Even though you are a network admin or telecom tech, if you are not dealing with something in daily basis, you might need assist or at least chasing technical information to achieve. Probably BGP, stands for Border Gateway Protocol, is the one of them. There is tons of information about BGP on Internet. Sometimes too much stuff gives you hassle.

This article series will give you essential information to bring your BGP. Not too much technical, but one must know. If you have any questions, visit our support forum page to see any possible answer you are looking for. If not, leave your thought. Let’s start with first topic "Do I need BGP?"

• BGP Tutorial for ISP customers – Do I need BGP?
• BGP Tutorial for ISP customers – Own ASN or borrowing one.
• BGP Tutorial for ISP customers – Enough memory for full routes?
• BGP Tutorial for ISP customers – Controlling outbound traffic.
• BGP Tutorial for ISP customers – Controlling inbound traffic.
• BGP Tutorial for ISP customers – Configuring BGP
• BGP Tutorial for ISP customers – BGP community string from ISP.
• BGP Tutorial for ISP customers – Verifying BGP routes.
• BGP Tutorial for ISP customers – BGP Troubleshooting.

 

 

Answer is Yes or No. 

Due to my job is related to WAN / Internet link maintenance, I deal with BGP issue all the time. Probably 40% of link doesn’t need BGP. No kidding!

"Static route should be enough"

Well, they might have some unbreakable political reason to keep BGP. What we can do. Do not get me wrong, I am not saying BGP choose is bad or hassle anything like that. Take a look which circumstance might need BGP and which case is not. 

 Cases might not need "BGP"

– Single ISP link (doesn’t matter high / low speed link)
– Two links to single ISP and one is master and other is shadow service
– Not ISP business

All other cases, you might need BGP configuration. Actually, some ISP requires BGP, when you have more than two links with them and announcing small IP block from same range of IP block you have.

What is the big deal whether having BGP or not?

Simply says "No big deals". 

However, you don’t want to waste your router resource for unnecessary processors. If your router is old, then it would be serious. You might want to check CPU processor for BGP on our device for few minutes. How the BGP processor is acting. ISP’s routing table is frequently changed and every change will reflect to their BGP speakers.

Make it simple.

For instance, router does most of firewall function, but not really recommends enabling a lot function of firewall. Because it will use a lot of resource and it would affect main routing function. Make it simple and enable necessary function only, it makes you life easier.

Still you think you need BGP, or decide having BGP, go next article. Let’s see what ISP request and what you need to be prepared to accomplish BGP setup.