PLANO, Texas, August 14, 2013 – Tektronix Communications, the world’s first telecommunications intelligence provider, today announced the general availability of High Performance Media Testing functionality on Spectra2 XL3, offering the best cost/performance ratios currently available.

Spectra2 XL3 is an advanced test solution for testing evolved packet core (EPC) and IP multimedia subsystem (IMS) elements for mobile LTE and fixed IP networks.  It enables equipment manufacturers and service providers to markedly reduce the capital and operational costs associated with testing IMS and EPC elements.

With today’s announcement, Spectra2 XL3 now delivers media test capacity in excess of 400,000 simultaneous, bi-directional G.711 IP based calls on a single two unit rack space, representing significant savings for test lab budgets and a substantially reduced physical hardware footprint.

“Spectra2 XL3 is addressing a crucial industry pain point for core network testing with 10G interface rates at the best possible price performance ratio,” said Olga Shapiro, Program Manager, Frost & Sullivan. “Spectra2’s software-only edition is very attractive for customers with unique lab build-out plans using off-the-shelf hardware. This diversified product line gives customers the flexibility and performance quality to meet their shrinking test lab budgets.”

As VoLTE/VoIP becomes the norm rather than the exception, and with data rich multi-media applications such as conversational video experiencing massive growth as a result of LTE rollouts, the need for high volume testing is becoming critical to network operators worldwide.

“The launch of high performance media test mode delivers unprecedented network test performance at less than half the current industry price points.  We believe in leveraging the industry’s open innovation that follows Moore’s law with the addition of our own ‘secret sauce’ to create a single 2u chassis with 1 and 10G traffic abilities at costs far below the competition.” said Chris Buhlmann, Vice President & General Manager of Core Test Solutions, Tektronix Communications. 

“With our heritage in the test and measurement space, we are confident that Spectra’s time proven ease-of-use and even more enhanced performance and cost benefits has created a best-in-breed solution for subscriber QoE testing,” Buhlmann concludes.

“Some of the test solutions that exist in the market today sacrifice statefulness of the traffic model to achieve high media test performance. Spectra2 can cycle through the calls as per a scripted traffic model at the stated performance levels providing customers with a real world stateful mixed media load test environment.” said Prakash Kanthi, Product Marketing Manager of Core Test Products, Tektronix Communications

Spectra2 XL3 enables the industry’s highest EPC test capacity for Diameter and IMS protocols with high-load media testing to benchmark performance, and resolve problems before they arise on live networks.   It is also the first single 2U solution that equips a multi discipline test team involved with numerous network technologies to simultaneously execute their test plans. 

Spectra2 XL3 scales with a network operator’s expanding use cases for policy and charging control, Diameter routing, VoLTE services, Media Resource Function (MRF) and Media Gateways with advanced signaling and mixed media traffic models.