Expand Networks www.expand.com, the leader in optimising WANs for branch office consolidation and virtualisation, today announced a major upgrade to its operating system - OS 6.3 - that will significantly improve the functionality, value and installation of its Accelerators. This latest OS runs across Expand's range of physical and virtual Accelerator solutions, and introduces advanced features to help customers achieve increased performance, ease of use, value for money, greater WAN provisioning capabilities and improved management and monitoring efficiencies.
The enhanced Layer 7 QOS features of OS 6.3 provide the highest levels of integrated visibility and control in a single OS of any vendor in the market, enabling organisations of all sizes to maximise their WAN infrastructure. OS 6.3 also introduces significant advancements in ease of deployment; for example, high latency environments requiring TCP acceleration benefit from enhanced dynamic SCPS support, and a new RDP proxy feature enables “zero touch” installation into Microsoft RDP environments.
WAN performance made easy
As IT infrastructures become more virtualised and distributed, so the need for effective deployment management increases. OS 6.3 has a number of new and enhanced features that enable organisations to deploy in a more dynamic andintuitive way, ensuring ease of configuration, use and ongoing management of Expand WAN optimisation solutions. These include:
* Central configuration - Enhanced central configuration enables single sided configuration, making global deployments across multiple time zones as simple as possible
* SCPS TCP Acceleration auto configuration - Single Sided “dynamic auto configuration” means no need to configure remote accelerators for acceleration functionality
* TCP auto bandwidth optimisation/virtual bandwidth - Extended ability to optimise and control physical and additional virtual bandwidth in dynamic environments where capacity availability is constantly changing.
* Microsoft RDP proxy - Accelerators are uniquely auto configured for “zero touch” installation into RDP environments, to deliver simple and immediate optimisation and acceleration benefits for Microsoft RDP protocols with no need to change RDP Server or client settings.
Improved optimisation, acceleration, visibility and control
This latest OS dramatically enhances application visibility and control via enhanced layer 7 QOS, enabling organisations of all sizes to maximise their WAN infrastructure. The new and enhanced features include:
* Enhanced VMware Vsphere4 integration - Fault tolerance and High Availability (HA) in virtualised environments enabling IT to take advantage of VMware's suite of management tools such as VMotion, Distributed Resource Scheduler (DRS) and High Availability, to dynamically deploy, manage, maintain and assure the performance of Expand's Virtual Accelerator.
* Enhanced Web caching for non Hard Drive appliances - The ability to now use hard drive caching techniques in Extreme environments on our non-hard drive platforms via the use of a 4GB Solid Stat memory card that simply slots into the available expansion slot.
* Enhanced TCP Acceleration with Hybla - Congestion avoidance algorithm counteracting the performance deterioration of TCP connections within high-latency terrestrial or satellite radio links.
Combining these new features with its existing RDP and Citrix Layer 7 Visibility and Control capabilities, Expand now boasts the industry's most comprehensive Layer 7 QOS engine enabling IT to easily identify, manage and control all applications traversing the enterprise and cloud WAN, while deployment has become even more simplified with the new dynamic installation management features.
“While tactical optimisation technologies can deliver extra network capacity, if it is not being controlled appropriately it can have a detrimental effect on the company's most important applications and, as a result, its business performance,” comments Efi Gatmor, CTO of Expand Networks. “IT has realised that maximising the WAN is no longer just about just providing acceleration, but about enabling enhanced levels of traffic visibility and control. These latest OS advancements further enhance Layer 7 visibility and ease of use, to provide greater control and optimisation of the WAN thus enabling organisations to assure the quality of user experience across complex environments.”
“Committed to a following a wholly holistic approach to WAN optimisation, Expand enables organisations to choose and use the right tool for the right application - and optimise it - regardless of network environment, or protocol. With our integrated technology, we continue to deliver this experience across physical, virtual and mobile appliances, and will continue to innovate in meeting the evolving needs of organisations,” concludes Barr.
Expand Networks OS 6.3 is available to customers on request from today, with general availability in May.
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Expand Networks
Expand Networks is the pioneer and leader in the WAN Optimisation market and is positioned by Gartner Inc. in the 'Leaders' quadrant in its Magic Quadrant for WAN Optimisation Controllers, 2009[i]. Expand helps organisations simplify their IT infrastructure while delivering remote offices fast, reliable and secure access to networked applications. This results in improved user productivity and cost-effective IT management. Expand offers a multi-service integrated platform that ensures superior performance for any application over any network. From its headquarters in Roseland, NJ and its global locations, Expand Networks serves more than 4 500 enterprise and public sector customers in over 100 countries including: American Express, Bacardi USA, BMW, Continental Airlines, Carr America, Colgate, Elizabeth Arden, Reed Exhibitions, Target and United States Department of Defence with over 50 000 units deployed and over 2 000 MS Terminal Services and Citrix customers. Expand is the largest supplier of WAN Optimisation products to US Government and Military agencies (greater than 10 000 units) and also has the most units deployed at a single corporate location, (4 500).
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