100 Gigabit Ethernet
40 Gigabit Ethernet and 100 Gigabit Ethernet are groups of computer networking technologies for transmitting Ethernet frames at rates of 40 and 100 gigabits per second, respectively. These technologies offer significantly higher speeds than 10 Gigabit Ethernet. The technology was first defined by the IEEE 802.3ba-2010 standard and later by the 802.3bg-2011, 802.3bj-2014, 802.3bm-2015, and 802.3cd-2018 standards. The first succeeding Terabit Ethernet specifications were approved in 2017.
The standards define numerous port types with different optical and electrical interfaces and different numbers of optical fiber strands per port. Short distances over twinaxial cable are supported while standards for fiber reach up to 80 km.
Standards development
On July 18, 2006, a call for interest for a High Speed Study Group to investigate new standards for high-speed Ethernet was held at the IEEE 802.3 plenary meeting in San Diego.The first 802.3 HSSG study group meeting was held in September 2006. In June 2007, a trade group called "Road to 100G" was formed after the NXTcomm trade show in Chicago.
On December 5, 2007, the Project Authorization Request for the P802.3ba and Ethernet Task Force was approved with the following project scope:
The purpose of this project is to extend the 802.3 protocol to operating speeds of and in order to provide a significant increase in bandwidth while maintaining maximum compatibility with the installed base of 802.3 interfaces, previous investment in research and development, and principles of network operation and management. The project is to provide for the interconnection of equipment satisfying the distance requirements of the intended applications.
The 802.3ba task force met for the first time in January 2008. This standard was approved at the June 2010 IEEE Standards Board meeting under the name IEEE Std 802.3ba-2010.
The first Ethernet Single-mode Fibre PMD study group meeting was held in January 2010 and on March 25, 2010, the P802.3bg Single-mode Fibre PMD Task Force was approved for the serial SMF PMD.
The scope of this project is to add a single-mode fiber Physical Medium Dependent option for serial operation by specifying additions to, and appropriate modifications of, IEEE Std 802.3-2008 as amended by the IEEE P802.3ba project.
On June 17, 2010, the IEEE 802.3ba standard was approved. In March 2011, the IEEE 802.3bg standard was approved. On September 10, 2011, the P802.3bj Backplane and Copper Cable task force was approved.
The scope of this project is to specify additions to and appropriate modifications of IEEE Std 802.3 to add 4-lane Physical Layer specifications and management parameters for operation on backplanes and twinaxial copper cables, and specify optional Energy Efficient Ethernet for and operation over backplanes and copper cables.
On May 10, 2013, the P802.3bm and Fiber Optic Task Force was approved.
This project is to specify additions to and appropriate modifications of IEEE Std 802.3 to add Physical Layer specifications and management parameters, using a four-lane electrical interface for operation on multimode and single-mode fiber optic cables, and to specify optional Energy Efficient Ethernet for and operation over fiber optic cables. In addition, to add Physical Layer specifications and management parameters for operation on extended reach single-mode fiber optic cables.
Also on May 10, 2013, the P802.3bq 40GBASE-T Task Force was approved.
Specify a Physical Layer for operation at on balanced twisted-pair copper cabling, using existing Media Access Control, and with extensions to the appropriate physical layer management parameters.
On June 12, 2014, the IEEE 802.3bj standard was approved.
On February 16, 2015, the IEEE 802.3bm standard was approved.
On May 12, 2016, the IEEE P802.3cd Task Force started working to define next generation two-lane PHY.
On May 14, 2018, the PAR for the IEEE P802.3ck Task Force was approved. The scope of this project is to specify additions to and appropriate modifications of IEEE Std 802.3 to add Physical Layer specifications and Management Parameters for,, and electrical interfaces based on signaling.
On December 5, 2018, the IEEE-SA Board approved the IEEE 802.3cd standard.
On November 12, 2018, the IEEE P802.3ct Task Force started working to define PHY supporting operation on a single wavelength capable of at least 80 km over a DWDM system.
In May 2019, the IEEE P802.3cu Task Force started working to define single-wavelength PHYs for operation over SMF with lengths up to at least 2 km and 10 km.
In June 2020, the IEEE P802.3db Task Force started working to define a physical layer specification that supports operation over 1 pair of MMF with lengths up to at least 50 m.
On February 11, 2021, the IEEE-SA Board approved the IEEE 802.3cu standard.
On June 16, 2021, the IEEE-SA Board approved the IEEE 802.3ct standard.
On September 21, 2022, the IEEE-SA Board approved the IEEE 802.3ck and 802.3db standards.
Early products
Optical signal transmission over a nonlinear medium is principally an analog design problem. As such, it has evolved more slowly than digital circuit lithography. This explains why transport systems existed since the mid-1990s, while the first forays into transmission happened about 15 years later – a 10x speed increase over 15 years is far slower than the 2x speed per 1.5 years typically cited for Moore's law.Nevertheless, at least five firms made customer announcements for transport systems by August 2011, with varying degrees of capabilities. Although vendors claimed that light paths could use existing analog optical infrastructure, deployment of high-speed technology was tightly controlled and extensive interoperability tests were required before moving them into service.
Designing routers or switches that support interfaces is difficult. The need to process a stream of packets at line rate without reordering within IP/MPLS microflows is one reason for this.
, most components in the packet processing path were not readily available off-the-shelf or require extensive qualification and co-design. Another problem is related to the low-output production of optical components, which were also not easily availableespecially in pluggable, long-reach or tunable laser flavors.
Backplane
announced backplane modules in October 2010.Multimode fiber
In 2009, Mellanox and Reflex Photonics announced modules based on the CFP agreement.Single mode fiber
, Sumitomo Electric Industries, and OpNext all demonstrated singlemode 40 or Ethernet modules based on the C form-factor pluggable agreement at the European Conference and Exhibition on Optical Communication in 2009. The first lasers for 100 GBE were demonstrated in 2008.Compatibility
Optical fiber IEEE 802.3ba implementations were not compatible with the numerous 40 and line rate transport systems because they had different optical layer and modulation formats, as the IEEE 802.3ba interface types show. In particular, existing transport solutions that used dense wavelength-division multiplexing to pack four signals into one optical medium were not compatible with the IEEE 802.3ba standard, which used either coarse WDM in 1310 nm wavelength region with four or ten channels, or parallel optics with four or ten optical fibers per direction.Test and measurement
- Quellan announced a test board in 2009.
- Ixia developed Physical Coding Sublayer Lanes and demonstrated a working 100GbE link through a test setup at NXTcomm in June 2008. Ixia announced test equipment in November 2008.
- Discovery Semiconductors introduced optoelectronics converters for testing of the 10 km and 40 km Ethernet standards in February 2009.
- JDS Uniphase introduced test and measurement products for 40 and Ethernet in August 2009.
- Spirent Communications introduced test and measurement products in September 2009.
- EXFO demonstrated interoperability in January 2010.
- Xena Networks demonstrated test equipment at the Technical University of Denmark in January 2011.
- Calnex Solutions introduced 100GbE Synchronous Ethernet synchronisation test equipment in November 2014.
- Spirent Communications introduced the Attero-100G for 100GbE and 40GbE impairment emulation in April 2015.
- VeEX introduced its CFP-based UX400-100GE and 40GE test and measurement platform in 2012, followed by CFP2, CFP4, QSFP28 and QSFP+ versions in 2015.
Mellanox Technologies