PDF of this tutorialApart from increased network capacity, four technologies have emerged that enable enterprises to optimize the throughput of their corporate networks. The table below summarizes how each of the following solutions addresses a different performance issue; all four technologies are complementary.
| Evaluating Available Solutions | ||||
| Bandwidth Management | Caching | Compression | ||
| Web Caching | Enterprise Caching | |||
| Need | Prioritize mission-critical or delay-sensitive traffic | Reduce response time in a Web environment | Increase and optimize and all data throughput and capacity | Optimize text files |
| Performance |
Performance improvement is for prioritized applications Limited to available bandwidth Decreases the performance of non-prioritized applications |
30% hit rate for Internet data | 100–400% improvement in throughput for all applications | 5–10% improvement in throughput in today's environments |
| Types of Traffic | Only accelerates prioritized applications | Only accelerates Web-based traffic | Accelerates all enterprise traffic (ERP, exchange, thin client, Web, etc.) |
Only suitable for legacy traffic Not suitable for precompressed data or graphics |
| Ease of Deployment |
Requires classification, analysis, enforcement and reporting of applications on the network Every time a new application is added, the bandwidth-management device may have to be reconfigured. |
Requires some configuration and knowledge of routers and transparent proxy |
Simple No network configuration required No priority rules Application and user transparent |
Simple to implement on private networks More difficult to implement on frame-relay networks |
