D-Link Wants To Run With The Enterprise

In an attempt to compete more strongly with enterprise networking and storage vendors, D-Link Systems Inc. -- typically thought of as a consumer company -- used Interop to position itself in the enterprise space. This was a surprise to users who already see them there. "We've been in business products for some time, but Interop has been our coming-out party," explains Joe Melfi, associate director of business solutions marketing for the Fountain Valley, Calif., company.

As part of this, D-Link also announced what it says is its first chassis switch line. The D-Link xStack Chassis Series network switches (DGS-8000) provide up to 160 Gbps full duplex line rate performance per slot, an array of modules with capacities of up to 48 Gb ports, including Power over Ethernet, and an 8-port 10G SFP+ modules with capacities of up to 64 10G. Added to this is the D-Link Unified Wired/Wireless Gigabit Switch (DWS-4026), which lets network administrators manage up to 64 D-Link Wired Unified 802.11n Access Points (DWL-8600AP) by itself, and up to 256 DWL-8600APs in a switch cluster. "This is the year for N," Melfi says. "We're seeing a lot of shifting from G to N." In fact, the company is phasing out its 802.11g line of products, he adds. Implementing a wireless switch lets organizations scale by adding new access points as they add employees and provides improved security through centralized management, Melfi says. In addition, support for 802.11n provides faster transition between access points if users - such as people using Voice over IP wireless headsets - are roaming, he says.

Finally, the company announced the DSN-5000 Series of xStack iSCSI SAN Arrays. Three models are available: DSN-5110 (4 x 1GbE ports per controller), DSN-5210 (8 x 1GbE ports per controller) and DSN-5410 (1 x 10GbE port per controller). D-Link's product line had been missing a high-availability solution with dual controllers, Melvi says. They offer up to 84 drives of up to 2 TB each, meaning one stack of controllers supports up to 168 TB, he says.

"I get the same value with the D-Link products and all the configuration parameters you would expect in the enterprise market," says J.P. Watters, director of technology for Grundy County, Ill., a rural county of some 40,000 people about 70 miles southwest of Chicago. He's chosen D-Link products over offerings from Cisco Systems Inc. and Hewlett-Packard Co. because of pricing. "HP is half the cost of Cisco. D-Link is a little more than a third of the cost of Cisco."

While Watters hasn't made any decisions yet, the county is "headed in that direction," he says. The organization already uses D-Link's existing wireless switches, and sees the new products as a third generation that will give them a single point of configuration. The D-Link xStack Chassis Series (DGS-8010 and DGS-8006) will be available in Q3; pricing will be announced then. The D-Link DWS-4026 and DWL-8600AP are available now for $7,999.99 and $799.99, respectively. The SAN products are available now for an undisclosed price.