Specifications

About StarFabric Connectivity
2 Aurora Technologies
Connectivity Past and Present
The history of connectivity has been a steady trend toward scalability, reliability,
and better performance. It began in the 1980s with bus-based standards such as the
Industry Standard Bus architecture (ISA) for Intel-based computers and VME and
SBus for Sun SPARC® workstations. ISA became an industry standard until the
early 1990s when processor speeds and application requirements demanded a
speedier, more robust replacement.
FIGURE 1. Growing Trend Toward Switch Interconnect Technologies
As shown in Figure 1, ISA, VME, and SBus gave way to the Peripheral Component
Interconnect (PCI) bus architecture which provided better performance and scal-
ability. PCI became the standard I/O methodology for most classes of computers
ranging from entry-level desktops to top-level enterprise servers. Today it is the
most widely used connectivity technology in the industry.
However, the limitations of PCI’s shared bus architecture, meaning low perfor-
mance, poor reliability, and limited scalability, are becoming issues as connectivity
demands on networks increase.
Bandwidth demands and performance requirements continue to grow, as shown in
Figure 2, but PCI standards (both past and present) cannot support the anticipated
levels of growth and Quality of Service (QoS) needed by next-generation server
and enterprise networks.