The family of planned switching products based on ThunderSWITCH will leverage TI's existing networking integrated circuit (IC) designs, combining many of the devices used in current switch designs into a single IC. This high level of integration saves large amounts of board space and offers the potential to significantly reduce component costs from current designs. In addition, the fully integrated media and network control functions help simplify design for OEMs and reduce their time to market with new products.
"Networks are moving to switched topologies as fast as they can, both for higher performance and for greater flexibility," said Altaf Hussain, TI's marketing manager for network switching products. "ThunderSWITCH is going to help drive this trend by providing versatile, easily upgradable configurations with a low per port cost. ThunderSWITCH will help the whole networking industry make a switch to the future."
The ThunderSWITCH architecture fully integrates media access controllers (MACs) and media-independent interfaces (MIIs) for multiple ports. These ports can be configured to support varying combinations of full duplex 10-BaseT, 100-BaseT and 100VG-AnyLAN Ethernet for potential 20- or 200-Mbps connection to desktops or high-speed servers through external physical layer (PHY) devices. An additional port can be designated as a 200-Mbps full-duplex providing an aggregate of 400-Mbps bandwidth for connection to an external switching fabric or for use as a high-speed uplink.
All of these media control and interface functions combine to help OEMs realize equipment designs based on ThunderSWITCH, providing network users with the freedom to connect their networks in a variety of ways and change those connections easily through upgrades.
A complementary external device, TI's new Quad PHY, supports ThunderSWITCH designs by integrating four 10-BaseT physical layer devices into a single chip. The Quad PHY integrates all wave shaping and filtering components on chip, requiring only a simple isolation transformer for connection to the network. Multiple Quad PHYs used in conjunction with ThunderSWITCH create a multi-port 10-BaseT Ethernet switch, with additional ports available for network management, high-traffic servers and enterprise connections. Other functions integrated in ThunderSWITCH architecture help simplify network administration for MIS managers and end users. Each port is capable of supporting virtual LANs (VLANs) for workgroup or segment switch applications. Built-in Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) and Remote Network Monitor (RMON) software agents were developed jointly with Epilogue Technology Corporation, the market leader in network management technology. A hardware Management Information Block (MIB) improves performance by gathering SNMP statistics on-chip, while any port can be snooped via a built-in RMON probe, improving network management and fault diagnostics capability.
"ThunderSWITCH with complementary, integrated Epilogue management software offers OEMs and end users a potent combination of networking silicon and network management software," said Dave Preston, president and chief operating officer of Epilogue Technology. "Networks will not only be easier to manage, but there will also be management continuity in equipment upgrades."
"Switching is among the most important developments in networking today, bringing higher performance to users and greater flexibility to LAN managers," said networking market analyst Tam Dell'Oro of the Dell'Oro Group. "Within the next three years, we estimate that all LANs connecting more than a handful of systems will be switched. Among silicon vendors, TI is uniquely qualified to serve the switching market because of its demonstrated commitment to building flexibility into its platforms, allowing users to future-proof as much as possible."
Planned packaging for ThunderSWITCH is a 388-pin ball grid array (BGA). Samples of the device are planned for 3Q96.
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