Convergence in action

In addition to showing off new voice and data products at the NetWorld+Interop 2002 show May 6-10 in Las Vegas, Extreme Networks and Shoreline Communications will put their gear to work.

10G Ethernet switches from Extreme and IP voice gear from Shoreline will be two of the main technologies used as the voice and data foundation for eNet, the converged network that will run the show.

Extreme will deploy five BlackDiamond switches fitted with its new 10G Ethernet blade to serve as the network backbone for the show. The switches will be arranged in a ring topology in what Extreme and show organizers say will be the largest temporary deployment of live 10G Ethernet equipment and will support more than 8,000 nodes during the week. Extreme also will deploy its Alpine and Summit48 switches as a distribution layer of the network. Those boxes will have network runs to the show floor, and uplink to the 10G bit/sec backbone via Gigabit Ethernet connections.

The 30 ShoreGear distributed voice switches will provide the phone infrastructure for the show floor and for conference facilities such as seminar rooms and corporate meeting suites. Shoreline will deploy a mix of analog and IP phones throughout the convention center, with all voice traffic linking over the Extreme backbone through the ShoreGear switches running Version 4.0 of Shoreline's operating system. Quality of service for the Shoreline voice traffic will be provided by the Extreme gear from all 10/100/1000M bit/sec connections through the 10-Gigabit core.