A new white paper from Juniper Networks is entitled, Next Steps Toward 10 Gigabit Ethernet Top-of-Rack Networking: Important Considerations When Selecting Top-of-Rack Switches. The company says the 6-page guide "will help [readers] take the next steps toward a ToR data center evolution."

"Once you have accepted the need to move to 10 GbE switching [in the data center], your next decision involves choosing switching architecture: top of rack (ToR) or end of row (EoR)," states the document. "At the access layer, ToR has an advantage over EoR in terms of power consumption, ease of scale when growing server PoDs [points of demarcation], and a reduction of cable management complexity. It’s easy to run cable from new compute or storage equipment to an existing switch and bring the new equipment online — that is, it should be easy."

The paper continues, "Often, however, cabling at an EoR Layer 2 (L2) switch is so messy and complicated that it undermines the agility advanced technologies were supposed to bring. The cabling chaos also contributes to higher operational expenses in the data center as the staff hours required to manage the cabling increase. Likewise, as the number of servers grows, the resulting cable sprawl increases the chance that manual cabling errors could lead to network downtime. Finally, the EoR model is difficult to sustain at scale because the switches’ footprint and energy draw become costly."

View/Download the white paper.