and can materially change both price and lead time.

For brownfield deployments, capture the exact remote device and transceiver at each end of the important links. Interoperability is usually straightforward when standards and supported combinations line up, but small differences in FEC mode, breakout configuration, optical specification or software support can block a deployment. Lab testing is especially valuable when a new high-speed link connects two vendors, two hardware generations or a router to a transport platform.

Cable management and serviceability become more important as density grows. A high-density modular chassis can terminate a large number of fibres, so patch-panel location, bend radius, labelling, spare-path access and front/rear service clearance should be planned before installation. In a live UAE data centre or telecom room, poor physical organisation can increase maintenance risk even when the logical design is sound.

How to size an ASR 9000 correctly

Sizing should begin with observed traffic and service requirements, not with the marketing maximum of a chassis. Collect at least several weeks of interface utilisation where possible, including peak-hour patterns, 95th-percentile behaviour, major event spikes, backup windows and any seasonal growth. Separate traffic that is expected to traverse the router from traffic that is switched or terminated elsewhere. A design based only on an average can fail during the very period when the network is most valuable.

Next, define growth. A service-provider platform may remain in service for many years, while traffic growth can be much faster than enterprise refresh cycles. Estimate the number of 10G, 25G, 100G or 400G interfaces likely to be added, how transit and peering will evolve, whether new broadband or enterprise services are planned, and whether the router will absorb functions currently handled by another device. Growth headroom should be intentional: enough to avoid premature replacement, but not so excessive that the organisation pays for a large chassis it cannot economically power or populate.

Port density and slot economics are the third layer. On a modular chassis, line-card slot count can be more important than total fabric capacity. If a particular port mix consumes slots inefficiently, a larger chassis may be needed even when forwarding bandwidth is modest. Conversely, a compact router may be ideal where only a few high-speed uplinks are required. Always map actual port counts to specific supported cards or integrated interfaces before comparing chassis prices.

Control-plane scale needs separate validation. The number of BGP routes, peers, route reflectors, VPNs, labels, multicast states, subscribers or service instances can create constraints unrelated to raw bits per second. Network policy also affects processing and memory requirements. A provider edge taking full internet tables from multiple upstreams is a different workload from an aggregation node forwarding mostly summarised internal routes, even if both carry the same traffic volume.

Feature overhead and packet size influence practical performance. Small packets create more packets-per-second work than large packets at the same bit rate. Complex service features, QoS, filtering, encapsulation and telemetry can alter resource use. This is why a vendor’s maximum fabric or chassis number should be treated as a platform reference, not a guarantee for an arbitrary configuration. If a design is close to a published limit, it is already too close for comfort without a much deeper engineering review.

Finally, decide the failure-state capacity. If two routers normally share traffic, can either one carry the required load when the other is offline? If a chassis loses a line card or fabric component, what remains available? If a maintenance procedure drains traffic to a neighbouring site, does that site have enough port and forwarding headroom? Capacity planning should include the network’s degraded operating states because that is when congestion and customer impact are most likely.

A useful sizing output is therefore not one bandwidth number. It is a small engineering profile: current and forecast traffic, interface schedule, route and service scale, feature set, redundancy objective, failure-state headroom, rack/power envelope, software release, lifecycle target and expected expansion path. That profile can then be mapped to one or more ASR 9000 configurations and compared with alternative Cisco platforms.

Licensing and software entitlement: confirm before the bill of materials is final

ASR 9000 licensing has evolved across hardware and software generations. Cisco’s current licensing reference discusses multiple approaches, including Flexible Consumption Model licensing, Smart Licensing and Smart Licensing Using Policy, right-to-use or non-consumption models for applicable functions, and Software Innovation Access concepts. The important procurement lesson is that the hardware chassis alone does not necessarily represent the complete feature entitlement required for the intended deployment.

Before requesting a quote, list the routing and service features that are actually required: for example, internet edge policy, MPLS or segment-routing functions, advanced service capabilities, automation or software access expectations, and any capacity-related entitlement relevant to the selected hardware. Then map those requirements to the current Cisco licensing reference for the exact platform and release. Avoid copying a licence list from an older ASR 9000 deployment because the commercial model may have changed.

Term-based and consumption-style licensing can also affect operational processes. The network team should know how entitlement is registered or reported, what happens when connectivity to licensing services is restricted, how compliance is monitored, who owns renewal dates and whether capacity can be pooled or moved according to the applicable program. These are not purely finance questions; a renewal or entitlement issue can become an operational risk if ownership is unclear.

Support coverage should be treated separately from feature licensing. A production edge router typically needs a defined hardware and software support path, escalation contacts, replacement expectations and access to appropriate software updates. The required service level depends on business impact and whether local spares or redundant routers can absorb a failure. A network with N+1 hardware on site may tolerate a different replacement window from a remote single-router location.

For UAE procurement, ask for the quotation to show hardware, power components, routing processors, fabrics where applicable, line cards, optics, licenses, subscription terms, support coverage, installation services and any spare strategy as distinct items. This makes it easier to compare proposals and prevents a low initial chassis price from hiding missing components that are essential for production use.

High availability: design for the failure you actually need to survive

Cisco documents multiple high-availability mechanisms across ASR 9000, including redundant routing control on applicable chassis, power-supply redundancy, cooling redundancy, stateful switchover, fabric switchover, non-stop forwarding, process restartability and fault detection. These are important platform capabilities, but high availability is a property of the overall design rather than a checkbox on the router.

Begin by defining failure domains. A dual-RSP chassis protects against a control-card failure, but not necessarily against a total chassis power event. Two power supplies connected to the same electrical source provide less resilience than properly engineered independent feeds. Two uplinks in the same fibre path can be lost by one cable incident. Two routers in the same rack can share environmental risk. When availability targets are stringent, the topology should distribute critical dependencies across power, fibre, chassis, racks and sometimes sites.

Routing protocols must be tuned to complement the physical design. Fast convergence is valuable, but aggressive timers without testing can create instability. Graceful restart, BFD, ECMP, link aggregation, IGP design, BGP policy and MPLS protection mechanisms should be selected according to network scale and operational experience. Maintenance behaviour matters as much as failure behaviour: the goal is to be able to upgrade, replace or drain components predictably without discovering hidden single points of failure.

Test the resilience plan. A commissioning procedure should include controlled link failures, control-plane failover where appropriate, power-feed verification, route reconvergence checks, service validation and monitoring alarms. The most useful high-availability design is one the operations team has actually exercised and documented. If the production network cannot safely tolerate a planned test, the design may already be too dependent on assumptions.

Rack, power, cooling and facility planning in the UAE

The physical range of ASR 9000 means facility planning can vary from a compact 2-RU installation to a chassis that consumes most or all of a rack. Cisco publishes different power-module options, airflow directions and chassis weights across the family. Those values must be checked against the exact hardware revision and power configuration; they should not be assumed from a nearby model. For large systems, facility readiness can become the critical path for deployment.

Rack depth and service clearance are often overlooked. Large routing chassis can be deep and heavy, and installation may require appropriate rails, lifting practices and clear front/rear access. Confirm rack type, usable depth, door clearance, cable management, floor loading where relevant and the path from loading bay to equipment room. A chassis that technically fits the rack units can still be impractical if it cannot be safely installed or serviced.

Power design should be based on the populated configuration rather than the empty chassis. Line cards, routing processors, fabric cards, fans and optics all contribute to load. Confirm whether AC or DC architecture is required, the number and rating of feeds, connector and PDU compatibility, redundancy policy and facility headroom. Cisco documentation notes that certain ASR 9000 power systems do not support mixing AC and DC modules, so the power architecture needs to be deliberate.

Cooling deserves equal attention in UAE facilities because ambient conditions outside the controlled room can be severe and because high-density equipment adds substantial heat load. The router must be operated within vendor environmental limits, with airflow orientation compatible with the room design. Do not block intake or exhaust paths with cable bundles or adjacent equipment. Verify that cooling remains sufficient during failure of one fan component or one room cooling unit if that scenario is part of the site availability objective.

For remote telecom rooms, industrial locations or lightly staffed points of presence, add monitoring and access considerations. Environmental sensors, remote console access, out-of-band management, camera or access-control procedures, local spares and clear escalation contacts can reduce mean time to repair. A technically redundant router is still difficult to recover if no one can reach the site or if the failed module cannot be identified quickly.

Lifecycle and procurement risk: the family is current, but every component is not

ASR 9000 has been in the market for many years and Cisco continues to list the overall series as available to order. At the same time, Cisco publishes separate end-of-sale and end-of-life notices for individual routers, route switch processors and line-card generations. That combination is normal for a long-lived modular family, but it creates a specific purchasing responsibility: every proposed product identifier should be checked against its lifecycle status at the time of quotation.

This is especially important when comparing new, remanufactured, used or installed-base expansion options. A component may be technically compatible with an existing chassis yet have a shorter remaining support life than the buyer expects. Another component may have a replacement recommendation that changes the economics of an upgrade. For a new strategic deployment, remaining support horizon can matter more than a lower acquisition price.

Do not assume that an end-of-sale component is immediately unsupported. Cisco lifecycle notices normally define separate milestones for last order, last ship, software maintenance and support. The relevant decision is whether those dates align with the project’s planned service life and risk policy. If a system is expected to run for seven years, buying a component with only a small part of that support window remaining may create an early forced migration.

Installed ASR 9006 or ASR 9010 environments can still have valid upgrade or expansion scenarios, but they need a particularly careful review of line cards, RSP generation, power systems and software support. New deployments may be better served by newer ASR 9900 platforms or, depending on the architecture, by another Cisco routing family. The correct choice is based on lifecycle, density, features and operational fit, not on preserving a familiar model name.

A good purchase order should therefore reference exact Cisco product IDs, quantities, hardware revisions where material, software or licence terms, support SKU, optics and any required accessories. “Cisco ASR 9000 router” is not sufficiently precise for a carrier-class procurement. Precise identifiers reduce the chance of receiving a component that is incompatible, near end of life or unsuitable for the intended release.

Migration planning from an existing edge router

Replacing or introducing a provider-edge router is a network migration, not a rack-and-stack task. The first stage is discovery. Capture the current device inventory, software version, interfaces, optics, addressing, routing adjacencies, MPLS or VPN services, QoS policy, filters, route maps or policies, management systems, AAA, logging, timing requirements, monitoring, out-of-band access and physical cabling. Exporting configuration is useful, but configuration alone rarely captures every dependency.

The second stage is translation. Decide which functions should be reproduced exactly and which should be redesigned. A migration is an opportunity to remove obsolete policy, standardise naming, improve routing hygiene and introduce more resilient topology, but changing too many variables at once can make troubleshooting difficult. For critical networks, separate mandatory migration changes from optional optimisation and test each group.

The third stage is coexistence. Whenever possible, create a period in which the old and new routers can operate in parallel. Establish new uplinks, management, routing adjacencies and service paths before moving the highest-risk traffic. Use route preference, communities, metrics or controlled physical changes to shift services progressively. This allows rollback without physically rebuilding the old state under pressure.

The fourth stage is validation. Confirm routing tables, next hops, traffic levels, packet loss, latency where relevant, MPLS or VPN reachability, customer services, QoS counters, alarms, telemetry and management access. Compare baseline graphs from before and after the change. The absence of a major alarm does not prove that all policy is correct; application-level or customer-level tests are often needed.

Finally, preserve rollback and evidence. Document the exact cutover point at which rollback remains safe, keep configuration backups, retain old optics and patching until acceptance, and update diagrams and support records after completion. If an old device will be decommissioned, check data-handling and asset-disposal requirements. In a regulated or carrier environment, the change record should be good enough for another engineer to reconstruct what happened without relying on individual memory.

FourTeck can scope a migration as hardware supply only, installation support, implementation assistance or a broader coordinated change depending on the project. The useful inputs are the current platform, target interfaces, routing and services, maintenance window, outage tolerance, available test environment, rollback constraints and the level of post-change support expected.

Operations, telemetry and change control

A high-capacity edge router should be observable before it carries production traffic. Define which metrics, logs and events matter: interface utilisation and errors, optical levels where available, routing-neighbour state, route counts, CPU and memory, fabric health, power and fan status, environmental alarms, packet drops, QoS counters, licensing state and configuration changes. Send the appropriate data to monitoring systems that can retain trends and alert on conditions that represent real operational risk.

Baseline collection is valuable. Record normal CPU, memory, route counts and traffic at several times of day before introducing major changes. After a software upgrade, new line card or service migration, compare against that baseline. A system can appear “up” while slowly developing congestion, optical errors or control-plane load. Trend data helps distinguish a new problem from normal daily variation.

Configuration governance should be explicit. Use version control or an approved configuration repository, peer review for significant changes, templating where appropriate and automated validation that checks intended state without blindly pushing commands. Emergency changes need a documented path as well. The objective is not bureaucracy; it is to reduce the probability that a single typo or unreviewed policy change affects thousands of customers.

Out-of-band management is particularly important for edge routers. If a routing or interface mistake isolates in-band management, engineers still need console or management access. The out-of-band path should have independent reachability, controlled authentication and tested procedures. Remote-hands instructions should identify physical slots, ports and LEDs clearly enough to avoid accidental removal of a healthy redundant component.

Software upgrades should be planned as repeatable operations. Maintain a compatibility matrix, record image hashes or approved packages, validate storage and dependencies, review release notes and open caveats, back up configuration, confirm rollback steps and monitor the router through the maintenance window. For redundant deployments, determine whether traffic can be drained or shifted to reduce impact. An upgrade method that works in a lab may still need different sequencing in a live multi-chassis network.

Security considerations at the routing edge

An edge router sits at a strategically important point, so hardening needs to cover management, control plane and data plane. Cisco highlights platform security elements such as Secure Boot and Trust Anchor capabilities in current ASR 9000 positioning, but secure operation still depends heavily on configuration and process. Restrict management access, use strong AAA, prefer encrypted management protocols, separate management from customer traffic where practical and log administrative activity.

Control-plane protection should be designed to keep unwanted traffic from exhausting routing resources. Filtering, infrastructure ACLs, routing-protocol authentication where applicable, peer protection, rate controls and route-policy hygiene all contribute. Internet-facing BGP sessions need strict prefix and policy controls. Internal routing adjacencies also deserve protection because a misconfigured trusted neighbour can cause as much disruption as an external attack.

DDoS planning should define detection, mitigation ownership and escalation. Cisco positions DDoS edge protection solutions around using edge and peering routers as part of the defence, but the exact method depends on architecture and subscribed capabilities. Some networks use upstream scrubbing, RTBH, FlowSpec or traffic diversion. The router design must leave enough operational headroom to remain manageable during an attack.

Software vulnerability management is equally important. Track Cisco security advisories for the deployed IOS XR release and hardware, assess exposure, and maintain a process for patching or mitigating vulnerabilities. A router that cannot be upgraded because the maintenance process was never tested becomes a long-term security liability. Lifecycle planning and security planning are therefore connected.

Physical security should not be ignored. Console ports, removable modules and local management interfaces need controlled access. In shared data centres, document rack ownership, escort rules and remote-hands authorisation. Keep serial numbers and asset records current so that a support case or replacement does not depend on discovering the installed hardware during an outage.

When ASR 9000 may not be the best fit

A large carrier-class router should not be selected automatically for every demanding network. If the requirement is a small enterprise WAN edge with limited routing scale, an ASR 9000 may introduce unnecessary cost, power, operational complexity and licensing. If the primary requirement is a newer disaggregated or routed-optical architecture, another Cisco family may provide a better lifecycle or density profile. If the network is dominated by data-centre leaf-spine switching rather than provider edge routing, a data-centre switching platform may be more appropriate.

The same principle applies within the ASR 9000 family. A 44-RU ASR 9922 is appropriate only when the site can use its slot density and scale. A smaller ASR 9902 or 9903 may be a better operational and facility fit where the port count is modest. Conversely, selecting the smallest router because it is cheaper can create an early replacement if the site is expected to add many 100G or 400G links.

Installed-base compatibility can also pull a design toward an older component that would not be chosen for a greenfield project. That may be reasonable when the objective is to extend a stable platform for a defined period, but the support horizon and exit plan should be documented. A short-term expansion and a new ten-year strategic edge are different procurement problems.

FourTeck can compare the requested ASR 9000 configuration with nearby Cisco routing options based on the real requirement. A balanced comparison should include forwarding capacity, port density, service features, software consistency, automation, rack/power impact, lifecycle, licensing, support and migration effort. The best platform is the one that meets the network objective with acceptable operational risk, not the one with the highest headline number.

UAE procurement checklist for Cisco ASR 9000

A useful request for quotation should give enough engineering detail to prevent multiple suppliers from pricing different interpretations of the same project. The checklist below can be sent with the requirement and refined during technical discovery.

Practical commissioning sequence

Common buyer questions

Regional planning and FourTeck resources

UAE projects can involve more than router supply. Data-centre access, rack preparation, structured cabling, optics, out-of-band connectivity, implementation labour, documentation and support coordination can all affect the delivery plan. For broader infrastructure and support requirements, see FourTeck IT Services UAE. This is useful when the ASR 9000 project is part of a larger network refresh rather than a standalone hardware purchase.

Organisations operating across multiple technology domains may also need server, virtualisation or data-centre dependencies reviewed alongside the routing edge. Server Dubai by FourTeck provides a specialist route for server infrastructure enquiries where compute and routing changes are part of the same project.

For corporate information and broader regional capability, visit FourTeck. The practical goal is to keep the ASR 9000 bill of materials technically precise while coordinating any adjacent installation, migration and facility tasks under a clear project scope.

Decision recap before you order

What FourTeck needs for an accurate ASR 9000 quotation

The fastest way to improve quotation accuracy is to provide engineering inputs rather than only a model family name. If some items are unknown, they can be resolved during a sizing discussion, but known information should be included from the start.

Plan the right Cisco ASR 9000 configuration for your UAE network

Cisco ASR 9000 is a broad routing family, so the quality of the result depends on matching the exact chassis, control and fabric architecture, line cards, optics, software, licensing and support lifecycle to the network. Send FourTeck your traffic, ports, routing role, resiliency target and site constraints for a focused model and bill-of-materials review. If ASR 9000 is not the best fit, the comparison can include an alternative Cisco routing approach rather than forcing the project into the requested family.