Infinera, Arista validate joint data center interconnect approach via Lippis Report

Optical transport systems vendor Infinera (NASDAQ:INFN) and data switch provider Arista Networks said last week that The Lippis Report has validated the performance of their joint data center interconnect approach. The run-through with the independent test organization provides confirmation that the combination of the Infinera Cloud Xpress and Arista 7280 programmable switching platform will provide line-rate 100 Gigabit Ethernet (GbE) throughput with low latency across 150 km without external amplification, the partners assert.

Infinera and Arista announced an agreement this past spring to jointly address the data center interconnect requirements of Internet content providers, large enterprises, and financial institutions (see "Data center interconnect focus of Infinera, Arista Networks partnership"). Sources at the two companies said that they did not have customer success stories they could share, but said that a significant amount of testing and integration work has been conducted. The latter includes integration of the Cloud Xpress with Arista's CloudVision software.

The sources naturally hope validation from The Lippis Report will garner attention from their intended customers. Lippis helped develop the test paradigm, according to the sources, then oversaw the run-through, which was based largely on RFC 2544. The tests took place at an Infinera facility over the course of a day. The test began with the systems loaded for 95% throughput, then grew from there, according to the company sources.

According to a joint press release, the tests demonstrated:

• end-to-end 100GbE line-rate throughput with zero loss for all traffic mixes tested
  
• end-to-end latency under 20 μs between servers in different data centers
• up to 500-Gbps DWDM bandwidth on a single fiber pair out of the Cloud Xpress
• reach beyond 150 km without external amplification
• power consumption of less than 1 W per gigabit/second for the Cloud Xpress
• ease of installation and operation.
  

"The Infinera-Arista end-to-end DCI solution is especially attractive for latency-sensitive applications, and can also be a great fit for a range of DCI use cases, such as business continuity, workload migration, data replication and big data analytics," said Nick Lippis, principal and publisher of The Lippis Report, via the press release. "The Infinera Cloud Xpress offers a small form factor and ease of use not previously available for DCI. I believe it will find a welcome reception in large enterprises who need to interconnect their datacenters with high bandwidth, low latency and low power."

A copy of the report is available online.

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