As part of its strategy to trade itself out of difficulties, Proteon Inc has announced a series of enhancements to its router line. These comprise a new entrant to its remote-site router range, an implementation of Novell’s IPX specification, and optional Border Gateway Protocol – BGP-4 – support. The latest addition to its Departmental Network eXchange suite of remote-site applications is the DNX 350 multi-protocol series. Available as a stand-alone device or integrated in the Proteon ProNet Boss hub-router, the product is said to support four wide area network interfaces and one local network interface and has 8Mb of RAM. According to the company, it comes with two protocol packs, the SNApack or the COREpack, depending on networking protocol requirements. It is available in both Ethernet and Token Ring versions. The DNX 350 lists for $5,090. The SNApack Protocol Pack lists for $1,500. All offerings are shipping now. The company has also announced Release 15 router software with DLSw Data Link Switching, which it controversially first implemented last January. Proteon says its DLSw implementation features local data link integrity – SDLC-LLC2, Systems Network Architecture session support across TCP/IP, LLC Flow Control and NetBIOS name cacheing. Also announced was Release 15 of its router software, which adds support for Novell Inc’s Internetwork Packet Exchange wide area network specification, defining how various protocols interoperate with IPX over wide area network links. Proteon says that its IPX implementation enables users to route IPX over Point-to-Point Protocol over the wide area. This also makes the Proteon router interoperable with Novell Multi-Protocol Routers, says the company. Finally, the company has announced optional BGP-4 support for its full line of routers, including the ProNet remote-site hub-router. BGP-4 support provides users with an addressing scheme for users of Internet backbones and regional networks.
