* Broadcom's Gigabit Ethernet switch family
Broadcom continues the rollout it started last week with a new family of Gigabit Ethernet switch chips aimed specifically at small to midsized businesses.
The ROBOSwitch integrated circuits range from 16 to 50 ports of Gigabit Ethernet, and – like last week’s highly integrated Wi-Fi chip – they incorporate a MIPS processor to run software and manage compute-intensive tasks. With the 32-bit processor built in, Broadcom argues that there is no need for a separate processor component in the switches to run those tasks.
The switch chips would be used by LAN switch manufacturers as the guts of their products. Broadcom chips are widely used in such gear.
The family of chips uses Broadcom’s WebSuperSmart Web-based network configuration software for setup and management of the switches. It enables security, QoS controls and VoIP services. That is, the QoS controls give priority to real-time traffic such as voice, streaming media or videoconferencing.
The company claims that a person without any prior networking experience should be able to configure and make changes to the network using this software.
The switch chips also support jumbo frames, Multiple Spanning Tree Protocol and double tagging.
They are available now in sample quantities, with mass production expected by the end of the year. There are models available with 16 ports, 24 ports and 48 ports, with the latter two having the option of an additional two Gigabit Ethernet uplinks.
In related news, Broadcom last week also introduced its first applications processor aimed at providing multimedia features in mobile phones and other portable devices. It supports an 8 mega-pixel digital camera, MPEG-4/H.264 VGA video decoding at 30 frames per second, video encoding at 30 frames per second, and TV output via composite, component and S-video connections.
