US Signal enhances testing with ADVA demarcation devices

Oct. 12, 2009
OCTOBER 12, 2009 -- US Signal has deployed ADVA's FSP 150CC-825 and FSP 150CC-925 Ethernet demarcation devices at centralized network sites and customer locations.

OCTOBER 12, 2009 -- US Signal, telecommunications infrastructure provider of network services, IP transport, Ethernet transport, and colocation facilities in the Midwest, says it has improved its network monitoring and testing capabilities and safeguarded its customers against potential disruptions with the implementation of ADVA Optical Networking technology.

Deploying ADVA's FSP 150CC-825 and FSP 150CC-925 Ethernet demarcation devices at centralized network sites and customer locations, US Signal has created remote test and monitoring points within its 6,000-mile fiber-optic network and metro rings in 21 markets serving customers in Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, and Wisconsin. The test points enable the organization to conduct internal service testing between its core network and customer locations, ensuring high-bandwidth customers will receive secure, reliable service.

According to the companies, the equipment enables US Signal to track down and eliminate technical issues within the network before they escalate into service outages. The FSP 150CC-825 and the FSP 150CC-925 offer remote operations, administration, and maintenance (OAM) features to help minimize the need for truck rolls and provide remote visibility into service-level agreement (SLA) conformance.

The FSP 150CC-825 and the FSP 150CC-925 include integrated RFC 2544 testing to verify SLA throughput, delay, and delay variation under fully loaded, worst-case conditions, ensuring services are carrier-class.

Both devices are equipped with ADVA's Etherjack technology, providing an intelligent Ethernet demarcation point, which includes an 802.1ag/802.3ah-aligned network interface device (NID) or network termination equipment (NTE) for OAM functionality, plus an MEF-aligned user network interface (UNI) for providing advanced services definition. The Etherjack NID includes the Etherjack Connection Performance Analyzer (ECPA), along with port-level and Virtual Local Area Network (VLAN)-level loopbacks to enable a carrier to remotely diagnose faults and verify Ethernet Virtual Connection (EVC) SLA conformance using RFC 2544 test suites. Etherjack Service Assurance (ESA) provides in-service SLA monitoring critical for carrier-class Ethernet services. The UNI provides service intelligence necessary for defining committed information rate (CIR), excess information rate (EIR), and burst size of individual ports, priorities, or VLANs. It uses 802.1p, 802.1q, type of service (ToS), or differentiated services code point (DSCP) to classify traffic into EVCs, VLANs, or priority level.

"The decision to deploy ADVA Optical Networking's FSP 150CC-825 and FSP 150CC-925 allows our customers to connect their different sites -- utilizing diverse last-mile access technologies such as OC-3, OC-12, or Native Ethernet -- to their Virtual Ethernet Service," claims Dan Olrich, chief operating officer for US Signal.

The US Signal optical backbone features DWDM technology that combines a redundant SONET architecture with an extensive switched Ethernet network. All of US Signal's services are delivered over this protected network.

"The ability to accurately test, measure, and monitor network performance is critical to the success of today's service providers," says Brian Protiva, chief executive officer of ADVA Optical Networking. "US Signal clearly takes that responsibility seriously, and we're proud to provide the tools and technology this organization relies on to protect its customers and its network."


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