3Com Switch 5500/5500G Family
3Com’s 5500/5500G products provide port density and performance comparable to the stackable switch specifications for competitive products. With reasonable, but not leading edge pricing and a good warranty, 3Com is maintaining its market momentum. (2/8/2010)

Alcatel-Lucent OmniSwitch 6850 Series
The Alcatel-Lucent OmniSwitch 6850 family of stackable fixed switches remains a competitive offering with PoE, 10G uplinks, strong security and software upgrade features that provide good investment protection. (7/13/2009)

Cisco Catalyst 3750/3750-E Series
Cisco’s Catalyst 3750/3750-E is very threatening to competitors because of its unmatched investment protection, strong performance, and strong model diversity. (12/5/2008)

Enterasys SecureStack C-Series
Enterasys’s SecureStack C-Series is threatening to competitors because of its strong port diversity, 10GbE support and the focus on security that Enterasys brings to all of its switching products. (7/23/2009)

Extreme Networks Summit X450e/X450a Series
Extreme’s Summit X450e/X450a series provides a competitive aggregation and small core switch due to good performance and reasonable port diversity. With PoE capabilities, the X450e can support handsets, access points, and other PoE devices. (8/3/2009)

Force10 S-Series
The Force10 S-Series offers good 10G Ethernet and PoE options, making this product competitive in the fixed and stackable switch market. (7/30/2009)

HP ProCurve Networking ProCurve Switch 3400cl Series
The ProCurve 3400cl line of fixed switches is vulnerable to competitors because, despite its ability to put pressure on the market with its pricing and lifetime warranty, it still lacks dedicated stacking and port diversity in the product line. (12/5/2008)

Nortel Ethernet Routing Switch 5000 Series
Nortel’s ERS 5500 series of fixed configuration switches are competitive due to its strong feature set and Nortel’s strong protocols such as DMLT and MLT. (12/5/2008)

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Report Contents

• Current Perspective Rating
• Product Strengths & Weaknesses
• Product Buying Criteria
• Product Metrics

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Fixed Switching Buying Criteria

• Performance
  
  
• Scalability
  
  
• Manageability/Ease of Use
  
  
• Total Cost of Ownership
  
  
• Port Diversity
  • Port Diversity is the amount of different and varying port types available in a given product family or chassis. This denotes the deployment flexibility the product has from a port perspective.

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Fixed Switching Product Metrics

• Physical Characteristics
  • Device Class
  • Primary Target Market
• QoS Features
  • Total Number of Transmit Queues Per Port
  • Total Number of Receive Queues Per Port
  • Strict Priority Queues
  • Rate Limiting Support
  • Rate Limiting Granularity
  • Classify by IP DSCP/TOS
  • Write/Re-write IP DSCP/TOS
• Protocol Support
  • 802.1w Fast Spanning Tree
  • 802.1s Per-VLAN Spanning Tree
  • 802.3ad Trunking
  • 802.1x User Authentication
  • Network Login
  • IGMP Snooping
  • IP Routing
  • IP Routing Protocols
• Interface Support
  • 10/100Base-T
  • 10/100Base-T with 802.3af
  • 100Base-FX
  • 10/100/1000Base-T
  • 10/100/1000Base-T with 802.3af
  • 1000Base-X (GBIC or SFP)
  • 10G - Fixed Optics
  • 10G - XENPAC
  • Other (Specify Type and Port Count)
  • Special Modules (Non-line Cards)
• High Availability
  • Redundant Power Supplies
  • Non-Stop Code Upgrade
• Performance
  • Aggregate Switch Throughput
  • Forwarding Rate
  • Non-blocking Wire Speed
  • Switch Forwarding Latency
• Pricing
  • Switch Price
  • Expansion Module Pricing
• Support
  • Standard Warranty
  • Enterprise Maintenance Contract
• Product Class Ratings
  • Performance
  • Scalability
  • Management/Ease of Use
  • Total Cost Of Ownership
  • Port Diversity