Abstract

Cabletron Systems Inc. commissioned The Tolly Group to benchmark the SmartSwitch 9000. The Tolly Group examined the SmartSwitch 9000’s translational switching capabilities in a heterogeneous network (Token Ring, Fast Ethernet, FDDI, and Ethernet), across a backbone technology (ATM), and in homogeneous Token Ring environments. The Tolly Group tested the frame handling capabilities of the SmartSwitch 9000 in these environments, as well. Testing was performed in December 1997 and January 1998. 

Test results show that the SmartSwitch 9000 delivers wire-speed performance across multiple streams of traffic while performing translational switching between Token Ring and Fast Ethernet, FDDI, and Ethernet with frame sizes of 512 bytes and larger. Even switching traffic across an ATM backbone, the SmartSwitch 9000 hit usage rates as high as 96.51% of the target Token Ring media. Transferring data between native Token Ring LANs, the SmartSwitch 9000 delivered wire-speed performance utilizing up to 99.7% of the target networks.