Abstract

New H3C Technologies commissioned Tolly to evaluate the performance, capacity, and feature set of the H3C MSR3610E-X1 and MSR3610E-X1-DP routers. The main focus of the project was to validate the platforms’ throughput, routing and NAT scale, automation and WAN optimization features, high-availability behavior, and support for advanced MPLS, SR-MPLS, and SRv6 services for enterprise WAN and SD-WAN deployments.  

The report covers both the MSR3610E-X1 and MSR3610E-X1-DP. In performance testing, Tolly measured 5.188Gbps aggregated IPsec throughput with 1400-byte frames and 2.488Gbps using Spirent’s IPsec iMIX profile. Standard Layer 3 throughput reached 19.937Gbps with 1518-byte frames. Tolly also verified support for 128 BGP neighbors, 300,000 IPv4 routes in both the routing table and FIB, 300,000 IPv6 routes in both the routing table and FIB, and 1,000,000 NAT sessions.  

Operational flexibility and resiliency were major themes in the report. Tolly validated automation support through TCL, Python, Ansible, Embedded Automation Architecture, and NETCONF, along with WAN optimization using Web Cache. Both routers also supported hot-swappable interface modules, and the MSR3610E-X1-DP added redundant hot-swappable power supplies. High-availability capabilities included NQA for static routing, policy-based routing, and VRRP; BFD with a minimum 10ms interval across routing, VRRP, and MPLS scenarios; intelligent NQA for direct packet-loss measurement; interface CRC error down; GIR for maintenance-mode upgrades with no packet loss; and dual-link packet duplication to reduce end-to-end loss.  

The feature set extended well beyond basic enterprise routing. Tolly verified BGP-LS, BGP FlowSpec for IPv4 and IPv6, MVPN and NG-MVPN, UCMP and ECMP, VXLAN and EVPN VXLAN, PPPoE server and client modes, NAT44/NAT444/NAT66/NAT64, GRE, mGRE, EoGRE, integrated wireless AC functionality, L2TP VPN, IKEv1 and IKEv2, GDVPN, ADVPN, firewall policies, ASPF, IPS, DPI, MPLS OAM and QoS, SR-MPLS BE and TE modes, SRv6 BE and TE modes, EVPN services over SR-MPLS and SRv6, TI-LFA fast reroute, SSL VPN, URL filtering blacklist, DNS application recognition, anti-virus, IPv6 DDNS, and MAP-E. Overall, the report presents the MSR3610E-X1 family as a feature-rich enterprise router platform that combines solid encrypted and routed performance with broad SD-WAN, security, and modern IP/MPLS service support.  

Routers tested in this report:

• H3C MSR3610E-X1 — Enterprise router model in the MSR3610E series for SD-WAN, branch, and WAN edge deployments.  
• H3C MSR3610E-X1-DP — Variant of the MSR3610E-X1 platform that adds dual power supplies for greater power redundancy in enterprise WAN deployments.