Crescendo Communications Inc, Sunnyvale, California has announced a stackable hub that supports both Copper Distributed Data Interface and Fibre Distributed Data Interface. It performs the functions of a workgroup concentrator or modular hub, in configurations from four FDDI or eight FDDI/copper ports up to 18 FDDI and/or copper ports. The hub’s stackable nature means fault-tolerant multiple hubs can be constructed which are said to offer three to five times the port density of equivalent offerings in a typical rack space. Multiple hubs can be monitored and managed simultaneously using the graphical user interface-based Crescendo Manager software, and up to 100Mbps traffic can be generated to examine the effects of network loading. The status of other network devices can be displayed using the SMT Window feature and, because software is stored in Flash memory, remote upgrading is possible. The FDDI/CDDI Workgroup Hub, which will be available in July, costs $645 per port for an 18-port CDDI configuration and $1,144 for an 18-port FDDI configuration.
