NETSCOUT announced the addition of a new blade and chassis Packet Flow Switch: the PFS 6010.

Carriers who have migrated to 100G networks require monitoring visibility infrastructure that scales with their networks, and allows them to leverage investments in existing 1G or 10G monitoring tools. A number of service providers around the world have already selected the PFS 6010 due to its scale, from 1G to 100G; performance, with a 6Tbps non-blocking fabric architecture; port density, from 60 to 600 ports in a single chassis, and flexibility, effectively bridging the gap between 100G networks and 1/10/40G monitoring tools. These service providers also leverage advanced packet conditioning capabilities such as packet slicing, header stripping and de-duplication to ensure their networks are managed efficiently.

The PFS 6010 solves a critical challenge that organizations managing large networks encounter: scaling access to network traffic with the growing need for service assurance, performance management, application management and additional security systems. According to IHS Infonetics Research, the 100G monitoring switch ports market is expected to grow by 106% annually through 2019.[1] In the past, port contention, stemming from the limited number of access ports and and speed mismatches, has hampered deployments. The combination of high density, scalability and flexibility from the PFS 6010 helps service providers and large enterprises migrate to 40G and 100G networks by enabling monitoring and security policies to be maintained by existing 10G/1G tools.

“This is a strategic expansion of our portfolio, enabling packet flow switches to scale to the needs of the world’s largest and most innovative service providers who need application visibility,” said Brian McCann, vice president and general manager of NETSCOUT’s Packet Flow Switch Business Unit. “With 6Tbps performance and up to 600 available ports, the PFS 6010 offers the industry’s most scalable packet flow switch solution, supporting advanced traffic optimization, filtering and flow balancing functionality in a single system that support speeds from 1G to 100G.”

Key features and capabilities of the PFS 6010 include:

- Massive scalability supports the largest datacenter and mobile network deployments, with up to 600 ports of 10G or 60 ports of 100G in a single chassis

- Carrier class reliability and application performance with a non-blocking 6Tbps line rate fabric and fully redundant architecture

- Advanced flexibility easily accommodates various traffic types and requirements, from 1G to 10G to 40G to 100G, with aggregation, replication, load balancing and advanced packet conditioning functionality

- Highly modular 15RU 10-slot chassis, where each blade can be selected and deployed based on speeds, port density and functionality required

Expanding the PFS portfolio, the PFS 6010 enables larger NETSCOUT PFS visibility networks for NETSCOUT probe applications and other third-party monitoring tools and security systems.