Abstract

Test results proved that the AFC, Inc (AFC) TransMAX 1500 provides absolute transparency with ultra-low latency to upper layer protocols such as Fibre Channel, 2 Gbps Fibre Channel, ESCON, FICON (based on the fact that FICON uses Fibre Channel physical layer for the transportation) and Gigabit Ethernet. Engineers have also proved that the TransMAX 1500 does indeed deliver high availability by witnessing its sub-millisecond fail-over time and hitless software update/upgrade.

Service-specific switches and transport devices are giving way to physical layer devices that are designed to provide multiservice transport over optical networks. AFC’s TransMAX 1500 is such a product. Tests show that it is ideal as a transport device for sending a variety of data types over fiber optics networks.

AFC commissioned The Tolly Group to evaluate its TransMAX 1500, a reconfigurable physical-layer optical add/drop multiplexer designed for use in carrier networks and large-scale enterprise nets that employ CWDM (Coarse Wavelength Division Multiplexing). The objective was to validate a number of throughput characteristics and device functions to demonstrate the effectiveness of the TransMAX 1500 in carrier networks and in enterprises that are supporting Fibre Channel, Gigabit Ethernet or other popular interface connections for storage area networks (SANs).

Tolly Group engineers conducted a battery of tests, including a steady state, bi-directional zero-loss (≤0.001% packet loss throughput test, Bit Error Rate test, latency measurement and a thorough examination of the TransMAX 1500’s high-availability features and scalability. One of the chief purposes of tests was to prove the TransMAX 1500’s transparency to upper layer protocols, such as Gigabit Ethernet, Fibre Channel and others.

While it is evident that the TransMAX 1500 fits well into carrier-class networks, enterprise users also should take note of the device. With the emergence of SANs, users find they may have Gigabit Ethernet networks that must mesh with Fibre Channel, ESCON, and even FICON facilities. The key is offering service transparency; certainly, this round of tests certifies that the TransMAX 1500 delivers transport transparency among a variety of protocol-specific network services. Enterprise users can take solace that the TransMAX 1500 can handle GbE traffic, as well as SAN traffic supporting Fibre Channel, ESCON, or FICON.

On the performance side, tests revealed that the TransMAX 1500 could deliver optimal performance at wire-speed for GbE, Fibre Channel and ESCON, with no packet loss. That alone proves the TransMAX 1500 is positioned well to serve SANs networks. Moreover, the high availability demonstrated on the device indicates that the TransMAX 1500 provides the type of resiliency required for not only carrier networks, but also enterprise networks that support converged voice, data and video.