Alcatel aims to reduce the size and expand the functionality of carrier networks with additions this week to its service edge routing product family: a 200-Gbit chassis, I/O cards and a hierarchical quality-of-service (QoS) technique.
The family was acquired from startup TiMetra Networks last July.
Alcatel gained access to three router chassis architectures when it acquired TiMetra and developed a redundant chassis that delivers a 200-Gbit full-duplex switch fabric/system capacity in an 8U-high box that consumes one-fifth rack. Other products on the market achieve that performance in a half-rack architecture, said Lindsay Newell, director of product marketing at Alcatel (www.alcatel.com).
The 7750 SR-7 chassis is a seven-slot architecture: five dedicated to I/O operation and two providing switch fabric architecture redundancy. Also, the system comes with extra fan trays and power supplies to boost redundancy.
The five I/O slots can support up to 40-Gbit/second operation. But card-capacity limitations will allow designers to achieve a peak of only 20 Gbit/s today. "In the future we'll have 40-Gbit/second line cards," Newell said.
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