Cisco Systems has unveiled a new line of routers designed to handle high-demand data loads.

The company claims that its ASR 9000 Series will be among the first to enable networks to stream large data loads on a huge scale, enabling IP networks to handle such tasks as streaming high-definition video.

The ASR 9000 is designed to serve as the 'edge' aggregation services router for networks built around the previously announced CRS-1 routing system.

Together, the system is designed to improve speed and efficiency for streaming HD video and other high-demand data loads.

Cisco claimed that the routers can serve data at speeds of up to 100Mbit/s and have the capacity to serve around 1.2 million separate HD video streams at the same time.

"This platform is designed for IP [network] transformation and will be used as the carrier Ethernet transport foundation for video and mobility data growth, " said Pankaj Patel, senior vice president and general manager of Cisco's service provider technology group.

"The Cisco ASR 9000 has been specifically optimised to deliver video and rich media better than any other platform on the market."

Cisco expects to release the new system in early 2009 at a starting price of $80,000.