From wire service reports
Vitesse Semiconductor Corp. Monday continued its
introduction of triple-speed (10/100/1000 Mbps) Ethernet
Media Access Controllers (MACs) to support the industry's
transition to copper-based Gigabit Ethernet.
Known as the
Barrington family, these 24-, 16- and 12-port devices are designed to
provide system OEMs with a cost-effective solution for
seamless scaling of Ethernet line card designs.
The products are based on Vitesse's third-generation
MAC architecture and include the 24-port VSC7324,
the 16-port VSC7325, and the 12-port VSC7326. Each device has
traffic over-subscription mechanisms to ensure
quality of service and high bandwidth availability during
periods of peak network utilization.
Combining this capability
with extensive per port buffering, high-density platforms,
such as Ethernet switches and routers, can aggregate up to 24
Gigabit Ethernet ports into a single 10 Gbps packet processor.
OEMs realize a substantial cost savings by reducing system
cost per user without impacting network performance.
Superior Network Management and Efficiency on a Per Port Basis
The Barrington family includes advanced over-subscription
mechanisms, used to control the bandwidth on each Ethernet
port in order to prioritize traffic across all 24-ports. As
part of the advanced over-subscription mechanisms, the
Barrington family also prioritizes and protects Layer 2 and
Layer 3 control frames to maintain overall network management
and efficiency during periods of peak network utilization.
"The addition of features, such as advanced over-subscription,
in the Barrington family is just the latest addition to a
product portfolio taking a leading edge approach to solving
the demands of high-density, cost-effective Ethernet
aggregation systems over existing copper infrastructures," said
Mark Fauber, director of product marketing for Vitesse's
triple-speed MACs.
The increased port density of the Barrington products allows
the Ethernet triple-speed linecards to scale up to densities
of 72 or 96 ports. More specifically, the 24-port Barrington
device (VSC7324) combines 24 triple-speed RGMII-based ports
and an OIF-compliant SPI-4.2 system interface, making it ideal
for use in modular Ethernet Switch and Router platforms used
in copper-based networks, such as Layer 2 and 3 Ethernet
Switches, Enterprise edge and Core Routers, and Modular
VPN/Firewall appliances.
This scaling flexibility is essential as the industry adopts
Gigabit Ethernet solutions. iSuppli, a leading market research
firm, forecasts that the shipments of Gigabit Ethernet ports
in switches and hubs will exceed those for Fast Ethernet ports
in 2005 by 12 million (70 million vs. nearly 62 million for
Fast Ethernet).
Benefits of The Industry's Broadest MAC Product Line
Over the past 15 months, Vitesse has introduced seven new
products in the stand-alone MAC market, beginning with
Meigs-II(TM), the industry's first QUADSpeed MAC device
combining ten triple-speed ports and a single 10 GbE port to
form the industry's highest density 10 Gbps MAC.
Like its predecessors, the Barrington family continues to
enable system OEMs to focus on the value-added features of the
packet processing function by simplifying the system interface
equation. These devices incorporate the industry standard OIF
SPI-4.2 interface for seamless connection to a wide variety of
integrated circuits, such as packet processors, traffic
managers, and switch fabrics. A single-packet processor
solution can support application densities of 12, 16, or 24
triple-speed ports in the Barrington family as well as other
port densities and applications using other members of the
Vitesse MAC product family, thus lowering overall system
implementation costs for the system OEM.
Packaging, Availability and Pricing
All members of the Barrington family operate over the
commercial temperature range of 0 degrees C to +70 degrees C,
and are available in 35mm PBGA packages. Samples are available
now with production quantities available in September 2004.
The 24-port Barrington device is priced at $144 in volume
quantities.
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