2/13/2006 -- Cisco Systems Inc.'s Carrier Routing System-1 (CRS-1) was a tough sell when it first appeared two years ago, in part because of its size, performance, and -- most importantly for service provider and other infrastructure customers -- immaturity. No one wanted to bet big on a platform (even so imposing a system as CRS-1) that was essentially unproven.

Two years on, prospective customers are a lot less chary -- and Cisco is starting to reap the rewards. Just last month, the networking giant announced that Chinese telco giant Shanghai Telecom plans to expand its IP network and provide super PoPs for its high-speed core IP network.

Last week, Cisco announced another CRS-1 adopter, MTS Allstream, which selected CRS-1 to enhance its national IP/MPLS backbone network and to serve as the hub of its next generation services initiative.

"With Cisco's platform, we can deliver even higher bandwidth capacity and carrier-class reliability for our expanding suite of converged IP solutions," said Paul Frizado, senior vice president of network services with MTS Allstream.

Customers such as MTS Allstream are tailor-made for CRS-1 and its gargantuan throughput capacity. And MTS Allstream is yet another high-profile customer win for CRS-1, which -- in the last 12 months, at least -- has started to pick up steam. In December of last year, for example, cable broadband giant Comcast selected Cisco's uber-router as its one-stop platform for broadband, communications, video entertainment and other services. Ditto for other CRS-1 adopters, including the China Education and Research Network (CERNET); U.K. communications giant Cable & Wireless; and Swiss service provider giant Swisscom Fixnet.

The lesson, analysts say, is that companies are deploying CRS-1 even though they're only scratching the surface of its scalability and performance potential. "The CRS-1's eight- and 16-slot models compete head-to-head with platforms from Juniper, Avici and Chiaro, which as a group scale from 0.6Terabits to over 5Terabits of switching capacity. Although the CRS-1 has the largest scalability metrics at 92Tbps, it is finding homes in current next-generation deployments and offers virtually unlimited growth for the future," wrote Glen Hunt, a senior analyst for carrier infrastructure with consultancy Current Analysis, late last year. -Stephen Swoyer