CROSSCOMM CORPORATION INTRODUCES ETHERNET SEGMENT AND ATM EDGE SWITCHES
WITH UNMATCHED NETWORK MANAGEMENT CAPABILITY

Distributed Switching Architecture Delivers New Levels of Scalability, High
Availability and Price/Performance as Part of ClearPath Strategy

MARLBOROUGH, MA, September 5, 1995 - - CrossComm Corporation today
introduced the newest members of its ClearPath network transition strategy
-- the Ethernet Segment Switch (ESS), and the ATM Edge Switch (AES). Both
product families provide users with new levels of scalability, high
availability and price/performance because they leverage second-
generation technology -- incorporating the Fore/A.N.T. switching chip set,
Network General LAN monitoring technology, and CrossComm's advances in ATM
switch development.

The ESS and AES switch families connect Ethernet Workgroup Switches, older
shared Ethernet hubs, and routers. They offer the best value for large
organizations who are looking to implement ATM, but who require a
scalable, easily manageable, and highly available switched virtual
network. These organizations typically are implementing
bandwidth-intensive remote office or client/server workgroup applications
-- including Lotus Notes, document imaging, full-motion video, medical
imaging, CAD/CAM applications such as Parametric 3D Modeling, multimedia
and visualization applications.

"The timing is right for an integrated solution which attacks two critical
issues in the market," noted Charlie Robbins, Vice President of
Communications Research at Aberdeen Group, Inc. "Customers want to find
cost effective and transparent vehicles to move to the next- generation
switched networks. This is the vision -- and with these product
announcements, the substance -- offered by CrossComm's ClearPath approach.
CrossComm's latest offerings enable users to take advantage of switching
at the backbone, with a clear ATM direction. The introduction of these
products, along with CrossComm's aggressive foray into strengthening its
distribution channels, is essential for increasing the company's momentum
in the market."

SUPERIOR MANAGEMENT FOR SWITCHED NETWORKS

Being able to manage high-powered, switched networks more efficiently is
becoming a key customer issue. "CrossComm has embedded LAN Analyzer
capabilities and proven Network General RMON+ technology," said Gary Wood,
Director of ATM & LAN Switching at CrossComm, "which centralizes control,
so you get very rapid error detection and fault isolation -- with no
impact in performance. The session capture and protocol decode, and port
monitoring functions for all ports means you can detect over 94% of
network problems from a central management station. The old, more costly
alternative was to physically move a network analyzer all around the
network trying to find the problem. The CrossComm design also enables
customers to do much more thorough capacity planning and trend analysis.
All nine standard Remote Monitoring (RMON) Groups -- including Network
General extensions -- are supported.

DESIGNED FOR RELIABILITY, AVAILABILITY AND VALUE

The ESS and AES family delivers the best value in the industry for users.
"In addition to the Fore/A.N.T. ASIC (Application Specific Integrated
Circuit) and Network General LAN monitoring technologies, we have
integrated CrossComm's Address Processor and Directory and ATM
capabilities. The distributed architecture design ensures no single point
of failure," said Wood, " so we can deliver mission- critical reliability
down to the port level and greatly increase overall reliability with
extensive port buffering -- over 256K bytes per 10M port and 1M bytes per
100M port. Port congestion is alleviated, thus improving network
availability and lowering packet loss. All components are hot-swappable
for serviceability."

Compared to the Cisco Catalyst 5000, the ESS and AES family offers a 32%
cost advantage in price per port, based on a 50-port configuration,
according to Wood. For remote LAN switching applications, CrossComm's ATM
Edge Switch comes in at 40% below the Catalyst 5000.

The ESS provides switched 10M, Full Duplex, and 100M Fast Ethernet, plus
the optional ATM connection. In shared LAN networks, it improves
performance dramatically by dividing the LAN so each user or segment can
have a dedicated 10 Mb/s of high-capacity bandwidth. The ESS and AES can
extend Virtual LANs (VLANs) across an enterprise, separating the "logical"
from the "physical" organization in the network infrastructure, making it
easy for administrators to handle the movements of personnel throughout
the organization. A capacity of 32,000 Media Access Controller (MAC)
addresses can support very large networks within an organization. ESS and
AES switches leverage the modular "plug-and-play" design of CrossComm's
ClearPath networking platform. The modules fit into small, medium or large
chassis, so customers can start with smaller, less expensive systems to
meet immediate LAN segmentation needs, and grow to large, mission-critical
client/server applications by moving to a larger chassis, providing as
many as 192 switched ports.

OPTIONAL ATM UPLINK CAPABILITY

The ATM Edge Switch (AES), designed to take advantage of ATM bandwidth,
integrates up to 22 10BaseT and two 100BaseT ports, an ATM port, and LAN
analyzer capabilities on a single module. The ATM port provides standard
ATM OC3 multi-mode or single-mode fiber and DS3 interfaces to connect to
an external ATM backbone switch, or to an internal ATM backplane. It
supports ATM Forum standard RFC 1483 LAN Encapsulation; future releases
support RFC 1577 IP over ATM and LAN Emulation.

CLEARPATH - ATM MIGRATION MADE EASY

The ESS family is the second phase of CrossComm ClearPath products to be
introduced in the last four months. ClearPath is the industry's first
fully-integrated communications and networking strategy that provides IT
professionals with a smooth transition from hub and router- based networks
to the next generation LAN switching and ATM environments. ClearPath
products -- integrating LAN switching, ATM, routing, and LAN hubs within a
single, fault-tolerant platform -- offer complete, high performance,
modular solutions that can grow as bandwidth demands increase.

PRICING AND AVAILABILITY (U.S. LIST PRICES)

ESS products will be available in September: with module prices ranging
from $11,995 for 16-ports to $15,995 for a 32-port module including two
100BaseT ports. AES modules will be available in November, priced at
$19,995 for the ATM OC3MM with 24 10BaseT ports, and $20,995 for the
version with two 100BaseT ports.

About CrossComm

CrossComm Corporation (NADSAQ/XCOM), founded in 1987, designs, develops,
manufactures and sells high-performance networking solutions that assist
organizations making the transition from today's hub and router-based
networks to next-generation LAN switching and ATM-based networks.
Worldwide headquarters are located at 450 Donald Lynch Boulevard,
Marlborough, MA. 01752. All CrossComm product names herein are trademarked
by CrossComm Corporation. All other product names are trademarked by their
respective companies.

ADDITIONAL QUOTES ON THE ESS/AES ANNOUNCEMENT

Nick Lippis, President, Strategic Networks Consulting: "The flexibility
associated with CrossComm's ESS and AES switches and ClearPath
architecture give people lots and lots of options. They offer full RMON
support, and are available at a low entry price."

Eric Hinden, Analyst, Yankee Group: "The new CrossComm switches show that
switching is far from a commodity, even at the workgroup level. The
inclusion of advanced LAN monitoring in addition to basic RMON, and the
switches' systems-oriented architecture, differentiate them from
competitive offerings."

Pat Craven, Senior Vice President, Operations, W&D Securities, NY: We are
currently using the ATM Edge Router and the Ethernet Workgroup Switches
(EWS) in our operations. As we look toward taking advantage of the
benefits of ATM in more areas throughout our organization, we appreciate
the ease with which the ClearPath products will enable us to do that."

Tom Bain, Research Analyst, Global Networking Strategies, META Group: "As
the use of switching increases, traffic analysis and fault management
become troublesome since most switches do not provide the same level of
management visibility as shared media devices."
 
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