Introduction To Fiber Optic Transceivers Applied To 10G Ethernet

Many Internet users have suffered a lot by lower bandwidth. In order to help people walk out this kind of deadlock, researchers and developers promoted 10 Gigabit Ethernet to meet the requirement of higher bandwidth for Internet users. For a single connection, 10 Gigabit Ethernet can arrive about 10000 MB/s, which is the 10 times higher than 1 Gigabit Ethernet. 10 Gigabit Ethernet can be shortened as 10GE, 10GbE, or 10 GigE, which is compliant with the IEEE 802.ae-2002 standard. Both copper and optical fiber cable can be used on 10GbE network infrastructure. How about 10G optical transceivers? Nowadays, the 10G SFP+, XFP, X2 XENPAK modules are ubiquitous in the telecom market. In this article, information about XFP, X2, XENPAK and SFP+ modules will be mainly covered.

XFP Module

XFP stands for 10 Gigabit Small Form Factor Pluggable, which is developed by XFP Multi Source Agreement. This transceiver uses optical fiber cable to transfer data, both single-mode and multimode fibers can be used. It supports 10GBASE Ethernet, OC-192/STM-64 data rates and the digital optical monitoring (DOM) technology with great flexibility and high capacity. The normal form factor is 805mm-height, 18.35mm-width and 78.0mm-depth. XFP modules are applicable to many types of transmitter and receiver, such as SR, LR, ER and ZR.

10GBASE-SR XFP module is designed for multimode fiber types, which uses the wavelength of 850 nm. The maximum transmission distance of 10GBASE-SR XFP is 300 m. LR, ER and ZR types are all for single-mode type. 10GBASE-LR XFP module can reach 10km transmission length with the wavelength of 1310 nm. The maximum transmission distance of 10GBASE-ER XFP module is 40 km with the wavelength of 1550 nm. Having the same wavelength as 10GBASE-ER XFP, 10GBASE-ZR XFP can reach a distance up to 80 km.

X2 Module

The X2 modules is an early version related to 10 Gigabit XENPAK (We will talk about it in the next paragraph.), which can be used with 10 Gigabit Ethernet or SONET/SDH equipment. It can be used both on copper cable and fiber optic cable. It is available with a variety of transmitter and receiver types, including CX4, T, LRM, LX4, SR, LR, ER and ZR. We would mainly introduce some types here. X2-10GB-T module supports link lengths of up to 100 m on CAT6A or CAT7 copper cable. X2-10GB-LR module supports a link length of 10km on standard single-mode fiber. X2 modules are widely used in routers and switches but now it is gradually being replaced by 10G SFP+ in most new applications.

XENPAK Module

XENPAK module is the advanced version of X2 module, which conforms to IEEE 802.3 standard. The cable type can both be copper cable and fiber optic cable. Just like X2 module, XENPAK Module is applicable to many transmitter and receiver types as well, which are consisting of CX4, LRM, LR+, SR, ER+ and ZR. Here, we would also list some types of XENPAK-10G modules for time-saving. XENPAK-CX4 supports link lengths of up to 15 m on CX4 copper cable. XENPAK-ER+ supports transmission distance of up to 40 km on single-mode fiber. XENPAK-10G-ZR supports link lengths of up to about 80 km on single mode fiber.

SFP+ Module

SFP+ module is developed to support 10 Gigabit Ethernet, which can arrive 16 Git/s data rate. It is specified by SFP multi-source agreement and it supports 8 Git/s Fibre Channel, 10 Gigabit Ethernet and Optical Transport Network standard OTU2.

SFP+ transceivers has many types according to different transmission distance. 10GBASE-SR SFP+ is the short reach optical transceiver while 10GBASE-LR SFP+, 10GBASE-ER SFP+ and 10GBASE-LRM SFP+ are the long transmission distance modules. As a common module in 10G transceiver market, 10G SR SFP+ is designed to support multimode fiber, such as OM3 (300 m) and OM4 (400 m). 10G LR SFP+ is very popular as well, it can support a long distance up to 10 km by using a single-mode fiber. They can supply to many applications, such as, SONET OC-192, CPRI wireless, 16G Fibre Channel...

Summary

Through this passage, we figured out the definition of 10 Gigabit Ethernet and learned several 10G fiber optic transceivers, that is, XFP module, X2 module, XENPAK module and SFP+ module. And now, SFP+ has been in the prevalence in the market. You can select a proper one according to your requirement.