Modularity is the theme of Juniper Networks' new trio of application acceleration appliances, unveiled this week.

The latest additions to Juniper’s WXC application acceleration lineup are the WXC 1800, WXC 2600 and WXC 3400 appliances. Each is geared at helping enterprises deliver fast, consistent application response across the WAN, so that users in remote branch offices can access centralized systems without paying a big performance penalty.

Like Juniper’s existing WAN acceleration appliances (Compare Application Acceleration and WAN Traffic Optimization products), the new models can recognize and eliminate redundant transmissions; accelerate TCP and application-specific protocols; prioritize and allocate access to bandwidth; and be integrated with Juniper’s routing, switching and security technologies. The new WXC appliances use software that automates provisioning and management tasks to give users greater network and application visibility, Juniper says.

Key to the design of the new appliances is their form factor: The new WXC platforms support Juniper's universal Field Replaceable Units design. Like many hardware makers, Juniper is looking to have multiple products share a common hardware form factor in order to streamline production, reduce stocking charges and keep product costs down.

"The new generation of WX series platforms marks another step toward Juniper's common hardware platform strategy, which will bring greater scalability, modularity and operational simplicity to Juniper's WAN acceleration portfolio," said analyst Jim Metzler of Ashton, Metzler & Associates, in a statement. "They form the important building blocks of Juniper's next-generation WAN acceleration feature set."

Juniper also says the new platform delivers higher disk capacities and performance in a smaller form factor.

The WXC 1800, which is geared for deployment in small to medium branch offices, can accelerate WAN traffic up to 2Mbps. Suited for medium to large branch offices and small data centers, the WXC 2600 can accelerate WAN traffic up to 8Mbps. The WXC 3400 can accelerate WAN traffic up to 45Mbps and is typically deployed at higher speed remote locations, corporate offices or data centers, Juniper says. Pricing starts at $4,895 for the WXC 1800 with support for up to 10 connections; $12,395 for the WXC 2600 with support for up to 20 connections; and $24,995 for the WXC 3400 with support for up to 140 connections.

Ann Bednarz is associate news editor at Network World.