Networking leader upgrades intelligent layer 3+ chassis switch series

Allied Telesis has announced the launch of a significant upgrade to its SwitchBlade® x8100 Series next-generation intelligent chassis switches via its new CFC960 controller card.

The AT-SBx81CFC960 controller card offers an impressive 960Gbps of switching capacity, delivering throughput of 1.92Tbps per chassis. Dual CFC960 controller cards deliver 160Gbps, per line card slot, doubling the throughput of the existing Allied Telesis CFC400 controller card. In addition, the CFC960 unlocks new features such as Virtual Routing and Forwarding (VRF) Lite, and Virtual Chassis Stacking Plus (VCStack Plus™), which allows two chassis to be stacked to form a virtual switch for increased reliability and reduced management overhead. These new features are ideal for large-scale enterprise and hosting environments.

The CFC960 also supports Allied Telesis Management Framework™ (AMF), a tool for simplifying network management and reducing everyday network operating costs. The CFC960 can either be a member of an AMF network or can act as a master for up to 120 nodes. More details about AMF are available online at alliedtelesis.com/amf.

“We are seeing considerable interest in the SwitchBlade platform among education, healthcare, and enterprise customers. These customers are under pressure to do more with less, and are increasingly looking for alternatives to their current networking vendor. AMF has enabled many organisations to deploy networks in a fraction of the time, reduce operational expenditure, and enable their staff to focus on improving service delivery within their organisations,” commented James Blumlein, UK Sales Director, Allied Telesis Allied Telesis.

Allied Telesis launched its flagship SwitchBlade x8100 Series chassis in 2012, targeting medium-scale enterprise networking applications. Due to its powerful, reliable feature set and low running costs, it has become a popular choice for cost-conscious users in markets such as local government, healthcare, and education. With its new controller card option, Allied Telesis now doubles the chassis performance and adds a range of new features, making the SwitchBlade x8100 Series ideal for larger-scale networks.

Blumlein added, “The massive switching capacity of the CFC960 enables the SwitchBlade x8100 Series chassis to be used as a core device in a large enterprise network. Combined with powerful software, the existing range of line cards, and a soon-to-be-released 16-port 10GE SFP+ line card, the SwitchBlade x8100 Series chassis provides a versatile solution for a wide variety of applications, requiring different speeds and feeds.”

The CFC960 features a quad-core 1.2GHz CPU that ensures a supremely reliable and robust networking platform, which is suited for the most rigorous applications. With the increased use of virtualisation and hosted or cloud-based applications, networks are now more dynamic than ever. The Allied Telesis AlliedWare Plus™ multi-threaded operating system has been specifically designed to take advantage of multi-core CPUs. Even within the most demanding environments, the CFC960 will remain responsive and stable, and network operations will continue to perform predictably.

The CFC960 features four 10GE SFP+ ports on the front panel to provide additional uplink capacity. Alternatively, they can be used with VCStack Plus for high capacity dedicated stacking—allowing two SwitchBlade x8100 Series chassis to be stacked together with up to 160Gbps stacking bandwidth. VCStack Plus is built using the same stacking technology that Allied Telesis uses for its AlliedWare Plus 1RU switches, for a feature-rich, stable, and consistent user experience.