International Space Station receives Ethernet upgrade

ISS Ethernet poky goes from 10 Mbps to 100 Mbps much faster thanks to the new switches

The space was the final frontier for Star Trek and now the last frontier for Ethernet networks thanks to EADS. This week the European Union space module Columbus took with him the first commercial LAN in space.

The Columbus module which contacted the International Space Station in charge personalized ProCurve 100 Mbps LAN switches. The switches according to eWeek are both connected computers from the space station and scientific experiments.

The previous network of the space station used much slower 10 Mbps LAN Cabletron centres. EWeek quotes Rolf Schmidhuber, Columbus data management system for technology leader of EADS Space Transportation in Germany as saying, “Originally there were only connected with our computers 10 megabit LAN, but we felt that it was not fast enough. Greater We wanted performance for payloads. So we built the system to support scientific payloads housed in a 19-inch racks, with payloads connected to the LAN. “

EADS said that ProCurve switches selected after evaluating the switch manufacturers including Avaya, Cisco, D-Link, Netgear and 3Com. After evaluation ProCurve 2524 switches were selected for the module. EADS said that made some customizations to the switches for the safe use and reliable in space.

EWeek Schmidhuber said, “We have taken the ProCurve as it is, unchanged electric. The only thing that changed the method of cooling. We have removed the heatsink in the switching fabric and replaced with copper strips that lead to the heat housing plate ground. “

An aluminum enclosure was designed to switches to help them withstand intense vibrations associated with spaceflight.

The astronauts were able to receive satellite television in the International Space Station through DirecTV. This LAN perhaps faster they can get your game on some WoW or Counter-Strike.