10 Gigabit ethernet
Standards connectors are XFP, SFP+ and RJ45.
SFP+
SFP+ is a cage which receives an optical transceiver or a direct attach copper cable. SFP+ uses SFI signal interface. This is a 1x lane TX + 1x lane RX differential pair interface
| SFP+ | |
|---|---|
| Height | 8.5 mm (0.33 inches) |
| Width | 13.4 mm (0.53 inches) |
| Depth | 56.5 mm (2.22 inches) |
XFP
XFP uses XFI signal interface. This is a 1x lane TX + 1x lane RX differential pair interface at 10.31 Gigabaud The primary difference between SFP+ and the slightly older XFP standard is that SFP+ moves the chip for clock and data recovery into a line card on the host device. This makes an SFP+ smaller than an XFP, enabling greater port density.
| XFP | |
|---|---|
| Height | 8.5 mm (0.33 inches) |
| Width | 18.35 mm (0.72 inches) |
| Depth | 78.0 mm (3.10 inches) |
PHY and transceivers
10G PHY usually interfaces with XAUI, RXAUI or XFI interface.
XAUI
This interface can be called also IEEE 802.3ae XGXS interface.
It is composed by four SERDES lines running a 3.125 GHz in each direction using 8/10 bits coding channel
RXAUI
RXAUI means Reduced XAUI.
It is composed by two SERDES lines running a 6.25 GHz in each direction.
RJ45
10G Ethernet can be available on standard copper cables.
It requires Cat6a connectors, with integrated magnetics