Reports & Publications

Digital Equipment Corporation Fast Ethernet Switching Competitive Evaluation: MultiSwitch 900/VNswitch 900XX – Cisco Systems Inc. Catalyst 5000 – 3Com Corp. CoreBuilder 5000

Sponsor: Digital Equipment Corp. (Compaq)
DEC - Fast Ethernet Switching Competitive Evaluation vs. Cisco Systems and 3Com

Abstract

Digital Equipment Corporation commissioned The Tolly Group to benchmark the switching throughput of the Digital Equipment Corporation MultiSwitch 900/VNswitch 900 with the Cisco Systems, Inc., Catalyst 5000, and the 3Com Corp. CoreBuilder 5000. The Tolly Group tested multi-stream Fast Ethernet performance. Additionally, for those customers concerned with overload conditions (all switch ports fully saturated), The Tolly Group examined frame loss characteristics under such conditions. Testing focused on inter-module traffic (i.e., across the backplane) since the densities of switching chassis interfaces required by today’s enterprise network managers result in high levels of inter-module (backplane) traffic flows. Testing was performed in September of 1997.

Test Highlights

  • MultiSwitch 900/VNswitch 900XX provides up to 2.25 times greater Fast Ethernet switching throughput than the Catalyst 5000
  • MultiSwitch 900/VNswitch 900XX provides up to 1.9 times greater Fast Ethernet switching throughput than the CoreBuilder 5000
  • In 13 Stream overload tests, the MultiSwitch 900/VNswitch 900XX’s frame loss ranged from 0.1%-11% while the Catalyst’s frame loss ranged from 24% - 56%
  • In 4 Stream overload tests, the MultiSwitch 900/VNswitch 900XX’s frame loss ranged from 0.1%-6.4% while the CoreBuilder’s frame loss ranged 50% - 60%

    • Report Information

    Document Number:
    7302
    Publication Date:
    10/1/1997
    Page Count:
    4
    Category:
    LAN Switches Routing
    View all reports from Digital Equipment Corp. (Compaq)