A leading networking company D-Link unveiled recently its new routers aimed at gamers. The new Game Lounge gaming routers support special enhancements called StreamEngine developed by UbiCom that are able to analyze and prioritize traffic that is related to games, VoIP and instant messaging.

Nowadays, when multiple computers are used in a home or an office along with variety of software, Internet connection bandwidth usage gets to very high levels and certain categories of users, such as gamers, or those who use video or voice conferencing over the Web, suffer from increased latencies due to such overload. However, certain intelligent mechanisms that would give priority to small packets often sent by latency-sensitive applications, such as games or conferencing software, over large packets often sent by peer-to-peer apps, could improve user experience with the Net.

D-Link's latest GamerLounge routers boast with Gigabit Ethernet, 108Mbps WLAN and use Ubicom's StreamEngine patterns to determine the type of traffic.

StreamEngine technology delivers an enhanced online experience by employing powerful Quality of Service (QoS) mechanisms. The key to making this useable for a home or small office is Intelligent Stream Handling, a patent-pending algorithm which automatically manages the flow of traffic going to the Internet, without the need for user configuration. As a result, real-time, interactive traffic, such as gaming, VoIP, Instant Messaging and video conferencing, are automatically given the appropriate priority when other users and applications use the network. In addition, Intelligent Stream Handling minimizes the impact of large packet, lower priority traffic on latency-sensitive traffic and eliminates delays caused by DSL or cable modem connections. StreamEngine effectively eliminates the lag and breakup problem in online gaming and other voice/video applications.

StreamEngine is a combination of hardware and software solutions. The most advanced processor from Ubicom, the developer of StreamEngine, features capabilities like zero-cycle context switching and eight-way deterministic, instruction-level hardware multithreading.

GamerLounge routers are available now through authorized retail, reseller and distribution partners at an MSRP of $179.99 for the DGL-4300 and $149.99 for the DGL-4100.