AT&T is spending serious money with Cisco to improve its Internet capabilities. Let’s just hope they’re spending enough.
To prevent our cable and DSL modems from delivering Hayes 1200-baud SmartModem-like performance, the major telecoms, such as AT&T, have been investing in serious infrastructure upgrades. In the most recent one, AT&T announced that it was buying Cisco CRS-1 core routers for 25 of its major Internet backbone sites. At $500,000 to more than $1 million per CRS-1, that’s serious mullah even for AT&T or Cisco.
What do you get for that kind of money? A single CRS-1 port, according to an independent test by Light Reading, can deliver 40 Gbit/s (gigabits per second). In another test, Light Reading was able to test two fully loaded CRS-1 chassis and the pair reached a rather stunning 1.2 Tbit/s (Terabits per second).
Now that, my friend, is fast.
I just hope it’s fast enough.