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3Com Introduces New Terabit Switch
3Com has taken a giant leap forward as a networking innovator with the launch of its family of highly-scalable terabit switches designed for the core of the largest enterprise networks.
The new Switch 8800 is the most powerful switch family ever offered by 3Com. The highly competitive mega-switch scales to support 10,000+ users, with up to 24 10-Gigabit and 288 Gigabit wirespeed ports in a resilient, fault-tolerant architecture. And a 1.44 Terabit-per-second backplane offers ultra-high performance today and long-term investment protection.
The new switch is the perfect complement to the existing 3Com® Switch 7700 family. Where the Switch 8800 delivers wirespeed 10-Gigabit and Gigabit for the enterprise core, the Switch 7700 with Gigabit and 10/100 — and a new 10-Gigabit downlink — is ideal for switch distribution sites in the network.
The Switch 8800 family is offered through 3Com Switch 8800 Authorized Partners backed by 3Com global services.
Highly innovative features of the Switch 8800 include:
Future-proofed 1.44 Terabit backplane
The Switch 8800 has an impressive 1.44 Terabit-per-second backplane that will allow for a second generation of fabric and switch modules to double performance of the switch.
Load-sharing fabrics
Adding a second fabric in the Switch 8800 provides fabric resiliency and also doubles the performance of the switch. This configuration makes each fabric active, improving the switch's performance, unlike the more typical "hot stand-by" approach where a second fabric sits idle waiting for the primary fabric to fail. The 3Com approach makes better use of the available processing power and of the investment made by the customer.
Simple cross-bar fabric design
The cross-bar design of the new switch is less expensive and provides higher performance and Mean Time Between Failure (MTBF) than more complex switching fabrics typical in competitive products.
Local media-rate on-board switching
All Switch 8800 switch modules handle full wirespeed Layer 2 / Layer 3 local switching on the actual module. Only traffic destined for other switch modules goes to the switch fabrics for switching; traffic going to another port on the same module stays local, increasing overall performance and reducing backplane traffic.
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