Testing IP Communications applications has always been a challenge, since new and exciting applications sometimes to appear ahead of the equipment that can properly test it. Then there’s the matter of a vendor being able to afford a full-blown testing lab just to help bring-to-market a single device or combination of hardware and software. In many cases, vendors rely on testing labs established in academia. For example, the first interoperability testing of SIP devices occurred at Columbia University in 1999. The 14 participants of this first “test fest” arrived from the U.S., Canada, Finland, Sweden and the U.K. to test their software and dedicated hardware. Today, with the world’s networks moving to IMS (IP Multimedia Subsytem), a common service architecture for both wireless and wireline worlds, comprehensive interoperability testing is even more important (and more difficult). Fortunately, the IMS Forum can rely on their “Plugfests” held periodically at the University of New Hamshipshire InterOperability Lab (UNH-IOL (News - Alert)).

 

That’s not to say that Academia has had a monopoly on communications testing labs. Yours Truly fondly recalls Chris Bajorek’s highly-regarded CT Labs (News - Alert), a leading center for testing and evaluation of Voice-over-IP (VoIP) and other next-gen network equipment and services, located in Rocklin, California (It was acquired in 2006 by Empirix (News - Alert), itself an a leading provider of integrated test and management solutions for VoIP, web and contact center environments.)

 

And today, Ixia (News - Alert) (www.ixiacom.com), a provider of performance test systems for IP-based infrastructure and services, is opening a new advanced testing facility in Silicon Valley, called iSimCity. iSimCity is a state-of-the-art proof-of-concept (PoC) lab and Executive Briefing Center adjacent to its sales and services offices in Santa Clara, California. Local companies such as Cisco and Force 10 Networks can use iSimCity to test their new products and services prior to deployment, including multi-play, VoIP, wireless, and more.

 

As modern networks become larger more complex, it has become necessary to test network equipment for performance, stress and quality at high capacity. When fully provisioned, IXIA's iSimCity will house all the IXIA chassis, applications, interfaces, infrastructure components, and professional expertise needed to run city-scale service emulations. 

 

At its grand opening, Ixia is conducting a city-scale demonstration on assuring Quality of Experience (QoE) in high performance, converged multi-play networks.

 

With its ability to conduct city-scale testing at iSimCity, customers can access thousands of test ports and aggregate traffic in the range of 10-100 Gbps, emulate hundreds of thousands of subscribers/users and generate millions of routes with thousands of routing peers. They also can conduct system testing by emulating dozens of infrastructure servers, including load balancers, denial of service defenders, switches, routers, video servers, SIP proxies, and DNS and DHCP servers.

 

“Our goal is to provide carrier grade scale with real-world network emulation that will provide quick proof to our customers that Ixia’s test solutions are essential in getting their products and services to market more quickly,” said Atul Bhatnagar, Ixia president and COO. “iSimCity has all the industry-leading Ixia software and hardware solutions so customers can be assured that their equipment and services are benchmarked with the best of breed testing solutions.”

 

Network equipment manufacturers, service providers and enterprises often request proof-of-concept demonstrations, at scale, before they will commit to purchasing test applications and equipment. Both test hardware and software must function with the devices tested.

 

Ixia’s iSimCity PoC lab can complement companies’ existing test labs and accelerate time to market by adding bandwidth for in-house projects, or handle short lead time requests for testing that their in-house test resources cannot schedule. Moreover, with Ixia’s Test Conductor, an entire test plan design and its execution can be automated to speed the same process to just a fraction of the time.

 

Additionally, in the case of the PoC test facilities and executive briefings, customers can take advantage of Ixia’s professional services and schedule third-party tests in iSimCity’s advanced lab environment.

 

“Ixia’s state-of-the-art lab is an ideal proving ground,” said Rob Smithers, CEO of Miercom, a leading technology product testing company. “The facility is the perfect place for high-density, large-scale and real-world tests of enterprise and carrier-market equipment.”

 

Ixia is committed to provisioning ‘iSimCity’ with cutting-edge products coupled with world-class expertise.