Wow! That's fast TCP!

Chris Mellor   Today’s Top Stories    or  Other Hardware Stories  

Best practices for safe hardware disposal Beyond consolidation: five reasons why you should start virtualizing Myth of the Million Dollar Database Learn-Fast Guide: Get Up to Speed on Green IT Sign up to receive Security Resource Alerts

December 01, 2004 (TechWorld.com) -- Data has been sent across a wide-area optical network at 101Gbit/sec., the fastest-ever sustained data transmission speed.
It was demonstrated by a High Energy Physics research team that included the California Institute of Technology, Stanford Linear Accelerator Center (SLAC) and the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratories (FNAL). The 101Gbit/sec. transmission from Pittsburgh to Los Angeles lasted several minutes as part of a 90-minute test and won the Supercomputing Bandwidth Challenge, intended to help increase network transmission speeds for grid computing such as CERN's Large Hadron Collider project.
The team set a new world record aggregate bandwidth peak of 101.13Gbit/sec., far in excess of the 2003 record of 23.21Gbit/sec., and beating the nearest contender by more than 300%.
The research team's "High-Speed TeraByte Transfers for Physics" record data transfer speed -- 12.6 Gbit/sec. or 4.6TB an hour -- is equivalent to downloading three full DVD movies per second, or transmitting all of the content of the Library of Congress in 15 minutes.
The sending and receiving servers were Sun Microsystem's Fire V20z servers, based on the AMD Opteron processor, running Solaris 10 and Linux. SLAC was able to completely fill a 10Gbit/sec. transcontinental network path for a sustained time with standard 1,500B packets, and the team achieved more than 15Gbit/sec. (9.43Gbit/sec .in one direction and 5.65Gbit/sec in the other simultaneously) on a single 10Gbit/sec. wavelength path.
The key was to use a Fast TCP (Transmission Control Protocol), developed by Professor Steven Low and his Caltech Netlab team. This prevents buffer overflow and packet-dropping better than the standard TCP method, which counts packet drops as a congestion measure.
Glenn Weinberg, vice president, operating platform group at Sun, said, "Blistering TCP/IP network performance with Solaris 10 allowed this collaborative effort ... to blow away previous records."
Future optical networks, incorporating multiple 10Gbit/sec. links, are expected to be the foundation of grid computing systems. A hybrid network integrating both traditional switching and routing of packets, and dynamically constructed optical paths to support the largest data flows, is a central part of the near-term future vision that the scientific community has adopted to meet the challenges of data intensive activities.
By demonstrating that many 10Gbit/sec. wavelengths can be used efficiently over continental and transoceanic distances (often in both directions simultaneously), the High Energy Physics team showed that this vision of a worldwide dynamic grid supporting many-terabyte and larger data transactions is practical.
It also means that SANs will be able to accommodate remote components as if they were local. It will also strengthen moves to storage consolidation as remote access will be as fast as local access.

Reprinted with permission from

For more enterprise technology news from the U.K., please visit TechWorld.com. Copyright 2006 IDG, all rights reserved.

Print this Story

Send Us Feedback

E-mail this Story

Digg this Story

Slashdot this Story

"It's the early 1990s when this pilot fish is challenged to find a better way to support telecommuting — and..." Read more... "It's a cheaper IT Blogwatch: in which Apple cuts the price of the top-end MacBook Air. Not to mention dan..." Read more... Read more Hardware posts or See all Blogs

Google gives away home-cooked Web application security scanner Microsoft trumpets security additions in upcoming IE8 Apple cuts price of high-end SSD MacBook Air by $500 More top stories...

Ultrathin showdown: Apple MacBook Air vs. Lenovo ThinkPad X300 vs. Toshiba Portege R500 Best Places to Work 2008 Storm botnet stages Fourth of July attacks

This old laptop: Revitalizing an aging notebook on the cheap All it takes is a couple hours and about $125 to breathe new life into an old laptop. Here's how. Bill Gates moves on Is Microsoft's Golden Age over? What are Gates' most memorable quotes? Find out in Computerworld's complete coverage of the end of the Bill Gates era at Microsoft. Five things you should never tell your boss There are some things your CIO definitely doesn't want to hear. Also don't miss the flipside, Five things you should always tell your boss. Hands-On: Firefox 3 fixes what's broke and keeps what's right With its latest version, Mozilla's browser continues to raise the bar for what Web browsers should be. Windows Vista A to Z Reviews, analyses, how-tos, visual tours, hot issues and predictions about Microsoft's new OS. More Continuing Coverage After 9/11: Homeland SecurityAsk a Premier 100 IT LeaderBlackBerry Legal BattleData Security BreachesElectronic VotingFirefoxH-1B VisasHP's Boardroom ScandalHandheld DevicesHurricane Katrina AftermathMicrosoft Legal IssuesMicrosoft's VistaOpen SourceRFID TechnologySCO's Linux FightSarbanes-Oxley ActSpamVoice Over IPWi-FiWindows Meta File VulnerabilityWindows XP Service Pack 3 IT Careers 2010 Four years from now, the IT field will be a vastly different place. Will you be ready? More Special Reports Premier 100 IT Leaders 2007 Best in Class2006 Computerworld Horizon Awards2006 Premier 100 IT Leaders2006 Salary Survey2007 Best Places to Work in IT2007 IT Forecast2007 Premier 100 IT Leaders40 Years of ComputerworldASPs, Take TwoBest Places to Work in IT 2003Best Places to Work in IT 2004Best Places to Work in IT 2005Best Places to Work in IT 2006Business Intelligence Home RunsBusiness Intelligence: Smarter BIBusiness Intelligence: The Future of BICRM Goes VerticalCRM: Sober CRMCareer Planning Guide 2005Careers: IT Profession 2010Computerworld Horizon Awards 2005Data Management: Mining for GemsData Management: Taming Data ChaosDevelopment: Hard-Workin' Web SitesDevelopment: New Tools New ChoicesDevelopment: The New World of Application DevelopmentDevelopment: The Web Services TsunamiDevelopment: Web Services HurdlesDisaster Recovery: Preparing for the WorstE-commerce Grows UpE-mail/Groupware: Big DecisionsFaces of Mobile ITForecast 2006Global MobileHardware: Multiple Cores, Multiple ChallengesHardware: On-Demand Un-HypedHardware: The Shape of Things to ComeHorizon Awards: 10 Cool Cutting Edge TechnologiesIT Management: Guide to Managing VendorsIT Management: Navigating Global ITIT Management: Recovery AheadIT Management: The Future of ITIT Management: The Resourceful Project ManagerInnovative Technology Awards 2004Management: Reinventing ITMicrosoft in TransitionMobile/Wireless Leaders and LaggardsMobile/Wireless: The Untethered WorkerMobile/Wireless: Tiny Gadgets, Huge CostsNetwork Management: Taking ControlNetworking: Turbulence Ahead!Networking: VoIP Goes MainstreamOperating Systems: In the Slow LaneOperating Systems: Linux Goes GlobalOperating Systems: Should You Nix Unix?Outsourcing: Offshore Buyer's GuideOutsourcing: Outsourcing DangersPremier 100 IT Leaders 2004 Best in ClassPremier 100 IT Leaders 2005 Best in ClassROI: Do the Math!Salary Survey 2003Salary Survey 2004Salary Survey 2005Security Action PlanSecurity: Compliance HeadachesSecurity: Proactive SecuritySecurity: Risk and RewardSecurity: Tips From Security ProsSouped-up SecurityStorage: Battling ComplexityStorage: Cheap & Secure Data StoresStorage: Stretching Your Storage DollarsStorage: The Lean Storage MachineStorage: The New Rules of StorageStorage: The Ultimate Backup GuideSupply Chain: Missing LinksSupply Chain: RFID Reality CheckThe Business of SecurityWeb 2.0 SecurityWireless: Wireless At Work All Zones Application Performance Zone Business Continuity Zone Data Center Management Zone Enterprise-Class Security Zone The File Data Management Zone Grid Computing on Windows Zone Security Management Zone ITIL Best Practices Zone The SAS Zone Storage Virtualization Zone Business Intelligence and Analytics Zone See your link here

Learn-Fast Guide: Get Up to Speed on Green IT (Source: Computerworld) Whether it's in the front office or the server room, green thinking can save energy, trees and money. From the Editorial Staff at Computerworld, here's the latest thinking on greening your operations. Download this executive briefing  Virtualization Everywhere Download this white paper, free, compliments of Citrix. (Source: Citrix) Adoption of virtualization is concentrated among large enterprises, while adoption by mid-sized companies has been much slower. For these companies, the cost and complexity of server virtualization solutions has been a barrier. In this paper, we'll discuss how Citrix XenServer" provides simple, economical server virtualization for any size company. Download now! Download this white paper  Long Tail Supplier Collaboration - What's In It For You? Long Tail Supplier Collaboration - What's In It For You? Download this webcast, free, compliments of Sterling Commerce Go to the webcast  White Papers Read up on the latest ideas and technologies from companies that sell hardware, software and services. Deploying Virtualized NetWare on Linux Whitepaper Toward More Flexible, Next-Generation Collaboration Solutions Driving Business Success Through Workgroup Choice and Flexibility View more whitepapers

• Google gives away home-cooked Web application security scanner
• Microsoft trumpets security additions in upcoming IE8
• Apple cuts price of high-end SSD MacBook Air by $500
• More top stories 

Cost Effective Scaling with Virtualization and Coyote Point Systems An overview of the industry trend toward virtualization, how server consolidation has increased the importance of application uptime and the steps being taken to integrate load balancing technology with virtualized servers. Download this white paper now!

Get Into Gear! Check out our new personal technology section -- TechGear -- for the latest on those cool gadgets that you just gotta have! Host Mike Elgan provides hands-on reviews and analysis of the stuff that makes IT fun. Head to TechGear

Detect, identify, and locate RF interference in 802.11 WLANs. AnalyzeAir software provides IT network professionals with the vision they need into the hidden world of RF, providing them with the ability to see the spectrum in a visible and intelligible format. AnalyzeAir software lets you see, monitor, analyze, and manage all the RF sources and wireless devices that influence your Wi-Fi network's performance and security, even if those devices are unauthorized or transient. AnalyzeAir Trial Software v3.1 highlights the features found in AnalyzeAir Software using a set of saved spectrum files. Replay the data and experience the visibility that AnalyzeAir Wi-Fi Spectrum Analyzer provides. Note: The trial software is limited to a player version only. It does not communicate with an AnalyzeAir PC card so it does not collect actual spectrum data. Register for this trial now.