Performance Comparison of EIGRP/ IS-IS and OSPF/ IS-IS

Abstract: In modern communication networks, routing protocols are used to determine the shortest path to the destination. Open Shortest Path First (OSPF), Enhanced Interior Gateway Routing Protocol (EIGRP) and Intermediate System to Intermediate System (IS-IS) are the dominant interior routing protocols for such networks. This thesis presents a simulation based analysis of these protocols. We used the combination of EIGRP&IS-IS, OSPF&IS-IS routing protocols on the same network in order to reveal the advantage of one over the other as well as the robustness of each protocol combination and how this is measured. To carry out the network simulations, we used Optimized Network Engineering Tool (OPNET). The comparison analysis is based on several parameters that determine the robustness of these protocols. The routing protocol convergence time is one important parameter which determines the time needed by the routers to learn the new topology of the network whenever a change occurs in the network. The routing protocol which converges faster is considered a better routing protocol. Point-to-point link throughput, HTTP object response time, database response time and e-mail download response time are other parameters we used to measure the routing performance of the network.