The SummitPx1 Application Switch from Extreme Networks is the answer to intellectually challenged networking gear. It's the first and only content-aware Application Switch to deliver an unprecedented level of Layer 4-7 intelligence and consistent line-rate Gigabit Ethernet performance to Internet data centers, massive web sites and big enterprises. Equally impressive is that SummitPx1 Application Switch maintains wire-speed no matter how many content-aware forwarding rules are enabled.Combining a TCP/IP stack, real-time content analysis engine, and resource tracking and allocation engine, the SummitPx1 performs wire-speed TCP session analysis, termination, origination and even modification � entirely in specialized silicon, cutting complex software, general purpose CPUs and network processors out of the loop. This guarantees wire-speed Gigabit Ethernet operations from TCP/IP Layer 4, deep into application Layer 7. While SummitPx1 sustains a gigabit line-rate connection in the TCP/IP stack, the real-time content analysis engine searches packets for program strings like cookies and URLs. The results are then sent to the resource tracking and allocation engine, where SummitPx1 decides which server resources can best fulfill the request. This information is then passed back to the TCP/IP stack, which opens a gigabit line-rate connection to the server. SummitPx1's server selection algorithms include round robin, weighted round robin, least connections, and weighted least connections. It also tracks client IP history, hashes cookies, automatically detects and tracks cookies, handles server-identifying cookies, and supports persistent SSL session IDs. By delivering orders of magnitude greater performance and scalability over old, expensive legacy load balancers, the SummitPx1 Application Switch makes it simpler and more cost effective to build larger data centers and massive web sites using fewer, higher-performance Application Switches.