Arista again looks to buck Cisco, others in data center

Arista Networks this week has rolled out four switches and enhanced software designed to address the scalability, resilience and density requirements of cloud computing.

Among the new switches are a 16-port 40Gbps Ethernet switch targeted at top-of-rack "spine" applications that connect server racks to the network core.

In addition to the QSFP 40G ports, Arista 7050Q-16 includes the capability to connect to eight ports of 1/10G Ethernet SFP+ interfaces.

The switch also includes a built-in solid-state drive for logging and local storage.

The 7050Q-16 will go up against Cisco's new Nexus 3016 40G Ethernet switch.

BACKGROUND: Cisco fabric launch seeks to undermine Arista, IBM

FABRIC WARS: Juniper vs. Cisco vs. Brocade 

The new 7050T-64 and 7050T-52 series "leaf" switches provide 48 ports of 100/1000/10GBase-T to server and storage nodes up to 100 meters away. This is intended to offer migration from existing Gigabit Ethernet to 10G Ethernet without disruptive upgrades, Arista says.

Both switches offer a choice of either four additional 40G QSFP+ interfaces or 10G SFP+ ports. QSFP+ interfaces can operate as either a 40G port or as four independent 10G ports to provide a total of 64 10G ports in the 7050T-64 model, Arista says.

The 7050S-52 is intended to address SFP direct-attached servers and fiber aggregation. It provides 52 ports of Gigabit Ethernet to complement the 7050S-64 switch announced earlier this year.

The 7050T and 7050S switches will go up against a variety of Gigabit Ethernet and 10G Ethernet switches, based on 10GBase-T or SFP/SFP+, from all major vendors, including Cisco, HP, Dell, Brocade, Extreme, Juniper and IBM.

Enhancements to Arista's EOS operating system software include Hitless Multi-Chassis Link Aggregation (MLAG) to provide sub-50 millisecond resiliency against cable, transceiver or switch failure in a two-tier network. MLAG also now supports In-Service Software Upgrades to allow users to add capabilities to the switch without any application downtime.

Arista also upgraded EOS's Zero Touch Provisioning software for automating the deployment and enhancement of switches. ZTP now includes a so-called

Zero Touch Replacement capability that enables stateless networking configuration with Layer 2/3 switches at the leaf layer.

The 7050T-64 and 7050T-52 start at $14,995, or $312 per port. The 7050Q-16 is $29,995 and the 7050S-52 is $19,995.

Read more about lan and wan in Network World's LAN & WAN section.

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