Fiber Transceiver Solution

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QSFP28 100GBASE-LR4 and 100GBASE-SR4 Optical Modules Overview

100G transceiver

Without denying that the market for 100G data center optics is accelerating, and more and more telecommunication vendors are aiming to seize this opportunity to launch cost-effective 100G solutions. FS.COM also offers a series of 100G optical modules and cabling solutions that are compliant to the IEEE standards. Our 100G optical modules support different transmission distance from 100m, 10km and more reach options in CFP and QSFP28 form factors. Before introducing the FS.COM 100G optical modules, let’s firstly talk about the 100 Gigabit Ethernet standard.

IEEE 100GbE Standard Introduction

Defined by the IEEE 802.3ba-2010 standard, 100 Gigabit Ethernet (100GbE) technology was given birth to transmit Ethernet frames at the rates of 100 gigabits per second. The 100G optical modules are not standardized by any official standards body but are in multi-source agreements (MSAs). The major 100Gigabit Ethernet 100GBASE-R optical module standards are briefly listed in the below table.

100g-standards

According to the above table, the 100GBASE-CR4 and 100GBASE-CR10 standards were met by twinax copper cable with a link length of 7m. The 802.3bm standard was approved in 2015, which specifies a lower-cost optical 100GBASE-SR4 PHY for multimode fibers (MMF). The 100GBASE-SR4 standard can operate over OM3 MMF for a link length of 70m, and transmit over OM4 for a link length of 100m. QSFP28-100G-SR4 is one of the common types of the 100G modules, which can be used in 100 Gigabit Ethernet links on up to 100m of OM4 multimode fiber.

For those infrastructure who require a link length longer than 2 km, 100GBASE-LR4 and 100GBASE-ER4 standards were introduced. These two standards are specially designed for use in long haul applications. For example, QSFP28 100GBASE-LR4 optics can support a distance of 10km, and the CFP 100GBASE-ER4 operate over single-mode fiber for a distance of 40km.

As for the 100GBASE-SR10 or 100GBASE-CR10, the 10x10 MSA was intended as a lower cost alternative to 100GBASE-SR4 for applications, which defines an optical Physical Medium Dependent (PMD) sublayer and establish compatible sources of low-cost, low-power, pluggable optical transceivers based on 10 optical lanes at 10 Gbit/s each.

FS.COM 100G Optical Modules

FS.COM provides 100G QSFP28 optical modules, including 100G QSFP28 SR4, 100G QSFP28 LR4 as well as 100G CFP LR4 optical module. All these 100G transceivers are good choice for today’s high-density data center 100G interconnection and networking.

  • QSFP28 100GBASE-SR4

The QSFP28 100GBASE-SR4 transceiver, based on the QSFP28 from factors, is a parallel 100G optical module designed with optical/electrical connection and digital diagnostic interface. It offers 4 independent transmit and receive channels, each capable of 25Gbps operation for an aggregated data rate of 100Gbps for 100 m on 12-fiber MPO/MTP OM4 multimode fiber.

qsfp28-100gbase-sr4

The QSFP28 SR4 module is a vertically integrated solution that meets IEEE 802.3 standards and MSA requirements with power dissipation well under 3.5W. It supports both 100GBASE-SR4 as well as 4x25G breakout applications, 100G QSFP28 to QSFP28 DAC and 100G QSFP28 SR4 to 4x25G SFP28 break-out cables, meeting the harshest external operating conditions including temperature, humidity and EMI interference.

  • QSFP28 100GBASE-LR4

The 100GBASE-LR4 QSFP28 transceiver, compliant to 100GBASE-LR4 of the IEEE P802.3ba standard, is also a 100Gbps transceiver module designed for long-reach communication applications. This module converts 4 input channels of 25Gbps electrical data to 4 channels of LAN WDM optical signals and then multiplexes them into a single channel for 100Gbps optical transmission. The high performance cooled LAN WDM EA-DFB transmitters and high sensitivity PIN receivers provide superior performance for 100GbE applications up to 10km links over single-mode fibers.

qsfp28-100gbase-lr4

Conclusion

According to the market researchers, the 100G optical transceivers market will be booming in the near future. So what are you waiting for? It is the ideal time for data center designers to prepare for the data center networking and architecture beforehand with 100G transceivers and cables. Contact us for the available 100G optical modules: 100G QSFP28 SR4, 100G QSFP28 LR4, 100G CFP, CFP2 and 100G CFP4 optics. Besides 100G optical modules, FS.COM also provides 100G cable solutions like 100G active optical cable (AOC) and 100G direct attach cable (DAC). You can have what you need here.