Comparison of soft and hard Routers

Vro is the core device in the network. The hardware router is familiar to everyone, and the most typical is the Cisco Series router. Software routers are emerging products, such as the WinRoute Pro software router launched by tiny software and the Internet gateway software router launched by vicomsoft. Compared with a software-based Router, some people think that Cisco products are purely hardware-based routers. This is one-sided. Like a PC, Cisco routers include power supplies, internal BUS, primary storage, flash memory, processors, and operating systems. At the same time, its internal components also include a dedicated Nic to process various possible connections. In short, the main difference between the hardware of a Cisco router and a dedicated computer with plug-in components is that the network operating system (IOS) of a Cisco router contains routing software, vro is running on Windows operating systems. The following is a comparison between the two in other aspects.

■ Different application scenarios

Tiny software's WinRoute pro is suitable for one branch office, while vicomsoft's Internet gateway is suitable for the whole office, because it can process multiple connections of each branch office. You can also use a shared remote server to call a user. Some companies are establishing their own working groups for security purposes and hiding them behind the software-based Network Address Translation (NAT) router.

Can these two soft routers meet the application requirements of large companies? For example, for a company with more than 5000 users, the company uses only one or two T-1 rental lines connected to the Internet, its bandwidth is less than 5 Mbps. Although both vrouters can generate more than six times the traffic of a high-speed PC, when DHCP is used, the number of Internet gateway routers is limited to 1024. When the number of users exceeds a certain number, the WinRoute pro email server will add a tag to the extra user files. In a large and complex company environment, these two vrouters are far from enough. In fact, most such companies require Cisco's new high-end routing products.

■ Different security levels

If you install a soft router on a very "clean" system, that is to say, the system installation has the latest MaintenanceProgramAnd security patch, without installing other software and performing Nat, the soft router can be as safe and reliable as the hard router provided by all other Cisco.

Although Nat was originally designed to enhance and protect network communication protocols, it does not run in the operating system and is usually installed between the hardware layer and the network protocol stack layer, the ability to access all information packages can be effectively controlled before they cause any harm, which greatly improves the security of the system. Internet gateway and WinRoute pro both use NAT technology, while Cisco fully integrates various Nat functions in its iOS v12.0 and later versions. These applications comply with the requirements of RFC 1631 for ip nat.

For Cisco hardware routers, Nat not only hides the IP addresses of network users, but also does not see the IP addresses of external network resources, this prevents malicious personnel from stealing network resources.

For the security level, the security of Cisco routers is not higher than that of soft routers. Cisco uses Nat in the pix, which is basically the same as using NAT in its own IOS. Even so, Cisco routers are doing well in resisting DoS attacks, mainly because Cisco's IOS is not only an operating system, but also a routing/security software. This integration method is not only more concise than the software routing products that work on windows, but also enables fast updates whenever Cisco discovers a new attack method.

■ Price differences

The prices of Cisco routers used by small and medium organizations generally vary. The price difference depends on the number of subnets and traffic support, the upload method and speed, and the security selection and whether the user requires the voice service. Let's look at a very common router-Cisco 4500-m. The throughput of the system is equivalent to the system we tested. The 4500-m high end supports a 155 Mbps ATM OC-3 component, the low end can support two T-1 rental line interface, this type of interface generally supports low-speed interfaces of 2.048mbps and 16.128mbps. A MHz PC can work under this bandwidth.

However, the price does not represent everything, and the surface phenomenon may be fraudulent. Cisco 4500-m has many advantages over other software-equipped PC products, including more built-in LAN and WAN protocols, optimized WAN services, and centralized installation and Design of users' basic network architecture. In addition, the normal running time of a Cisco router or other mainstream routing products is much longer than that of A vro on a Windows platform. However, this type of router is still more expensive than the two soft routers (including server hardware devices) We introduced above, this does not include the funds required to hire a Cisco-certified installer. Therefore, it is best for users to consider their own needs before making a choice.

ArticleInput: CSH responsible editor: CSH