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Source: Cisco Licensed Test to Spirent: Page 2 of 3

It turns out that Cisco is apparently the mysterious vendor with the ability to scale into the 200-plus switch range. What's more, Cisco knew all along that it would outshine its competitors on the SRT because the company developed the test itself, according to an industry source who did not want to be identified.

"There is no way that Cisco would have licensed [the storage routing test] to Spirent if [Cisco] did not know that their switch would not work to the limits," says the source.

It's not clear how exactly how many Fibre Channel switches other vendors, such as Brocade Communications Systems Inc. (Nasdaq: BRCD) and McData Corp. (Nasdaq: MCDTA), are able to support in a single SAN. Brocade claims its SilkWorm 12000 handles the theoretical maximum of 239; McData makes the more conservative claim of supporting 24 switches per fabric.

But is there more at stake here than empty bragging rights? After all, it's worth noting that even the largest SANs today don't comprise more than a dozen or so switches in a single fabric.

Cisco, according to our source, does indeed believe that the high-scale test shows significant differentiation between its MDS switches and those from Brocade and McData.