The Data Center of the Future Ramps Up To Full Throttle with 10 Gigabit Ethernet

Today, what IDC calls the “Data Center of the Future,” is ramping up to full throttle with 10 Gigabit Ethernet, the unifying network standard. Data centers equipped with 10 Gigabit Ethernet can enjoy a range of compelling benefits including investment protection, product flexibility, performance, and energy efficiency backed by a deep, multi-vendor ecosystem to deliver 10Gb NICs, interconnects, blade and rack-level switches, as well as conventional fixed and chassis-based switches. What’s more, one of the issues that until now has impeded the adoption of 10Gb was price, which is now becoming less of an issue as per port prices have declined below $500 per port, the price point at which the volume economics of Ethernet are expected to accelerate the move to 10Gb NICs, edge and aggregation switches.

BLADE and IDC recently teamed up with HP and IBM to air two webinars: “10G Ethernet: Overcoming Network Overload with Rackonomics—An Innovative Approach to Scaling Out Data Center Networks” and “10G Ethernet: The Future of Scalable Networks for Blade Server Virtualization." These webinars offer insights into factors that are introducing new loads and requirements for low latency to the network. For example, IDC’s Cindy Borovick explains the impact on the network from “Dynamic Datacenters” that are equipped to manage workloads based on business priorities, provide virtual I/O and virtual network services and deliver SOA-based applications.

Cindy’s “Essential Guidance” is fivefold:
1. The “Datacenter of the Future“ will require performance, availability and scale.
2. Virtualization changes network requirements.
3. Asset consolidation drives the need for high bandwidth and low latency.
4. Ethernet is on a path to be the unifying network standard in the datacenter.
5. 10 Gigabit Ethernet will be the foundation of the future datacenter network.

If you’re like me, you’ll come away from these webinars as time well spent with some fresh insights into why 10 Gigabit Ethernet is the best choice for the dynamic and highly virtualized “Data Centers of the Future.”

Once again Ethernet is the de facto mainstream network topology with 10 Gigabit Ethernet today’s best choice for massive scale-out enterprise networks, emerging converged networking/storage networks and virtually everywhere and anywhere a server or bank of servers requires high bandwidth, low latency, advanced energy efficiency and the affordability of Ethernet’s volume economics. Even High Performance Computing (HPC) clusters, which have been the domain of Infiniband and other proprietary server I/O interconnects, show growing use of Ethernet – see the TOP500 List of the world’s most powerful supercomputers.

The technology blogosphere is paying attention to the coming widespread migration to 10 Gigabit Ethernet as the mainstream standard. I encourage you to visit Stephen Brown’s informative blog about all things 10GbE.


Also, it’s worthwhile to read what Chris Mellor for Blocks and Files in the U.K has to say in his view about BLADE’s groundbreaking solutions for implementing the lossless 10Gb Ethernet required for converged Fibre Channel over Ethernet (FCoE) storage networks. “No need to wait,” writes Mellor, because BLADE can implement a loss-less, low-latency FC0E network now.”

At BLADE, our embedded 1Gb/10Gb Ethernet switches and new 10Gb top-of-rack data center-class RackSwitch are the flagships of our product line and the mainstays of our Rackonomics concept for provisioning massive-scale out networks at the rack level. BLADE 10Gb switches are being deployed across our customer base in more than two dozen market segments, including finance, automotive, defense, and academia to name a few.

For example, a leading academic computer center one of the largest supercomputing and networking centers in Eastern Europe, recently installed BLADE’s 10 Gigabit Ethernet switches an HPC solution using IBM BladeCenter. After evaluating other vendors and fabrics such as Infiniband and Myrinet, the computer center chose BLADE’s 10GB solution primarily because Ethernet is a well-known technology that is easier and more affordable to deploy, configure, install and manage. Using 10Gb Ethernet interconnects within the IBM BladeCenter chassis also delivers significant price-performance advantages along with high bandwidth and low latency. You can download BLADE’s Solution Brief about 10 Gigabit Ethernet High Performance Computing Clusters on IBM BladeCenter at

Just as 10 Gigabit Ethernet is now growing through widespread deployment in the data center, the discussion has not shifted to consider tomorrow’s even higher-speed interconnects – namely 40Gb and 100Gb Ethernet. Coming in September 2008 to a Web browser near you, I will be appearing on NetEvents.tv to speak about the future of Ethernet – specifically “100Gb Ethernet - why, how and when?” Stay tuned to NetEvents.tv’s Telco Channel. For now, hold on to your hats because 10 Gigabit Ethernet is ready to help your dynamic data center ramp up to full throttle.