Hewlett-Packard Co and Seagate Technology Inc have agreed to work together to development products based on 2 gigabit-per-second fibre channel technology, with a roadmap leading to 4 Gbps and higher. The two say the combined work will address the emerging needs of OEMs looking to build arbitrated loops with higher bandwidth and to build topologies capable of cascading several 1 Gbps loops together via high-speed switches interconnected by multigigabit links. The tie-up, which came as a result of HP’s work with transceivers and fibre channel protocol controllers and Seagate’s with high performance fibre channel hard drives, is expected to help lead the industry’s implementation of the enhanced data rates already defined in the fibre channel specification. The two claim they’re also working with other industry leaders within the fibre channel standards community to ensure that future multigigabit fibre channel products interoperate and co-exist with today’s 1Gb/s products, as well as with other vendors’ future multigigabit products. Multigigabit fibre channel products are expected to begin emerging in 2000.
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