New Ethernet Transport Switch from Extreme Targets Tier 2, 3 Carriers

Extreme Networks (News - Alert) today took the wraps off its BlackDiamond 20804 Ethernet transport switch, which it designed to help tier 2 and 3 carriers migrating from SONET/SDH to 1gigE and 10gigE rings to address the boom in residential video, business Ethernet and mobile backhaul traffic.

This four-slot device, which provides 120 gbps per slot line-rate switching capacity, is in the same product family as the eight-slot BlackDiamond 20808, which Extreme Networks introduced last year.

To simplify network operations and reduce training and sparing requirements, both products use the same power supplies, IO modules and management modules. Both also support the Ethernet ring resiliency protocol known as Ethernet Access Protection Switching, or EAPS RFC 3619.

The 20804 supports up to 32 line-rate 10 gigE ports per chassis, has ample bandwidth for future 100 GE IO Modules, and is designed for future switch fabric upgrades to enable 480 gbps of switching capacity per slot. It includes multicast quality of service hardware resources to ensure video multicast traffic gets to the subscriber no matter how busy the network. And it has MEF certified E-LINE and E-LAN support, pre-standard E-NNI support and support for provider backbone bridges.

The BlackDiamond 20804 Ethernet transport switch will be available in the first quarter of 2010.