* SMC, Broadcom and PowerDsine separately take Ethernet further
Today we’ve got a grab-bag of three different product announcements – from SMC, Broadcom and PowerDsine – that all have in common the theme of pushing the envelope of high-speed Ethernet.
SMC Networks revealed that it has chosen Vativ Technologies’ transceiver for an option on its TigerStack 1000 switches. You may remember from recent newsletters that Vativ’s transceiver runs Ethernet at 10G bit/sec over Category-5 copper cabling – but can’t really be called 10 Gigabit Ethernet in the standard sense.
That means, at this point, those TigerStack switches will only be able to connect to other TigerStacks, but it could present an interesting option for those who want to get high LAN speeds at low cost. SMC plans to offer the option next month.
Power-over-Ethernet specialist PowerDsine unveiled a line of power over Ethernet midspans, which add electrical power to an Ethernet cable to deploy IP phones, wireless LAN access points and other equipment. They would be used in conjunction with a regular LAN switch, taking the Ethernet signals in from the switch on one side, adding power and delivering both to devices on the other side.
These particular devices support power over Gigabit Ethernet, which is a step beyond most equipment in this area that can only run 10/100M bit/sec Ethernet.
The first model of the 6000G series to ship will be the 24-port 6024G, and it is expected to ship in volume in July.
On a related note, chip maker Broadcom introduced a dual-port Gigabit Ethernet transceiver intended for IP phones.
With PCs and IP phones often sharing a connection, it will become more important for the phone to support Gigabit Ethernet so that it doesn’t slow down the Gigabit connection to the PC. In other words, you don’t want the IP phone to be a bottleneck. The two ports are important to support voice and data at the same time, Broadcom says.
The new transceiver is available in samples now to manufacturers.
