Ilkley, UK-based Sarian said the DR6000 series comprises three models with different numbers of serial ports: the DR6410 has one, the 6420 two, and the 6460 six. The last of these is designed for retail environments where there may be multiple handheld card swiping devices at different counters, said Duncan Ellison, Sarian’s sales and marketing director.
This represents the company’s second foray into HSDPA. Sarian had already launched the HR4110, an HSDPA-only router that can serve as automatic backup to, say, a Cisco box by creating a redundancy link using the Virtual Route Redundancy Protocol or an extension to that standard developed by Sarian called VRRP+.
The difference is that the 6000 series is DSL (specifically, ADSL2 and ADSL2+) and 3G/HSDPA in the same box. It also has the option of an ISDN or PSTN module so that in the event that both the DSL and HSDPA links fail, a dial-up connection can be established. Even before resorting to either of the dial-up technologies, users can have not one but two cellular backup options because the 6000 series also has dual SIM card capabilities so that connectivity via two different mobile networks can be available.
Ellison said the ISDN option is particularly timely in the UK where BT has announced plans to launch a service that combines two 64-bit ISDN data channels and two regular phone lines for small businesses. BT’s offering them the option of downgrading to just the two ISDN lines, so with our device they can introduce DSL and keep the ISDN as backup as well as cellular, he said.
Sarian was founded in 1999 and developed its own operating system called SAR/OS, which forms the basis for all its products. In addition to the 4110n and the 6000 series are ISDN, DSL, GPRS, and EDGE devices, as well as combinations of these protocols. The new boxes’ list prices range from 500 pounds to 800 pounds ($980 to $1,570), depending on size and whether they are loaded with one or other of the option modules.
Ellison said Sarian markets its products in 30 countries across Europe and APAC, competing primarily with Cisco and its Linksys subsidiary, though the combination of DSL and HSDPA is something of a USP at the moment. The company has so far kept out of the all-important US market because it lacks the clout to address it properly, but Ellison said that is likely to change over the next 12 months.
