Since I am spending this week in the lab with my newly received ASR 1004 and ASR 1006 I decided that this week I will dedicate to the ASR and as such I wanted to introduce you to the ASR and answer/clear up any concerns you may have regarding this platform. The platform fits nicely between the 7200/7300 Series and the 7600 series and at first glance you’ll notice that for a router it’s extremely streamlined (ok it’s not as astecially pleasing to the eye as a Ferrari but as you’ll see this is platform is the Ferrari of the information superhighway) and very feature rich for an initial release. Many customers/partners initially are concerned with the ASR’s new IOS XE software release but by the end of this series I hope to show you that when you configure IOS XE on the ASR you really won’t see a huge difference between the config structure on the 7200/7600 Series. Before we start let examine the main differences between the platforms within the product family from a hardware point of view:

ASR 1002
The Cisco ASR 1002 Router (3-SPA, 2-RU chassis) comes with an integrated Route Processor (RP), an integrated SPA Interface Processor (SIP), four built-in Gigabit Ethernet ports, and is configurable with either the 5 Gbps or 10 Gbps Embedded Services Processor (ESP). The Cisco ASR 1002 Router supports the following components:

• One Cisco ASR 1000 Series Embedded Services Processor (ESP). Either the 5-Gbps Cisco ASR 1000 Series ESP (ASR1000-ESP5) or the 10-Gbps Cisco ASR 1000 Series ESP (ASR1000-ESP10.
• One Cisco ASR1000 Series Route Processor 1 (RP1) with 4-GB DRAM (memory is not factory- or field-upgradeable) integrated in the chassis
• Four built-in Gigabit Ethernet ports
• One Cisco ASR1000 SPA Interface Processor 10 (ASR1000-SIP10)
• Up to three fixed SPAs integrated in the chassis
• Dual (redundant) power supplies, option of either AC or DC power supply

Running on Cisco IOS XE Software, the Cisco ASR 1002 Router supports software redundancy, Cisco high-availability features, Nonstop Forwarding (NSF), and In Service Software Upgrades (ISSUs) without redundant hardware.

ASR 1004
The Cisco ASR 1004 Router (8-SPA, 4-RU chassis) comes with one Route Processor (RP) slot, one Embedded Services Processor (ESP) slot, two SPA Interface Processor (SIP) slots, and provides 10 Gbps throughput support. The Cisco ASR 1004 Router supports the following components:

• One Cisco ASR 1000 Series Embedded Services Processor (Cisco ASR1000-ESP10)
• One Cisco ASR 1000 Series Route Processor 1 (Cisco ASR1000-RP1)
• Up to two Cisco ASR 1000 Series SPA Interface Processors (Cisco ASR1000-SIP10s)
• Up to eight SPAs
• Dual (redundant) power supplies, option of either AC or DC power supply

Running on Cisco IOS XE Software, the Cisco ASR 1004 Router supports software redundancy, Cisco high-availability features, NSF, and ISSUs without redundant hardware.

ASR1006
The Cisco ASR 1006 Router (12-SPA, 6-RU chassis) provides the option of hardware-redundant Route Processor (RP) and Embedded Services Processor (ESP) support. Its features include two ESP slots, two RP slots, three SIP slots, and 10 Gbps throughput support. The Cisco ASR 1006 Router supports the following components:

• Dual Cisco ASR 1000 Series Embedded Services Processors (Cisco ASR1000-ESP10s)
• Dual Cisco ASR 1000 Series Route Processor 1s (Cisco ASR1000-RP1s)
• Up to three Cisco ASR 1000 Series SPA Interface Processors (Cisco ASR1000-SIP10s)
• Up to twelve SPAs
• Dual (redundant) power supplies, option of either AC or DC power supply

Running on Cisco IOS XE Software, the Cisco ASR 1006 Router supports hardware redundancy, NSF, ISSUs, and future Route-Processor service upgrades. When multiple ESPs, RPs, and SIPs are used, the amount of memory should be equal for like components. (The amount of memory in both ESPs should be equal, the amount of memory in both RPs should be equal, and the amount of memory in each SIP should be equal.)

Of significant difference between the 1006 and the other platforms is its ability to support redundant hardware components, mainly Control and Data Plan components like the redundant RP1’s and the redundant ESPs. On the RP1’s you will notice that there is a dedicated GE management interface and the purpose of this interface is to allow users to perform management tasks on the router; it is basically an interface that should not and often cannot forward network traffic but can otherwise access the router, often via Telnet and SSH, and perform most management tasks on the router. The interface is most useful before a router has begun routing, or in troubleshooting scenarios when the SPA interfaces are inactive. The following aspects of the Management Ethernet interface should be noted:

• Each RP has a Management Ethernet interface, but only the active RP has an accessible Management Ethernet interface (the standby RP can be accessed using the console port, however)
• IPv4, IPv6, and ARP are the only routed protocols supported for the interface.
• The interface provides a method of access to the router even if the SPA interfaces or the IOS processes are down.
• The Management Ethernet interface is part of its own VRF.

Paying particular attention to the last bulleted item you will notice that the GE Management interface is automatically part of its own VRF. This VRF, which is named “Mgmt-intf,” is automatically configured on the Cisco ASR 1000 Series Router and is dedicated to the Management Ethernet interface; no other interfaces can join this VRF. Therefore, this VRF does not participate in the MPLS VPN VRF or any other network-wide VRF. Let’s take a look at the management interface vrf in closer detail by issuing the ’sh running-config vrf’ command:

rcdsp1006-239#sh running-config vrf
Building configuration...

Current configuration : 347 bytes
vrf definition Mgmt-intf
!
address-family ipv4
exit-address-family
!
address-family ipv6
exit-address-family
!
!
ip route vrf Mgmt-intf 0.0.0.0 0.0.0.0 10.89.246.1
!
!
interface GigabitEthernet0
description *** MGMT INT ***
vrf forwarding Mgmt-intf
ip address 10.89.246.239 255.255.255.0
speed auto
duplex auto
negotiation auto
!
end

rcdsp1006-239#

Notice that a VRF named Mgmt-intf is defined on the router and GE0 is placed within that VRF. I mentioned that no other interface can be a part of this VRF so let’s see what happend when I try to add anther interface into that VRF:

rcdsp1006-239#config t
Enter configuration commands, one per line. End with CNTL/Z.
rcdsp1006-239(config)#int gig2/1/9
rcdsp1006-239(config-if)#vrf forwarding Mgmt-intf
% VRF Mgmt-intf is reserved for management interface.

rcdsp1006-239(config-if)#

Apart from having a CLI the ASR also has a Web User Interface as well that can be accessed just as any other router using an HTTP config. What makes the ASR a little different is that in addition to a normal web interface the ASR also has an enhanced Web UI that can be enabled using the legacy HTTP Server configuration but also using a ‘transport-map’ command. A sample config enabled the enhanced WebUI can be seen below:

rcdsp1004-238#config t
Enter configuration commands, one per line. End with CNTL/Z.
rcdsp1004-238(config)#ip http server
rcdsp1004-238(config)#ip http port 80
rcdsp1004-238(config)#transport-map type persistent webui http-web
rcdsp1004-238(config-tmap)#server
rcdsp1004-238(config-tmap)#exit
rcdsp1004-238(config)#transport type persistent webui input http-web
rcdsp1004-238(config)#end
*Jun 2 12:27:33.853: %UICFGEXP-6-SERVER_NOTIFIED_START: R0/0: psd: Server wui has been notified to start
rcdsp1004-238(config)#end
rcdsp1004-238#


As noted in the document High Availability Overview, the  ASR 1002 and ASR 1004 both support only a single RP1 and single ESP however both of the routers support dual IOS processes running on the same RP1 or software redundancy where a standby IOS process can be available on the same Route Processor as the active IOS process. This standby IOS process can be switched to in the event of an IOS failure, and can also be used to upgrade sub-package software in some scenarios. Lets take a look how we enable software redundancy on the ASR 1004:


rcdsp1004-238#
rcdsp1004-238#sh redundancy state
my state = 13 -ACTIVE
peer state = 1 -DISABLED
Mode = Simplex
Unit ID = 48
....
Redundancy Mode (Operational) = Non-redundant
Redundancy Mode (Configured) = sso
Redundancy State = Non Redundant
Maintenance Mode = Disabled
Manual Swact = disabled (system is simplex (no peer unit))
Communications = Down Reason: Simplex mode
client count = 66
client_notification_TMR = 30000 milliseconds
RF debug mask = 0x0
...
rcdsp1004-238#
rcdsp1004-238#config t
Enter configuration commands, one per line. End with CNTL/Z.
rcdsp1004-238(config)#redundancy
rcdsp1004-238(config-red)#mode sso
rcdsp1004-238(config-red)#
*Jun 2 14:07:52.981: %CMRP-6-DUAL_IOS_REBOOT_REQUIRED: R0/0: cmand: Configuration must be saved and the chassis must be rebooted for IOS redundancy changes to take effect
rcdsp1004-238(config-red)#end
rcdsp1004-238#

After I write the configuration to memory and reboot the router you will begin to see the following messages displayed on the console:

*Jun 2 14:16:02.592: %REDUNDANCY-5-PEER_MONITOR_EVENT: Active detected a standby insertion (raw-event=PEER_FOUND(4))
*Jun 2 14:16:02.592: %REDUNDANCY-5-PEER_MONITOR_EVENT: Active detected a standby insertion (raw-event=PEER_REDUNDANCY_STATE_CHANGE(5))

*Jun 2 14:17:57.195: %HA_CONFIG_SYNC-6-BULK_CFGSYNC_SUCCEED: Bulk Sync succeeded
*Jun 2 14:17:57.220: %RF-5-RF_TERMINAL_STATE: Terminal state reached for (SSO)

One thing to know with SSO enabled on the ASR is that if you try and enter into config mode prior to the router sync’ing up config and processes you will get the following error message on the console:

rcdsp1004-238#config t
Config mode cannot be entered during Standby initialization

Once the router has synced everything you can look at the redundancy state again and you should see the following:

rcdsp1004-238#sh redundancy state
my state = 13 -ACTIVE
peer state = 8 -STANDBY HOT
Mode = Duplex
Unit ID = 48
...
Redundancy Mode (Operational) = sso
Redundancy Mode (Configured) = sso
Redundancy State = sso
Maintenance Mode = Disabled
Manual Swact = enabled
Communications = Up
...
client count = 66
client_notification_TMR = 30000 milliseconds
RF debug mask = 0x0
rcdsp1004-238#

So let’s examine the output from the ’show plaform’ command before we swap over to software redundancy and after. In the output below you will notice that the first output lists the RP1’s slot as R0 with a state of active so in essence there is a single instance running on the RP however after I issue the ‘mode sso’ command from within the redundancy config mode you will see that the ASR’s RP created two slots for the RP, R0/0 and R0/1 with R0/0 being active and R0/1 being standby:

rcdsp1004-238#sh platform
Chassis type: ASR1004            

Slot      Type                 State         Insert time (ago) 
————————————————————–
0         ASR1000-SIP10        ok            00:02:07     
 0/3      SPA-1X10GE-L-V2      ok            00:00:50     
1         ASR1000-SIP10        ok            00:02:07     
 1/3      SPA-8X1GE-V2         ok            00:00:50     
R0        ASR1000-RP1          ok, active    00:02:07     
F0        ASR1000-ESP10        ok, active    00:02:07     
P0        ASR1004-PWR-AC       ok            00:01:20     
P1        ASR1004-PWR-AC       ok            00:01:20     

rcdsp1004-238#

……………………………………..
……………………………………..
……………………………………..

rcdsp1004-238#sh platform
Chassis type: ASR1004            

Slot      Type                 State         Insert time (ago)
————————————————————–
0         ASR1000-SIP10        ok            16:17:09     
 0/3      SPA-1X10GE-L-V2      ok            16:15:53     
1         ASR1000-SIP10        ok            16:17:09     
 1/3      SPA-8X1GE-V2         ok            16:15:53     
R0        ASR1000-RP1          ok            16:17:09     
 R0/0                          ok, active    16:17:09     
 R0/1                          ok, standby   16:15:24     
F0        ASR1000-ESP10        ok, active    16:17:09     
P0        ASR1004-PWR-AC       ok            16:16:22     
P1        ASR1004-PWR-AC       ok            16:16:22     

rcdsp1004-238#