The Ethernet Alliance, a global consortium dedicated to the continued success and advancement of Ethernet technologies, today announced details of its upcoming multi-vendor demo at the 25th annual 2013 Supercomputing Conference (SC13), November 17 – 22, in Denver, Colo. The Ethernet Alliance demonstration in SC13 booth 622 integrates a range of innovative technologies from across the Ethernet ecosystem, including high-performance computing (HPC), networking, and storage. The display attests to Ethernet’s growing impact and influence in the HPC arena.
“With the ever-increasing interest in emerging technologies, convergence, and enhancements to existing infrastructures in both HPC and data center environments, the Ethernet Alliance is excited to bring a live demonstration of a real-world data center fabric to SC13,” said Mario Chow, SC13 technical lead, Ethernet Alliance, and senior technical marketing engineer, Dell. “Our Supercomputing 2013 demo integrates the best Ethernet technologies and advancements in a mixed-vendor environment – we have an operational Ethernet fabric that includes 10GbE and 40GbE inter-fabric links, LAN/SAN convergence with data center bridging (DCB), and RDMA over Converged Ethernet (RoCE), 10/40GbE line-rate access performance, and full Layer 1 interoperability. This demo illustrates Ethernet’s growing command of HPC and other relevant high-performance fabric requirements, and sets the pace for its continued expansion within the supercomputing and advanced research community.”
Simulating traffic volumes, patterns, and flows found in today’s HPC and data center environments, the Ethernet Alliance SC13 demo network topology spans two layers. These layers include 10GbE attached servers in the access layer that are linked to multiple 10/40GbE access layer switches, aggregated by two 10/40GbE core switches.
The Ethernet Alliance SC13 demo was constructed with equipment and technologies provided by multiple member companies, including Amphenol Corporation (NYSE: APH); Avago (NASDAQ: AVAGO); Cisco Systems (NASDAQ: CSCO); Dell (NASDAQ: DELL); Ixia (NASDAQ: XXIA), Mellanox Technologies, Ltd. (NASDAQ: MLNX); TE Connectivity (NYSE: TEL); Teledyne LeCroy; and Volex (LSE: VLX).
“Ethernet is steadily making significant inroads throughout the global HPC community. As a market-driven technology, Ethernet is continually evolving and adapting to meet changing demands not only in HPC, but across a diverse range of industries and applications,” said Scott Kipp, president, Ethernet Alliance, and senior technologist, Brocade. “The prevalence of Gigabit and 10GbE systems on the most recent TOP500 list demonstrates Ethernet is proving itself a reliable and cost-effective means for meeting today’s demanding supercomputing performance needs. And with 40GbE, 100GbE and the era of 400G drawing closer, we expect to see this shift toward Ethernet-based supercomputing to accelerate.”
For more information about the Ethernet Alliance, please visit http://www.ethernetalliance.org, follow @EthernetAllianc on Twitter, visit its Facebook page, or join its LinkedIn group.
About the Ethernet Alliance
The Ethernet Alliance is a global consortium that includes system and component vendors, industry experts and university and government professionals who are committed to the continued success and expansion of Ethernet technology. The Ethernet Alliance takes Ethernet standards to market by supporting activities that span from incubation of new Ethernet technologies to interoperability demonstrations and education.
To receive updates on Ethernet Alliance news, activities and events sign up for the organization’s newsletter at www.ethernetalliance.org/newsletter.
Additional Quotes:
“Amphenol is once again proud to be part of the Ethernet Alliance live demo at this year’s Super Computing conference. The Super Computing conference and exhibition is one of the premier events of the year. The Ethernet Alliance booth is great place for designers and end users to get unbiased information on the latest in GbE and see the latest products in live and static demos. Amphenol will be showing our world class 10GbE SFP+ and 40GbE QSFP+ interconnect systems. From our passive, active copper cables and the latest active optical cable assemblies to our SFP+ and QSFP+ cages and connectors. Additionally we will be showcasing a new offering of High Density (HD) rack mount optical connectivity panels and trunk cable solutions designed to increase density to improve cable routing and tray congestion.” – Greg McSorley, technical business development manager, Amphenol
“We are honored to have been selected as the primary provider of high-speed Ethernet optical transceiver solutions for the Ethernet Alliance 40G network demonstration at the Supercomputing Conference 2013 (SC13). Avago Technologies has been on the forefront of parallel optics technology enabling superior channel density and bandwidth for high performance computing applications. We are a leading provider of pluggable and embedded parallel optics solutions as demonstrated by our QSFP+ transceivers, QSFP+ AOCs, SFP+ transceivers and SFP+ AOCs shown here at SC13.” – Steve Shultis, director of product marketing, fiber optics product division, Avago
“Ixia remains committed to helping the Ethernet Alliance drive forward its mission to deliver successful and expanded Ethernet technologies. Participating in events like the live demonstration at the 2013 Supercomputing Conference is a great way to showcase how we, as industry leaders, are working together to advance technology. With our longstanding history developing cutting edge solutions to test and validate networks, our IxLoad and IxNetwork solutions coupled with the Xcellon-Multis platform will provide visitors with real insight into the way today’s emerging Ethernet-related technologies will impact the future of supercomputing.” – Jim Smith, vice president of marketing, Ixia Test Solutions
“At SC13, the Ethernet Alliance is bringing together a diversified list of switches, NICs, cables and test equipment vendors for building a demonstration of a vendor agnostic fully standardized data center. As a leading provider of the world’s best performing switches and network interface cards for data centers of any scale, Mellanox Technologies is proud to provide our Ethernet solutions into the live demo. Interoperability is a key factor when integrating new equipment into an existing deployment, and Mellanox takes great pride in providing either a complete end-to-end Ethernet interconnect solution or any networking element that can interoperate with existing devices using standards based protocols.” – Ran Almog, senior product manager, Ethernet products, Mellanox Technologies
“As Ethernet continues to become increasingly relevant to high performance fabrics, HPC system architecture demands better performance – in energy efficiency, deployment of higher data rates and total life cycle cost – while remaining compliant to the Ethernet standard. The Ethernet Alliance demo illustrates how this can be achieved today through the interoperability of multiple technologies. As a founding member of the Ethernet Alliance, TE Connectivity is excited to participate in these presentations that showcase the evolution of Ethernet. For the demonstrations, TE will be providing 10- and 40-Gb/s copper and optical connectivity solutions – I/O interconnects, cables, transceivers and structured wiring patch panels.” – Nathan Tracy, system architecture team, TE Connectivity
“Volex is excited to participate in the Ethernet Alliance interoperability demonstration at SC13 in Denver. The demonstration allows Volex to showcase it’s SFP+ and QSFP+ technologies that provide robust, cost effective, and reliable, 10G and 40G data center connectivity. These technologies include passive copper, active copper, and active optical, and support connectivity requirements from 1m to 100m and beyond. Come see the Volex connectivity solutions in the Ethernet Alliance booth, number 622.” – Matt Davis, product marketing manager, Volex
Contacts:
Melissa Power, 401-454-1314
melissa.power@interprosepr.com
