"No one is going to choose SONET/SDH over 10-Gigabit Ethernet," CIR observed.
Also keying the move to 10-gigabit Ethernet is the increasing need for high speed and intelligence at the network edge, not only at its core. As IP telephones, WLAN access points, and similar bandwidth-hungry devices proliferate at the network edge, the edge now needs high speeds. Companies are, therefore, releasing 10-gigabit devices designed for the network edge.
Hewlett-Packard, for example, recently announced a new architecture, the ProCurve Adaptive EDGE Architecture, designed to bring high speed and intelligence to the network edge. Key to the architecture is the ProCurve Switch 6400cl series, a family of high-performance 10 Gigabit wire-speed aggregators.
And Alcatel, recently announced a family of 1U-high, layer-three gigabit switches with 10-gigabit Ethernet uplinks, designed to help networks make the transition to gigabit Ethernet at the desktop.
Cisco, not to be outdone, recently released 20 new switches that bring 10-gigabit speeds to the network edge. Cisco's John Yen, senior manager for LAN switching, explained: "With them, you can deploy 10 gigabits all the way down to the wiring closet."
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