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BiB 081: 128 Technology Rethinks The WAN Router
Ethan Banks and Drew Conry-Murray were delegates at a recent Networking Field Day Extra to hear from 128 Technology.
128 Technology makes a software router that runs on x86. There are a variety of software-based routers on the market. What sets 128T apart is how it does the routing.
For example:
* The 128T router is session-based and stateful
* It’s secure via policy, with a zero-trust posture
* Operators can set policies to determine the network path depending on SLAs and changing network characteristics
* The router relies on packet metadata and NAT to direct packets
* The router uses AES-256 or 128 to encrypt metadata in the first packet, and the payload in every packet in a session
Use Cases
The speakers from 128 Technology outlined several use cases for their software router:
* Routing/connectivity in locations with significant bandwidth constraints, such as satellite
* SD-WAN (including cloud traffic optimization)
* VoIP/call centers
* L4 firewall (not an NG or UTM platform, but you can do service chaining for the fancy stuff)
* “We’re going after the routing market. Not just the SD-WAN market.”
NAT Vs. Tunneling
The 128 Technology presentations go to great pains to explain that they don’t rely on tunneling or encapsulation to get packets from source to destination. By eschewing tunnels, 128 Technology claims several benefits:
* Efficiency gains of ~ 30% demonstrated (i.e. more throughput due to less tunnel overhead, matters more when bandwidth-constrained)
* Reduced risk of fragmentation / having to tweak TCP MSS or MTU
* If there is fragmentation required (metadata adds ~150-200 bytes of overhead depending on policy complexity), they will fragment/reassemble within their own fabric
Show Links:
128 Technology.com
Networking Field Day Exclusive with 128Technology – TechFieldDay
Networking Field Day Videos on YouTube
Event playlist
128 Technology Networking Platform Overview
128 Technology Service Centricity via the 128T Networking Platform Data Model
128 Technology Routing Protocols: SVR
128 Technology Routing Protocols: STEP
128 Technology Why Tunnel Free is Better and How We’re Different from Legacy Overlays