NASA Deploys Force10 E-Series to Increase Capability of Pilot Testing Programs and Computational Models over Locally Distributed Clusters.

Business Editors/High-Tech Writers

MILPITAS, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--April 14, 2004

Force10 Networks today announced that the National Aeronautics Space Administration (NASA) has deployed the E300 in its Goddard Space Flight Center, home to the largest organization of combined Earth and space scientists and engineers in the U.S. Leveraging the resiliency and scalability of the Force10 E-Series, NASA is planning to interconnect a number of high performance clusters to create more advanced computational models that will enable scientists to better explore and understand both the Earth and the universe.

"At the Goddard Space Flight Center our scientists develop a broad spectrum of flight missions and maintain advanced information systems for the display, analysis, archiving and distribution of space and Earth science data," said Pat Gary, network projects leader in NASA's Earth and Space Data Computing Division. "To perform the simulations and computational models, some of our scientists require extensive supercomputing even for a single job; and one cost-effective approach to achieving that capability is to harness several clusters together across a relatively inexpensive, very high performance local area network such as the E300 provides."

The Goddard Space Flight Center's Earth and Space Data Computing Division (ESDCD) deployed the E300 near a set of high performance computing clusters to perform pilot testing in their research and development lab. The E300 combines its EtherScale architecture with the Force10 Operating System (FTOS) software to deliver an unmatched level of resiliency and security. As a real-time operating system, the FTOS software is customized for maximum resiliency and fault tolerance while distinct data and control planes bring a new level of security to the E-Series, providing an inherent fault containment system that prevents network attacks from impacting performance.

The ESDCD provides the science community with access to state-of-the-art high-performance computing and mass storage systems, networking and information systems technologies and dedicated computational science expertise, resources that enable NASA-supported scientists to increase their understanding of the Earth, the solar system, and the universe through computational modeling and processing of spaceborne observations. The ESDCD also manages and operates the NASA Center for Computational Sciences (NCCS), a world-class supercomputing facility that provides scientists with some of the most powerful computing and mass storage resources available.

"NASA relies on computation intensive operations to process the data it gathers and to run simulations for its pilots and unmanned spacecrafts," said Andrew Feldman, vice president of marketing of Force10 Networks. "To support this research, NASA demands a resiliency and availability that the E300 alone provides, delivering the computing power that enables scientists to more effectively explore and understand the universe."

The E300 is the most recent addition to the Force10 E-Series family of Gigabit and 10 Gigabit Ethernet switch/routers. As the industry's most compact line-rate 10 Gigabit Ethernet solution, the E300 features the same unmatched scalability and resiliency that characterizes the Force10 E-Series. Built-in redundancy simplifies network topology, management and troubleshooting while line-rate Gigabit and 10 Gigabit throughput, regardless of traffic conditions, enables predictable and resilient application performance.

About Force10 Networks

Force10 Networks is the pioneer in scalable resiliency for high performance switching and routing. Based on a revolutionary system architecture that delivers best-in-class resiliency and massive scalability, Force10's E-Series switch/routers ensure predictable application performance, increase network availability, and reduce operating costs. Today, many of the world's largest Gigabit Ethernet and 10 Gigabit Ethernet networks depend on Force10 Networks. For additional information, please visit the company's website at www.force10networks.com.

Force10, E-Series, EtherScale and FTOS are trademarks of Force10 Networks, Inc. All other company names are trademarks of their respective holders.