* 3Com introduces more than a dozen switches
I recently wrote about 3Com’s moves in security and VoIP, moves that are intended to keep the company on users’ minds as they look at enterprise LAN options. This week 3Com continues on that path with a range of switches coming out of its joint venture with Huawei Technologies.
3Com is unveiling the Switch 5500 family of Layer 2-4 edge switches, a family with 12 members right out of the gate. Seven of the switches have 10/100M bit/sec Ethernet ports, and the rest are Gigabit Ethernet models. The power supply in the Gigabit models can be upgraded in the future to support Power over Ethernet, 3Com says. The switches, some of which have up to 48 ports, can be managed together as a single unit, or “virtual chassis.”
3Com is also adding to its Switch 7700 family with two new chassis. The four-slot Switch 7754 and seven-slot Switch 7757 allow users to add 10/100/1000M bit/sec Ethernet ports and deliver Power over Ethernet to those ports.
The Power-over-Ethernet support is important for anyone deploying VoIP. As I mentioned before, 3Com is building out its lineup of IP phones and upgrading its IP PBX software, so this is more than complementary; it’s a necessity: http://www.networkworld.com/newsletters/lans/2005/0523lan1.html
Additionally, 3Com is rolling out software, which my colleague Tim Greene alluded to several weeks ago, that lets its intrusion prevention system quarantine any attacks on an enterprise network. He has full details in this week’s story:
http://www.networkworld.com/news/2005/060605-3com.html
3Com has been struggling with enterprise networking for several years now, ever since it pulled out of the business and then jumped back in. What is interesting now is to see 3Com acting like a company that really wants to play in the enterprise big leagues. Its close partnership with Huawei is obviously facilitating that, allowing 3Com to quickly introduce more than a dozen LAN switches all at once.
Will enterprise firms bite? Let me know at mailto:jcaruso@nww.com
