Riverbed RiOS 4.0 Feature Recap

RiOS 4.0 Feature Recap

Riverbed has announced version 4.0 of RiOS, the Riverbed Optimization System for Steelhead appliances. RiOS 4.0 allows for the acceleration of SSL traffic; adds new benefits for HTTP traffic, and advances the ability of Steelhead appliances to accelerate traffic on high-bandwidth high-latency WAN links even in the face of high packet loss.

With these impressive new features, Riverbed keeps its place as the leader of the WDS market. Any Steelhead appliance is upgradable to RiOS to reap the benefits of these important new capabilities.

Support for SSL Traffic

Steelhead appliances now accelerate encrypted (SSL) traffic, utilizing all of Riverbed's algorithms to provide LAN-like performance for those key business applications. Previously there was no way to securely increase the performance or responsiveness of SSL WAN traffic other than off-loading it using Application Front End (AFE) or other "SSL Offload" products. While those approaches are still appropriate to help scale SSL application deployments, they don't offer the dramatic acceleration that Riverbed customers are used to with their non-encrypted applications.

Riverbed is the first company to use true SSL acceleration (not SSL off-load) without the need of distribution of certificates or private keys to the edge, yet enables SSL traffic to be decrypted, optimized, and then re-encrypted before moving onto the WAN. When traffic reaches the other side of the network, the same process is repeated: decryption, decoding (the other side of the Riverbed optimization algorithm), and then re-encryption for delivery to the client. These optimizations are bi-directional making sure that all traffic is encrypted end-to-end from client to server, to or from branch offices.

Some other symmetric application acceleration solutions claim to accelerate encrypted traffic, but they do require the distribution of certificates or private keys to the branch office, which may introduce significant security problems, and is not acceptable to most IT architects.

MX-TCP: Additional Performance Gains for High Bandwidth "Long Fat Networks"

Riverbed now delivers MX-TCP to optimize all bandwidth which is available on high bandwidth links. For customers who require the maximum performance under congested conditions or links with packet loss, MX-TCP is the ideal solution. MX-TCP is optional and, when utilized, will use 100% of a given amount of bandwidth, which reduces the time to complete a given job. The bandwidth limit is configurable by an administrator, and can be set to use the whole link or a portion of a link. MX-TCP is available on all Steelhead appliance models.

Riverbed has long supported an important feature for high bandwidth WAN links called high speed TCP (HS-TCP) as an option on the larger Steelhead appliances, there are some conditions under which even HS-TCP is not enough. HS-TCP is a feature to help "fill the pipe" when high latency prevented full utilization of available bandwidth. While HS-TCP is very efficient for most high-latency, high-bandwidth links (sometimes referred to as "Long Fat Networks" or LFNs), HS-TCP is still designed to back off in the face of congestion or packet loss. HS-TCP is also now available on all models as well.

Enhanced HTTP Performance

RiOS 4.0 adds additional HTTP acceleration capabilities: RiOS now includes a specialized learning algorithm that enables it to learn the objects requested in pages and make object pre-fetching, accelerating all objects in parallel. These optimizations work for all HTTP and HTTPS applications, including CRM, ERP, financials, document management, intranet portals, and more.

New HTTPS Acceleration

With a combination of its new capabilities of accelerating SSL-encrypted traffic with its powerfully enhanced HTTP Application Streamlining, RiOS 4.0 can now also accelerate HTTPS traffic. Enterprises that encrypt web-based applications with SSL can now gain the benefits the powerful acceleration capabilities for HTTPS that they already have for HTTP

Secure Auto-Registration

Only approved Steelhead appliances can connect with the CMC to download configurations, which increases the security of Riverbed deployments.

Enhanced Auto-Discovery

Advancing on Riverbed's patented auto-discovery functionality, Steelhead appliances now make it possible for auto-discovery (also known as "auto-peer") even in multi-hop environments. By bypassing any intermediary Steelhead appliances automatically. Enhancements to Auto-Discovery also simplifies configuration and makes deployments more scalable.

Enhanced Active-Active Failover

Serial in-path devices can now automatically keep all data-stores fully synchronized at all times. This provides for failover without performance loss as well as overflow capacity.

SSL Key Management

RiOS delivers an easy-to-use interface that manages server SSL certificates and Steelhead SSL certificates.

MX-TCP Management

RiOS enables administrators to simply configure a maximum usable bandwidth for MX-TCP.

Improved QoS Management

RiOS advances on the 3.0 release of QoS by adding new tuning capabilities, delivering a more simple management interface, and enhancing QoS reporting.

Datasheets:

• RiOS 5.0 New Features Overview

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