For some companies, like financial institutions that rely on stock ticker feeds, a slight difference in network latency could mean a difference of millions of dollars. Enterprises and government agencies also rely on ultra-low latency networks (ULLN) and devices to power their time-sensitive applications; and communications providers employ them to enable differentiated, premium services. To remain competitive, today’s network equipment providers (NEMs) labor to eliminate sub-micro-seconds of forwarding latency in their routers, switches, and optical equipment.

Ultra-low latency (ULL) has become one of the hottest trends in information technology and ULL testing has come to the forefront.

To keep you informed on this topic, we have just released a new Ixia Black Book for ULL testing. The booklet provides examples with detailed steps showing how to use Ixia IxNetwork emulation software and applications to achieve functional and performance test objectives for ULL testing. This freely-downloadable publication describes:

• How to measure and minimize latency
• Factors that impact latency
• ULL test methodologies:
  • ULL testing throughput and latency using RFC 2544
  • ULL measuring latency over time and enabling the latency histogram
  • ULLN testing a service during service activation or during maintenance