Cisco 8000 Series Routers Data Sheet

 

Cisco 8000 Series

Cisco 8000 Series routers

High-performance networking systems have historically been divided into routing or switching classes, with distinct hardware and software. Over time, this distinction has become less pronounced. This convergence has occurred with the evolution of feature-rich switching chips and routing chips that balance traditional Service Provider (SP)–class capabilities with many benefits of switching Application-Specific Integrated Circuits (ASICs).

Cisco^® 8000 Series routers complete this journey. They deliver provider-class routing functionality at unmatched density, performance, and power. This enables Cisco 8000 Series to be deployed into an unprecedented range of routing roles – all supported with a single ASIC architecture and operating system – thus streamlining qualification, deployment, and operations.

The Cisco 8000 Series combines the revolutionary Cisco Silicon One^™, IOS XR^® software, and a set of clean sheet chassis to deliver a breakthrough in high-performance routers. The 8000 Series comprises a full range of feature-rich, highly scalable, deep-buffered, on-chip High Bandwidth Memory (HBM) and 400 Gigabit Ethernet (GbE)-optimized routers ranging from 10.8 to 25.6 Tbps in a 1 RU footprint. It is also available in an industry leading, rack-mountable modular system capable of 518.4 Tbps of full-duplex, line rate forwarding.

The Cisco 8000 Series includes three distinct router architectures that utilize the Cisco Silicon One ASICs: distributed/modular, centralized, and fixed. Only the distributed/modular (8800 series) and fixed (8100/8200 series) architectures will be covered in this datasheet. Learn more about centralized router architecture here.

The Cisco 8100 and 8200 Series utilize Cisco’s Router-on-Chip (RoC) architecture to deliver full routing functionality with a single ASIC per router. Both support the full routing feature set, but the 8200 has deep buffers and expanded forwarding tables, while the 8100 Series is targeted for data center applications with lower buffering and forwarding table scale requirements.

The RoC architecture is distinguished from System-on-Chip (SoC) switches by supporting large forwarding tables, deep buffers, more flexible packet operations, and enhanced programmability. The Cisco 8100 and 8200 provide up to 25.6 Tbps of network bandwidth with lower power than similar systems.

Cisco 8000 Series hardware

The 8000 Series includes routers in both fixed and modular form factors to address a broad range of bandwidth needs and facility requirements.

Table 1.           Cisco 8100 and 8200 Series fixed chassis options

Table 2.           Cisco 8800 Series modular chassis options

Silicon innovation with the Cisco Silicon One ASIC

Cisco Silicon One is the first routing silicon architecture to break through the 10-Tbps benchmark for network bandwidth. This is accomplished without sacrificing route capacity, packet-per-second forwarding performance, or feature flexibility. The first-generation Q100 ASIC delivers 10.8 Tbps of throughput in 16-nm process technology, while the second-generation Q200 ASIC increases the performance to 12.8 Tbps in 7-nm process technology and now the new P100 ASIC pushes the performance even further to 19.2Tbps in 7-nm technology. Q100, Q200 and P100 ASICs deliver high-scale routing and deep buffering that typically require off-chip memories. In case of external memories, data path bandwidth is reduced due to frequent memory access. The Cisco Silicon One architecture achieves high-performance and full routing capabilities without external memories. This is enabled by the clean-sheet internal architecture that includes an on-chip High Bandwidth Memory (HBM). HBM provides a significant increase in performance while lowering power consumption. It is located on the chip package and connects to the Cisco Silicon One ASIC via an ultra-fast silicon interface. HBM is used to increase the scale of the forwarding table. G100 ASIC with 25.6Tbps performance does not use HBM and it is optimized for certain applications such as Top of Rack (ToR), leaf, spine, etc. in Data Centers and large scale AI/ML (Artificial Intelligence/ Machine Learning) networks.

The Cisco Silicon One architecture supports multiple modes of operation. It can function as an RoC, a line card network processor, and a switch fabric element. This flexibility enables consistent software in multiple roles and rapid silicon evolution.

System design innovation

Supporting the 8000 Series capabilities demanded a wide range of new approaches to platform design. By leveraging over 25 years of high-performance system design, Cisco has delivered unprecedented capacity without compromising forwarding performance or requiring oversubscription. This required new power supplies, a redesigned cooling architecture, and future-proof connectors.

The Cisco 8100 and 8200 Series routers required extensive innovation like consolidation of multiple components into a single ASIC to support high densities. Cisco Silicon One brings the capabilities of multiple chips into one single device, greatly increasing the power efficiency of the solution. As with all modern networking devices the power density of the ASIC creates a challenging thermal problem. In addition, 400GbE optics require up to six times the power of 100GbE QSFP28 modules. These challenges are addressed via advanced system design, including state-of-the-art fans and heat sinks, and QSFP-DD modular optics.

The 8800 chassis utilize a state-of-the-art orthogonal direct design with advanced cooling, high power capacity and new power supplies. The chassis and all data path components for the 8800 Series benefit from a clean-sheet design that allows the systems to take full advantage of the latest technologies and Cisco’s design expertise. This design connects all forwarding path components directly without a backplane or midplane. In the 8800 Series, the line cards are oriented horizontally, and the eight fabric cards are oriented vertically. Every major component of the 8800 Series was developed with a clean sheet approach – representing unprecedented investment and commitment to a long lifecycle for the 8000 Series.

The 8800 chassis deliver significant improvements over previous orthogonal chassis, including:

●     State-of-the-art redundant fans

●     Network Equipment Building System (NEBS)–compliant air filters with doors for simplified line card access

●     Future-proof power capacity with power-saving internal distribution

●     New power supplies for power feed redundancy with reduced provisioning

●     Cable management for up to 864 fibers

Cisco 8100 Series

Cisco 8101-32H-O

Cisco 8102-64H-O

Cisco 8101-32FH-O

Cisco 8111-32EH-O

Cisco 8122-64EH-O

The Cisco 8100 Series extends the small footprint, low power, and high performance of the 8000 Series to data center fabric roles that do not require the expanded forwarding scale and deep buffering of the 8200 Series.

The 8100 Series designed with Cisco’s Q200 and G100 generation ASICs and without HBM delivers the low power and high performance of 7nm technology at four bandwidth levels – 3.2 Tbps, 6.4 Tbps, 12.8 Tbps and 25.6 Tbps so the latest silicon developments can be fully leveraged across data center networks in roles such as Top of Rack (ToR), high-density IP Fabric leaf and spines.

The Cisco 8100 Series offers four different variants: Cisco 8101-32H-O with 32 ports of 100GbE in a compact 1RU form factor, Cisco 8102-64H-O with 64 ports of 100GbE in a 2RU from factor, Cisco 8101-32FH-O with 32 ports of 400GbE in a compact 1RU form factor and Cisco 8111-32EH-O with 32 ports of 800G or 64 ports of 400GbE with breakout cable in a compact 1RU form factor.

The 8100 Series supports the open-source network operating system SONiC (Software for Open Networking in the Cloud).

Cisco 8200 Series

Cisco 8201-SYS

Cisco 8202-SYS

Cisco 8201-32FH/ 8201-32FH-O

Cisco 8201-24H8FH

Cisco 8202-32FH-M

The Cisco 8200 Series is designed for roles requiring higher scale and external deep buffers. To achieve similar routed bandwidth and scale, other industry routers require multiple devices such as off-chip Ternary Content-Addressable Memory (TCAMs), fabric ASICs, and multiple network processors. However, the Cisco 8200 Series routers use a simple single ASIC (with HBM) design without the need for off-chip TCAM.

The 8200 Series 1 and 2 RU footprints allow them to be deployed in locations that traditionally required much larger chassis and special accommodations for power and cooling. Provisioning up to 12.8 Tbps in the most efficient 100G/400G-generation chassis requires over seven times the space. The 8200 Series provides tens of milliseconds of buffering and supports large forwarding tables. The ability to deploy a full-featured router into power- and space-constrained facilities such as colocation, Content Delivery Networks (CDNs), Internet

Exchange Points (IXPs), or older central office sites opens new possibilities for network designs. The 8200 Series with its large buffer and scale capacity is most suitable for roles such as aggregation, peering, core, and Data Center Interconnects (DCIs).

The Cisco 8200 Series offers five different variants: Cisco 8201-SYS with 24 ports of 400GbE and 12 ports of 100GbE in a compact 1RU form factor, Cisco 8202-SYS with 60 ports of 100GbE and 12 ports of 400GbE in a 2RU from factor, Cisco 8201-24H8FH with 24 ports of 100GbE and 8 ports of 400GbE in a compact 1RU form factor, Cisco 8201-32FH with 32 ports of 400GbE in a compact 1RU form factor and Cisco 8202-32FH-M with 32 ports of 400GbE with MACsec in a 2RU form factor.

The 8200 Series supports both IOS XR software on all 8200 and the open-source network operating system SONiC (Software for Open Networking in the Cloud) on 8201-32FH-O.

Cisco 8800 Series

Cisco 8800 4-, 8-, 12-, and 18-slot modular chassis

With up to 518.4 Tbps via 648 800G (2x 400GbE) ports, the Cisco 8800 Series delivers industry leading breakthrough density and efficiency with the extensive scale, buffering, and feature capabilities common to all the Cisco 8000 Series of routers. It includes four chassis – the 8804, 8808, 8812, and 8818 – to meet a broad set of network and facility requirements.

In addition to reducing per-port power relative to previous generations, the Cisco 8800 Series enables even greater savings by reducing the number of routers required in a given location – potentially removing entire layers from a network. This results in a significant reduction in the total number of router port and optics, one of the top contributors to network costs.

Cisco 8800 Series line cards

The Cisco 8800 Series modular platform supports six different 100GbE, 400GbE, and 800G line cards. The line cards utilize multiple Cisco Silicon One forwarding ASICs to achieve high performance and bandwidth with line rate forwarding. All ports on all six-line cards support different breakout options for 200 GbE, 100GbE, 50GbE, 40GbE, and 10GbE.

Table 3.           Cisco 8800 Series line card options

There are six different line cards supported on all 8800 modular chassis.

The 48-port QSFP28 100GbE line card provides 4.8 Tbps of throughput with MACsec support on all ports. It also supports QSFP+ optics for 10G and 40G compatibility.

48-port QSFP28 100GbE line card

The two variants of 36-port QSFP56-DD 400GbE line cards are based on Q100 and Q200 silicon chips. Each line card provides 14.4 Tbps via 36 QSFP56-DD front-panel ports.

36-port QSFP56-DD 400GbE line card

There is also a Q200-based, MACsec-capable, 36-port QSFP56-DD 400GbE line card that provides 14.4 Tbps of throughput with line rate MACsec on all ports.

36-port QSFP56-DD 400GbE line card with MACsec

The 36-port QSFP-DD800 800G line card provides 28.8 Tbps of throughput. Each 800G port can be used as 2x400GbE ethernet or 8x100GbE ethernet.

36-port QSFP-DD800 800G line card

In addition, there is a combo card that provides 34 - QSFP28 ports and 14 - QSFP56-DD ports. It offers customers the ability to smoothly transition from 100G to 400G. For additional flexibility, this card supports MACsec on 16 of the 100GbE ports.

34 – port QSFP28 100GbE and 14 – port QSFP56-DD 400GbE

Cisco 8800 Series switch fabric

The Cisco 8800 Series switch fabric is powered by 8 fabric cards that provide 7+1 line rate redundancy. In addition, the fabric supports a separate operational model with 4+1 fabric card redundancy to provide an entry level option for systems with only the 48-port 100GbE line card. This mode reduces cost and power for networks that want to take advantage of the latest platforms but are not yet ready to broadly deploy 400GbE.

Cisco 8800 fabric card

Cisco 8800 Series Route Processor

The Route Processor (RP) runs the Cisco network operating system – IOS XR. It manages control plane, management, and timing synchronization functions for the 8000 modular platforms. In addition, the RP performs route processing and distributes forwarding tables to the line cards. It also controls fans, alarms, and power supplies using an I2C communication link to each fan tray and power supply. The RP supports 1+1 redundancy; there can be two Route Processor cards in the modular system in active and hot standby modes. The standby RP takes over all control functions in the case of active RP failure.

Table 4.           Cisco 8800 Series Route Processor options

Security

Security is a major concern for all Cisco customers. Attacks on networking equipment can have disastrous results. Network operators need assurance that their equipment is secure and running authorized Cisco software. Cisco 8000 Series routers support hardware root of trust based on the Trusted Computing Group (TCG) and IEEE 802.1 AR standards. This approach is far more reliable than a software-based security approach. All Cisco 8200 routers are FIPS 140-2 Level 2 compliant and support advance security features to ensure platform and OS integrity.

●     Cisco secures the supply chain of every system at manufacturing time. A technology called “Chip Protection” allows customers to be assured that the hardware they receive from Cisco has no counterfeit components. This is accomplished with the use of unique identifiers that are stored inside the Trusted Anchor Module (TAM) device as a way to identify and track components through the entire lifecycle of the Cisco 8000. The checks cover all major components, including network processors, CPUs, and Field-Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGAs).

●     Every image that a customer downloads from the Cisco site is cryptographically signed using Cisco private keys. Each platform has a TAM (based on the TCG standard) that uses built-in cryptographic functions to validate the image signature. Once the signature is validated, the software is considered authentic and is ready for install.

●     During normal operation, the JTAG (Joint Test Action Group – a method of chip testing and verification) ports on chips are monitored. JTAG is one of the most common attack surfaces and therefore must be secured. Cisco uses a technology called “Secure JTAG” to monitor the port. If any illegal activity is detected, it is flagged and the system CPU is held in reset mode.

●     Secure Boot root of trust is anchored in the TAM. It establishes an authentication chain in which each software module authenticates the next module in the boot process.

Cisco IOS XR software

Cisco IOS XR7 is a unified network OS spanning access, aggregation, edge, and core. The networking protocol stack within XR7 can be cut down by two-thirds when the IP transport architecture is simplified. Improvements to XR7 internal architecture have reduced the memory footprint by 35 percent. By reducing code size and the resources required, XR7 can be installed onto even the most constrained hardware designs with full security features without impact to boot times.

Modernizing XR7 with install procedures using standard Linux software package managers has also improved operations. Instead of “one-size-fits-all,” XR7 provides modularity, so customers only load what they will use.

Service providers can easily access new software packages from trusted Cisco Red Hat Package Manager (RPM) repositories. Alternatively, they can build their own repository of both Cisco and custom software packages, which can be fetched for final system configuration without spending time trying to sort out software dependencies. All the required Cisco software packages, home-grown/third-party software packages, and router configurations can be pulled into a single Cisco software image known as a “Golden ISO.” Customized images can now be installed consistently and with confidence across devices in the network.

Cisco IOS XR7 brings an unmatched level of openness for programmability and customization.

IOS XR 7 supports open, model-driven APIs at all layers of the software stack. At the management layer, XR supports a comprehensive list of both native and industry-driven OpenConfig models with multiple encoding (XML and JSON) and transport (gRPC, Netconf) options. The APIs at the management layer allow operators to apply configuration to the device or retrieve the state of the system. The APIs also address advanced traffic engineering use cases, allowing applications to control the route followed by traffic within the network. These APIs can be used independently or combined with other ecosystem abstraction layers such as SONIC or P4Runtime.

IOS XR 7 also supports the OFA (Open Forwarding Abstraction) API, which provides a logical representation of all the forwarding and telemetry capabilities of the underlying hardware. In addition, IOS XR 7 provides a flexible consumption model, allowing third-party application software to run on the device alongside IOS XR to enable customization options for the customer network. With application hosting capabilities, operators can host their own controller agent or custom protocol; use various hosting apps for telemetry collection, traffic engineering, and configuration management; or manage the box like a Linux machine using third-party software such as Chef, Puppet, or Ansible.

Cisco IOS XR 7 is the industry’s most trusted network operating system.

XR7 is the most advanced network operating system for improving the security posture of the router. The Cisco Secure Boot subsystem ensures that the device boot image is genuine and untampered. With advanced signing technology, XR7 can establish software integrity enforcement and measurement. To further enhance the trusted defense posture, multiple runtime defenses within XR7 guard against malicious actors and make exploitation of bugs more difficult. Even if booted securely, a router may run for months or years without rebooting, which could leave vulnerabilities at runtime undetected for a long time. XR7 leverages Integrated Measurement Architecture (IMA) to significantly enhance security by verifying the integrity of running software. In the IMA appraisal mode, signature validations prevent unauthorized images to launch. In the IMA measurement mode, the hashes of all images are logged in a secure location used for verification. Records of run time processes can be sent for analysis, so the operator knows that system software, updates, or patches are running as intended.

Detailed information on XR7 can be found here: IOS XR Data Sheet.

For a complete list of supported features, refer to the Cisco Feature Navigator.

Ordering overview

The high-level hardware components are listed below. For full ordering information, refer to the ordering documentation.

Table 5.           Cisco 8000 Series ordering overview

Physical characteristics

Table 6.           Cisco 8000 Series physical characteristics

Compliance

Table 7.           Compliance

Additional features 

The 8000 Series Routers also support the Cisco DDoS Edge Protection solution. 

Add leading DDoS protection directly to the 8000 Series Routers to detect and block DDoS attacks on-box cost-effectively at aggregation and peering locations. 

Cisco DDoS Edge Protection is supported on the following platforms:

Fixed Platforms:

●     Cisco 8111-32EH

●     Cisco 8101-32FH

●     Cisco 8102-64H

●     Cisco 8101-32H

●     Cisco 8201-32FH

●     Cisco 8201-24H8FH

●     Cisco 8202-32FH-M

●     Cisco 8201-SYS

●     Cisco 8202-SYS

Distributed Platforms:

●     Cisco 8804

●     Cisco 8808

●     Cisco 8812

●     Cisco 8818

Line Cards:

●     8800-LC-48H

●     8800-LC-36FH

●     88-LC0-36FH-M

●     88-LC0-36FH

●     88-LC0-34H14FH

Learn more about the Cisco DDoS Edge Protection solution. 

Warranty

Service and support

Accelerate your deployment, performance, maintenance, and ROI for your Cisco 8000 Series-based infrastructure with Cisco Services offering a variety of options to assist you across the lifecycle.

Cisco Advanced Services use an architecture-led approach to help you align your network infrastructure with your business goals and achieve long-term value.

Next, we can help you maintain continuity and minimize risk with Cisco Service Provider Base, Smart Net Total Care^® and Cisco Software Support Basic. So when minutes matter, you can get help fast for your Network Open Architecture with 24/7 access to our expert hardware and software support engineers in the Cisco Technical Assistance Center.

Product sustainability

Information about Cisco’s Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) initiatives and performance is provided in Cisco’s CSR and sustainability reporting.

Table 8.           Product sustainability

Cisco Smart Licensing

Cisco Smart Licensing is a flexible and secure licensing model that provides you with an easier, faster, and more consistent way to purchase, activate, manage, renew, and upgrade software products across the Cisco portfolio and across your organization. And it’s secure – you control what users can access. With Smart Licensing you get:

●     Easy Activation. Smart Licensing establishes a pool of software licenses that can be used across the entire organization—no more PAKs (Product Activation Keys).

●     Unified Management. My Cisco Entitlements (MCE) provides a complete view into all of your Cisco products and services in an easy-to-use portal, so you always know what you have and what you are using.

●     License Flexibility. Your software is not node-locked to your hardware, so you can easily use and transfer licenses as needed.

In order to retrieve your Smart Licenses, you will first need to set up a Smart Account on Cisco Software Central (software.cisco.com).

For a more detailed overview on Cisco Licensing, go to cisco.com/go/licensingguide.

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Learn more about the Cisco 8000 Series routers

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