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Computer Aided Design (CAD) programs are an essential tool for engineering and manufacturing firms. However, it can be difficult to share CAD drawings across the WAN due to the size of the typical CAD file.
With Silver Peak, firms of all sizes experience faster download/saves when accessing centralized CAD images, and improved speed and reliability when transferring CAD files using FTP, email or other applications. The Silver Peak solution delivers 10-20x better performance on average when using a variety of different CAD solutions across the WAN, including AutoDesk's AutoCAD®, Bentley’s Microstation and others.
Data Reduction using Network Memory
Silver Peak NX appliances use Network Memory to eliminate repetitive information that is sent across the WAN when transferring CAD images. Silver Peak's process for WAN deduplication works at the network layer, with byte level granularity. This enables Silver Peak appliances to detect even the slightest change to a CAD image, regardless of file format. (For more information on how this differs from other deduplication schemes, download a detailed technology note here)
The benefits of the Silver Peak approach are especially evident in the 2007 and 2008 versions of AutoCAD, where file modifications are randomly inserted within a CAD image. This random insertion prevents block-based WAN optimization techniques from effectively performing deduplication, as it is difficult to match blocks of data from one save to the next. Silver Peak, however, does not have the same problem. Network Memory's IP based byte-level approach to deduplication enables any changes to be detected easily at arbitrary boundaries, regardless of size or placement within the file. The result is fast and reliable CAD performance across the WAN - regardless of which version of CAD software is being used.
When CAD images are transferred using FTP, CIFS, and other applications that run over TCP, they are subject to the latency imposed by that protocol. Silver Peak implements a variety of TCP acceleration techniques, such as adjustable window sizing and selective acknowledgements, to overcome TCP "chattiness" for better CAD performance across the WAN.
CAD image transfers can be slowed down when IP packets are dropped or delivered out of order, as is often the case in MPLS, IP VPNs, and other shared WANs. Silver Peak offers a variety of real-time techniques to overcome these packet delivery challenges, including Forward Error Correction (FEC) and Packet Order Correction (POC). With Silver Peak, lost packets do not have to be retransmitted across the WAN, resulting in better end-to-end performance when transferring large CAD image.
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