Gennum and Altera demo 4x25Gb/s ICs for next-generation 100Gb/s networks

BURLINGTON, CANADA & SAN JOSE, USA: Bolstering the ecosystem for next-generation 4x25Gb/s based optical transceivers, Gennum Corp. and Altera Corp. will demonstrate interoperability of Gennum's 25-28Gb/s PHY with Altera's 28Gb/s enabled Stratix V GT FPGA in Gennum's booth (hall 1, booth 1768) at the European Conference and Exhibition on Optical Communication (ECOC), September 19-21, in Geneva.

This is the first time an FPGA will have demonstrated interoperability with a PHY at 25Gb/s, which is enabling the industry's migration to higher density, lower power, lower cost optical modules used in 100Gb/s optical networks.

The demonstration will feature Gennum's GN2425 and GN2426 module clock and data recovery (CDR) integrated circuits communicating with an Altera linecard/host-based Stratix V GT FPGA operating at 25-28Gb/s over an OIF CEI-28G-VSR compliant electrical link. The link has greater than 10dB of loss at the Nyquist data rate and is comprised of host board traces, module board traces and a Molex zQSFP+ interconnect system. The link exceeds the CEI-28G-VSR IA requirements and is able to operate at a bit-error-rate (BER) of less than 1E-15.

As global Internet traffic is expected to multiply over the coming years, significantly more bandwidth will be required, driving the need for large-scale network upgrades. Gennum's GN2425 and GN2426, now in pre-production, are designed to support 25-28Gb/s data streams for next-generation 100Gb/s pluggable fiber-optic modules, line cards and direct-attach copper cables using the 25G-QSFP+ and CFP2 form factors. They provide exceptional jitter performance with low power consumption.

By resetting the jitter budgets within the module in both the transmit and receive directions, Gennum's CDRs enable robust operation for new systems such as 100GBASE-LR4 optical modules. In the transmit direction they drive EML, DML or MZM drivers with very low jitter, allowing clean, wide-open transmit eyes. In the receive direction they remove jitter from the recovered optical signals, promoting error-free reception by a downstream receiver on the host board. The GN2425 and GN2426 CDRs include the equalization capability demanded of the new CEI-28G-VSR IA, providing a robust VSR link.

Altera's high-performance Stratix V GT FPGAs are tailored to support the most bandwidth-intensive communications systems. Featuring 28Gb/s integrated transceivers, Stratix V FPGAs deliver the highest system bandwidth at the lowest power consumption, under 200mW per channel at 28Gb/s. Stratix V GT FPGAs support backplane, optical module and chip-to-chip applications through four 28Gb/s transceivers, and 66 full-duplex 14.1Gb/s transceivers. The transceivers in Stratix V GT FPGAs provide the industry's highest system reliability with the lowest jitter.

The live interoperability demo at the Gennum booth (hall 1, booth 1768) of the 2011 ECOC show in Geneva demonstrates the availability of key building blocks enabling a system or equipment manufacturer to be able to begin manufacturing higher density and lower power optical networks.