Cisco Says New Router to "Forever Change the Internet": The Question Is 'When?'

Editor's note: Cisco made
headlines today announcing a next generation router that will
revolutionize the internet by increasing downloads to unheard of
speeds. The Cisco press release makes the following claims about the
CRS-3 router:

It enables the entire printed collection of
the Library of Congress to be downloaded in just over one second; every
man, woman and child in China to make a video call, simultaneously; and
every motion picture ever created to be streamed in less than four
minutes.Tech Ticker interviewed Kelly Ahuja, Cisco Senior
Vice President and General Manager Service Provider Routing Technology
Group about the new product this afternoon. He answered all our
questions but one: When will consumers be able to take advantage of
this new high speed internet? Perhaps that's because that part of the
equation is up to our internet service providers. Until they upgrade it
might as well all be a dream.

Below is Kara Swisher's take on the new product.

Provided by All Things D, March 9, 2010:Cisco
today announced a new version of its key routing system, which the
networking giant said has a dozen times the traffic capacity of
competitors and three times as much as the company’s previous version.
Cisco’s
CEO John Chambers said the CRS-3 Carrier Routing System is aimed at the
huge growth in video on the Internet, a trend that has also caused
slowdowns.

Pankaj Patel, SVP and GM for the service provider
business, claimed the system could in just a few minutes deliver all
the movies ever made or allow everyone in China to make a video phone
call at once.
It had better. The consumption of video online is growing like crazy and a constant bottleneck is likely without some relief.
“Video brings the Internet to life,” said Chambers. “You are moving from a messaging platform to a video platform.”
Along
with Chambers and Patel, AT&T (T) Labs CEO and President Keith
Cambron was on the call discussing deployment trials the telecom giant
has been doing with the CRS-3. CRS-3 (pictured here) will be available
within the calendar year, said the Cisco execs on a press and analyst
call this morning. Cisco had said weeks ago that it was making
“a significant announcement that will forever change the Internet and
its impact on consumers, businesses and governments.”

Significant?
We’ll see, of course. For sure, it was a highly hyped announcement by
Chambers. But due to the speculation about what Cisco was unveiling,
its stock hit a 52-week high yesterday. It dropped slightly this
morning after the call.

Many others are getting into the
high-speed act on the Web. Google (GOOG) said recently that it is
planning on building a superfast broadband service. In addition, the
Federal Communications Commission is set to unveil its own ambitious
plan to improve high-speed Internet access across the United States.

Cisco
has gotten deep into the video business of late, both in pushing its
networking gear and in acquiring a video device maker like Pure
Digital, the company behind my beloved Flip digital camera.

It is also working on innovative holographic and television-based home telepresence technologies.