40 Gigabit Ethernet and 100 Gigabit Ethernet IEEE Std. 802.3baTM

Santa Clara, CA
IEEE Plugfest PoE Certification Technology Tradeshow Webinar

The Ethernet Alliance Higher Speed Ethernet Subcommittee (HSE) hosted an IEEE 802.3ba 40Gb/s and 100Gb/s interoperability plugfest event on September 13 in Santa Clara, CA held at Ixia’s iSimCity lab.   The plugfest targeted interoperability testing of Ethernet standards developed by IEEE 802.3ba to address potential interoperability issues.  The plugfest performed testing across a broad vendor community and will exercise interoperability across multiple platforms.  Participants in this plugfest included Altera, Amphenol, CommScope, Cisco, FCI, Finisar, Ixia, Leviton, Mellanox Technologies, Opnext, Panduit, Siemon, Sumitomo Electric and Vitesse Semiconductor, and Volex Group and was assisted by the University of New Hampshire Interoperability Lab (UNH?IOL).  Complete success was achieved for interoperability between transceivers, cables and systems tested, except for one cable that was determined to be faulty due to incorrect assembly.
The interoperability results were impressive considering that this was the first time so many vendors had participated in such an event. The test results will give service providers an increased level of comfort knowing that there will be a wide availability of HSE products and a greater breadth of vendor choice. Participants were able to demonstrate effectively the interoperability of their products. Cables tested either met or exceeded IEEE Std. 802.3ba, and bit error ratio tests (BERT) were used in the transceiver and cable tests to verify link?level error?free operation within the requirements of IEEE Std.802.3ba. Basic layer 3 traffic was used to verify system?level error?free operation. Ixia provided 40 and 100 Gbps test ports, Cisco provided 40 and 100 Gbps switch and router ports, Mellanox provided 40 Gbps NICs, and development boards from Altera and Vitesse were used for transceiver testing. CFP MSA transceivers from Finisar, Opnext and one other optics vendor were included in the testing as well as QSFP transceivers from Finisar and QSFP active cables from Amphenol, Finisar and Siemon. Optical cables, including OM3 and OM4 multimode fiber and direct attached copper, passive and active cable assemblies along with direct attach active optical cable assemblies were contributed by Amphenol, CommScope, FCI, Leviton, Panduit, Siemon and Volex Group.
Additional information on the interoperability demonstration is available in a white paper here.

 

 

Participants in this plugfest includes:

 

Share