FREMONT, CALIFORNIA(May 22, 2000) ? ZNYX Networks today announced the ZX4500 series of CompactPCI Ethernet switches that provide advanced Carrier Class features and the highest density available in an open-standard format. In a single 6U slot, the ZX4500 features 24 10/100 Ethernet ports, 2 Gigabit Ethernet ports, an embedded Motorola 8240 PPC processor and a PMC/PPMC slot for an expansion processor or additional I/O. The design is fully HotSwap compliant, and all 10/100 Ethernet ports are implemented as Rear-Panel I/O. With 64 megabytes of buffer RAM and a non-blocking switch fabric, the ZX4500 can handle full line rate and over 6.6 million packets per second. Both Layer 2 and Layer 3 switching is supported.

?This product allows OEMs and system integrators to solve all kinds of switching architecture problems,? said Alan Deikman, CTO of ZNYX Networks. ?By combining high performance switching silicon with the open standards of CompactPCI and PMC, the system designer no longer needs to resort to a separate, rack-mount switch to service any given application. High density results in more efficient utilization of rack space, and rear-panel I/O vastly simplifies cable management and maintenance.?

The Carrier Class features of the ZX4500 can be combined with ZNYX Networks? existing RAINlink™ technology to provide fail-over and link aggregation services. A system integrator can use this technology to provide fault-tolerant configurations with five-nines (99.999%) availability. The ZX4500 provides program interfaces to allow it to be managed by the same management software as the rest of the equipment in the chassis.

"Our OEM telco and ISP equipment customers have been looking for this solution for some time,? said Connie Austin, ZNYX Networks? President and CEO. ?The ZX4500 is an excellent platform for customers to reduce their time-to-market on a wide variety of applications. These include Voice-over-IP, call management, billing, DWDM traffic distribution, network monitoring, and many others.? Ms. Austin went on to explain that while many customers want to use the ZX4500 ?as-is? for standard Layer 2 and 3 switching, others are interested in adding their own PMC or PPMC processor modules to implement custom applications.

One Stop Systems, a Calabasas, California based systems-provider, is using the ZX4500 in an airborne military Command and Control system. ?The ZX4500s fit right into the space we had,? said Steve Cooper, One Stop?s president. ?You don?t have a lot of space on a helicopter, but you do need performance and fault tolerance. I am particularly impressed with the speed of the RAINlink failover. It seems to be instantaneous.?

The ZX4500 is currently available under an OEM partners program. General availability is scheduled for August, 2000 with a suggested list price of $6,500, not including the Rear-Transition Module.

Since its inception in 1993, ZNYX Networks has pursued a vision of High Availability Local Area Network (LAN) solutions. The company is now the worldwide leader in supplying Carrier Class LAN hardware and software for the telecommunications and data communications industries.

ZNYX Networks PCI, PMC, PIM, and CompactPCI networking products incorporate Redundant Array of Independent Netports™ (RAIN™) technology to bring five-nines (or better) reliability to LAN equipment deployed in Network Equipment Building System (NEBS) environments. Principal customers include telecommunications equipment providers, ISPs, enterprise, government, and embedded industrial automation providers. ZNYX Networks supports an unprecedented number of operating systems including LynxOS and BlueCat by Lynux Works, Sun Solaris, Berkeley Software BSD/OS, QSSI QNX, FreeBSD, IBM OS/2, Linux, Microsoft Windows 98/NT/2000, Apple Mac OS, Novell NetWare, SCO OpenServer, SCO UnixWare, and WindRiver VxWorks and pSOS+.

ZNYX Networks is a privately held company with corporate headquarters at 48501 Warm Springs Blvd, Suite 107, Fremont, CA, USA, 94539, and Advanced Technology Centers in San Francisco and Santa Barbara CA. ZNYX Networks can be reached at (510) 249-0800, sales@znyx.com, or www.znyx.com.