Update on QoS, Part 2

Like many vendors, Foundry Networks sees a fairly limited role for quality of service in the enterprise, asserting that the technology will maintain a role in service provider networks.

" For enterprise networks, the need for QoS will never come into play, " says Val Oliva, Layer 2/3 product manager for Foundry. For proof, he says look at utilization of data networks in a typical enterprise. With the switched 100M bit/sec to the desktop that you can easily get today, " 99% of the time, you're going to have 20% to 30% utilization, " he says. You may have spikes over 70%, but the duration of those spikes is in mere seconds.

For voice, a simple prioritization scheme is all you need, Oliva says. Just make sure to give voice a higher priority. However, he says he doesn't think voice will be a key driver for QoS in many enterprise networks. Instead, multicast of video and audio for training may be the driver.

If you want to run QoS, Foundry has the capability to let you deploy access control lists at Layer 2, in wiring closet switches. It also has released network management software to manage QoS.

Next time: Extreme Networks' view

In addition to writing this newsletter, Jeff Caruso edits Network World's e-mail newsletters from his office on New York's Long Island. If you would like to make suggestions about newsletter format or content, or even just express your opinion on today's topic, you can reach Jeff at jcaruso@nww.com.

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