Skip Links

Network World

  • Social Web 
  • Email 
  • Close

Getting the most from big pipes

Silver Peak Systems is upgrading the software that powers its WAN optimization gear
Network Optimization Alert By Ann Bednarz , Network World , 06/05/2007
Ann Bednarz
Sign up for this newsletter now!

Associate News Editor Ann Bednarz covers the latest news on application acceleration, content delivery and more.

I’ve written a lot lately about integrated devices and the trend to bundle multiple traffic management, security and routing capabilities in a single appliance to help combat branch office clutter.

But not all WAN optimization vendors are moving in the branch-office-in-a-box direction. A company with a different objective is Silver Peak Systems, which continues to sharpen its focus on high capacity WAN links and their distinct performance, scalability and configuration challenges.

Silver Peak this week is due to unveil Version 2.0 of the software that runs in its NX family of appliances and Global Management Systems devices. The new version is aimed at improving application performance over big pipes and simplifying the management of distributed NX devices.

High capacity WAN links -- those 45Mbps and higher -- have characteristics that separate them from smaller branch office connections, says Jeff Aaron, director of product marketing at Silver Peak. They typically involve larger volumes of data, more types of applications, larger numbers of simultaneous user sessions, and more complex network configurations requiring asymmetric routing and advanced QoS policies, for example.

“Branch offices traditionally are going to have basic file, e-mail, and other office productivity tools that are usually client-server applications,” Aaron says. “With bigger pipes, you’re now introducing more server-to-server applications, like backup and replication and SQL. These fat pipes have very different characteristics than their skinny brethren.”

In Version 2.0, Silver Peak enhanced its Network Memory technology for doing disk-based data reduction at high speeds. Data reduction can reduce over 95% of WAN traffic by eliminating the transfer of duplicate data, Silver Peak says.

“Data reduction on these big pipes is pretty difficult to do because you’re required to do lots of read and writes, at very high speeds, and you’re writing to disks, which can take time if you don’t doing it correctly. It can potentially introduce a new latency element that you obviously want to avoid,” Aaron says.

The new version of Network Memory features better pattern-recognition capabilities -- which are particularly useful for improving the performance of applications that do “interactive saves,” such as Microsoft Excel, Aaron says.

Ann Bednarz is associate news editor at Network World.

Partner Content

NetScout is one of the world's premier providers of integrated network and application performance solutions.

www.netscout.com

Know First

Get Proactive — Move from Troubleshooting to Monitoring to Management with nGenius K2's Service Dashboard & Intelligent Early Warning Alarms

Watch the Video

Know Where

Get Rapid Performance Problem Isolation with nGenius Performance Manager and Diagnose Problems up to 70% Faster!

Learn More

Know Why

Get the Details to Validate and Solve your Toughest Performance Issues with nGenius InfiniStream and Sniffer Intelligence Modules

Read the Whitepaper

Comment
Login
Forgot your account info?
Add comment
Anonymous comments subject to approval. Register here for member benefits.
Have a NetworkWorld account? Log in here. Register now for a free account.

Videos

rssRss Feed

Whitepapers

Sun Microsystems: The Green Tide Is Coming. Pressure Builds for an Energy-Efficient Data Center

It's safe to say that most companies, if presented with hard numbers on their energy consumption...

Magic Quadrant for Application Delivery Controllers

Gartner summarizes its view on Application Delivery Controllers, evaluates strengths and weaknesses...

Secure Wireless Printing Options

Discover how you can reduce the TCO of your wireless printers in this whitepaper. Learn how to...

Webcasts

Direct from Microsoft: Tips for Integrating Exchange 2007 and Double-Take Software

Double-Take (r) Software and Microsoft are teaming up on September 9, 2008 for a webinar focusing...

PoE Plus: Impact on the PoE Market

The standard for Power over Ethernet (PoE), IEEE Std. 802.3af(tm)-2003, advanced networking,...

Intelligent Mobility: BlackBerry Technical Seminar 2008

The virtual BlackBerry Technical Seminar keeps growing in popularity every year, and we want to...

Special Reports

Virtualization Reality Check

Find out why analysts say approaching virtualization with an ounce of caution is wise. And also why...

Closing the Loop: Extending Wireless LAN Security to Wireless Printers

Enterprises cannot overlook wireless printers when assessing network security. The print jobs and...

Ethernet Services: WAN options mature

WAN Ethernet services are reliable, cost-efficient offerings that are widely available and in a...

Get instant email notification when white papers, webcasts, executive guides are added to our library. Stay informed and up-to-date with the latest on IT Technologies with Network World's Resource Alerts.