Planning Your Cisco MVE Deployment
This topic provides an overview of the provisioning process and describes deployment considerations for the Megaport ONE Virtual Edge (MVE).
Appliance modes
Cisco MVE offers two appliance modes that determine how you configure and manage your deployments:
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Autonomous mode – Supports Cisco IOS XE non SD-WAN deployment for traditional routing without SD-WAN. This feature provides access to the Cisco IOS XE software features and technologies. For details, see Creating a Cisco MVE in Autonomous Mode.
Note
To learn more about Cisco Catalyst Edge software, see:
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SD-WAN mode – Supports the Cisco SD-WAN solution. This mode uses the existing SD-WAN functionality with no changes. To operate with Cisco SD-WAN, a new MVE must be provisioned in SD-WAN mode. For details, see Creating a Cisco SD-WAN MVE in vManage.
| Appliance Mode | Features |
|---|---|
| Autonomous |
|
| SD-WAN |
|
Important
You select the appliance mode when you configure the MVE. After you select a mode and deploy the MVE, you can’t change the appliance mode.
Deployment considerations
This section provides an overview of the MVE deployment options and features.
MVE locations
For a list of global locations where you can connect to an MVE, see Megaport Virtual Edge Locations.
Sizing your MVE instance
The instance size determines the MVE capabilities, such as how many concurrent connections it can support. The MVE instances are consolidated into three sizes.
| Package Size | vCPUs | DRAM | Transit Gateway Speed * |
|---|---|---|---|
| MVE 2/4/500 (aka Small) |
2 | 4 GB | 500 Mbps |
| MVE 4/8/1000 (aka Medium) |
4 | 8 GB | 1000 Mbps |
| MVE 8/16/5000 (aka Large) |
8 | 16 GB | 5000 Mbps |
* The Transit Gateway is symmetric, redundant, and diverse, and includes DDoS protection.
These performance and capacity metrics are estimates and your speeds will vary. When choosing an MVE instance size, keep in mind these items:
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Any increase on the network data stream load can degrade performance. For example, establishing secure tunnels with IPsec, adding traffic path steering, or using deep packet inspection (DPI) can impact the maximum throughput speed.
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Plans to scale the network.
What if I need more MVE capacity in the future?
You have a couple options:
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You can provision another MVE instance and split the workload between the two MVEs.
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You can provision a larger MVE instance, migrate connections from the old MVE to the new larger MVE, and then retire the old MVE.
Security
MVE provides capacity to and from your internet-enabled branch locations securely, to any endpoint or service provider on Megaport ONE’s SDN. CSP-hosted instances of partner SD-WAN products route critical traffic across Megaport ONE’s SDN, reducing internet dependence. Traffic remains encrypted and under your policy control while traveling across the Megaport ONE SDN, to or from, MVE.
Each MVE subscription includes distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack protection for no additional charge.
Licensing
You bring your own Cisco Interconnect Gateway (Cisco Catalyst 8000V Edge Software) Smart License for Cisco for use with MVE.
The Catalyst 8000V license is part of Cisco DNA and is based on bandwidth tiers. New customers need a Catalyst 8000v license with Tier 2 bandwidth (DNA-C8KV-T2-A-SDCI) for small and medium MVE instances, or a Catalyst 8000V license with Tier 3 bandwidth (DNA-C8KV-T3-A-SDCI) for large MVE instances.
If you already have Catalyst 8000V licenses and subscriptions, MVE requires Cisco DNA Premier or Cisco DNA Advantage subscriptions and Tier 2 (for small and medium instances) or Tier 3 (for large instances) bandwidth.
You can order the solution through Cisco partners, who can order all components through Cisco Commerce Workspace (CCW).
For more information, discuss licensing with your account manager and refer to the Cisco Catalyst 8000V Edge Software Ordering Guide.
VLAN tagging
Megaport uses Q-in-Q, also known as 802.1ad nested VLANs, to differentiate between customer MVEs on a given host hardware system.