Cadence Design Systems released a case study covering QLogic’s use of its Cadence Palladium XP Verification Computing Platform to speed up the design (specifically the system-level testing) of a system-on-chip (SoC) leveraged  in a new architecture the company has been developing.

QLogic is a networking solutions vendor that makes Fibre Channel, 10Gb Ethernet and InfiniBand switches. Jesse Parker, the head of its Network Solutions Group highlighted some of the advantages that the company got from using Cadence’s simulation infastrcature.

“Specialized SoCs are a critical element that enable us to deliver network switches optimized for the power, performance and bandwidth requirements of our customers. The Palladium XP platform gave us the ability to test our design at the system level much earlier in the design cycle and much faster than ever before.”

Cadence claims that QLogic managed to drive down development speeds even in comparison to earlier projects where less complicated switches were designed.  It managed to achieve that thanks to Palladium XP’s ability to scale in order to accommodate a rather complex design, and the platform’s debugging capabilities.  This testing environment also facilitated the simultaneous inspection of bus, port and crossbar interactions.

Palladium’s XP packs some impressive specs, with  4MHz  processing and the ability to support up to 512 concurrent users.

QLogic’s investments in R&D, including a recent portfolio overhaul and the addition of support for 16Gb converged Fibre Bhannel to two of the company’s biggest product lines, seem to have pushed it past Emulex. The Register picked some figures indicating QLogic reported higher GAAP earnings then its former parent company in the last quarter. Nevertheless, Emulex remains highly competitive in the Fibre Channel market.

Yesterday it unveiled the LightPulse 16Gb Fibre Channel Host Bus Adapters. After nine generations Emulex claims that the family can pump out over one million IOPS on a single port – making LightPulse the fastest adapter of its kind.