networkZONE Products for the week of June 7, 2004

Quake Technologies Says…
WIS-Ful Thinking -- Quake 10 Gbit/s PHY IC Supports Ethernet And Fibre Channel In LAN And WAN Applications
Integrated WIS-Compliant Framer Could Change The Economics Of 10G WAN Access

Quake Technologies Inc. has announced availability of the QT2030, a 10Gb/s serial-to-XAUI PHY for Ethernet and Fibre Channel local and wide area networks (LAN/WAN). The QT2030 builds on Quake's success with existing LAN PHY components and includes an optional WAN Interconnect Sublayer (WIS) for connecting 10Gb/s Ethernet and Fibre Channel islands across SONET/SDH and WDM networks.

10Gb/s Ethernet ports are proliferating across corporate LAN and metro networks. With this expansion comes the requirement to send the 10Gbit/s LAN traffic across the existing global SONET/SDH and WDM infrastructure. The standard for 10Gbit/s Ethernet over WAN was ratified as part of the IEEE802.3ae-2002 initiative. This standard allows Ethernet users to utilize SONET/SDH and WDM networks as transport, while maintaining the attractive low cost structure of Ethernet.

The QT2030 provides a single-chip solution for both the LAN and the WAN clients. The excellent jitter margin of the QT2030, combined with Quake's experience in delivering three generations of 10Gbit/s serial-to-XAUI products, enables the deployment of optical modules and systems that achieve very robust link performance.

"The QT2030 is our most versatile product yet," said Petre Popescu, CTO and co-founder of Quake Technologies. "Our customers can design one module or system card that can carry any serial 10GE traffic and take advantage of an easy migration path from our existing LAN-only products. The industry leading SONET-compliant jitter performance of the QT2030 ensures seamless operation with the SONET/SDH and WDM infrastructure."

About the QT2030
The QT2030 is an integrated 10Gbit/s serial-to-XAUI PHY for 10Gbit/s Ethernet and Fibre Channel LAN and WAN applications. It includes the PMA, PCS, WIS and XGXS processing on a single chip. The WIS interface can be enabled or disabled, depending on the application. The QT2030 includes a standard two-wire interface for communicating with external EEPROM and DOM devices or XFP modules. An MDIO/MDC interface is provided for control and status of the PHY.

The QT2030 can be used in XAUI-based modules or directly on a system card interfacing to XFP modules. The QT2030 is fully compliant with IEEE802.3ae-2002 10GE and INCITS/T11 10GFC standards, the XENPAK/XPAK/X2 and XFP Multi Source Agreements (MSA).

The QT2030 receiver includes a built-in equalizer to recover the serial data over as much as 12 inches of standard FR-4 material. The jitter performance exceeds the SONET and XFP telecom requirements. The QT2030 has ample margin to allow for additional jitter contribution from optics and XFP modules. The QT2030 supports line and loop timing for additional flexibility in SONET based network designs.

The QT2030 comes with a full suite of features to optimize module and system card designs. Built-in test capability includes generators and checkers for jitter pattern and PRBS, plus enhanced link quality monitoring. These test features help speed up the development of modules and systems and eliminate the need for high-speed production test equipment.

The QT2030 is packaged in a 15x15 mm2 PBGA and is footprint compatible with existing Quake LAN products.

analogZONE Says . . .

The promise of an all-IP future that was delayed by the 2001 tech slump is now making a surprisingly strong come-back as several different access technologies are racing to drop the cost of transporting Ethernet across the vast installed base of SONET/SDH infrastructure. While there are excellent products on the market that support LCAS, VCAT, RPR, and other critical EOS standards from the likes of Galazar, PMC-Sierra, TranSwitch, and Mindspeed, Quake's latest product embraces a different approach in the form of the WAN Interconnect Sublayer (WIS). WIS is a lightweight SONET-like framing technique that allows a clean, rate-compatible bridge between a packet-based IP stream and a frame-based OC-X (in this case, OC-192) connection. As we'll see, the QT2030 could form the heart of a low-cost linecard or stand-alone CPE box that could use a dark fiber to directly connect to a port on a SONET/SDH network without having to extend the entire metro ring to the premises: something that could seriously alter the economics of extending Ethernet beyond the LAN.

Quake's QT2030 combines its 10G PHY-layer expertise and its systems knowhow to integrate a 10G to XAUI SerDes with a WIS interface to produce what they call a "LAN + WAN" PHY. The device sports a standard XAUI interface, plus blocks to support both 8B/10B XAUI encoding, and 64B/65B Ethernet coding for 10GE LAN applications (see Figure). It also has a selectable WIS layer that can be enabled for WAN applications. The WIS logic maps Ethernet packets into SONET frames, attaches the necessary overhead bytes for addressing, pointer adjustment, and other SONET functionality, and then connects to a regular Ethernet MAC layer for transport.

Most of the QT2030's other features are described nicely in the manufacturer's announcement above, so I won't restate them here. It is worth noting, however, that its on-chip loop timing enables attachment of equipment without an expensive timing generation source. This line timing mode is a big deal because it saves cost in access CPE while staying fully synchronous with the OC-X connection on the other end. I also appreciate the fact that the chip has an elastic FIFO that handles the buffering issues for both transmit- and receive-side connections without requiring external components. A final advantage offered by Quake is their focus on end-to-end connectivity, and compliance with both optical and electrical standards -- something they claim that many manufacturers oriented on the optical side of the market don't have.

The QT2030's unique ability to operate in both LAN and WAN environments makes it an excellent candidate for application is both Enterprise, and access equipment. This is because over the next 18 months, or so, growing of 1GE desktop connections should drive the demand for 10GE in both Enterprise backbones and access links in metro networks.

With the proper strategy, WIS-capable equipment (powered by the QT2030) could make a significant play in the access market. Equipment manufacturers could cash in on this demand by offering a simple blade upgrade to their router or multi-service platform that would add one or more low-cost Ethernet-to-OC-192 connections on a SONET or DWDM network port 10G access port over leased dark fiber. The QT2030 makes this easier with its selectable LAN/WAN modes that allows you to build one module, blade, or system card for both backbone and WLAN applications. And if you're already using a Quake 10G transceiver, it's even easier because thanks to its footprint-compatibility (ie mostly pin-compatible) with other Quake LAN products.

It's no surprise that Quake is one of the early champions of WIS besides Paxonet, since they have remained tenaciously focused on 10G Ethernet, even through the tough market conditions that encompassed most of the company's four-year history. This commitment may well be paying off as they now claim to be shipping 70% of the XAUI-based transceivers into modules for XENPAK & XPAK/X2 designs. They are now plowing some new fertile ground with the QT2030 and its ability to make a direct connection between Ethernet and SONET equipment, something that could seriously undercut some existing EoS applications.

The QT2030 is sampling now and is priced at $300 in small volumes. An evaluation kit is available.

Data Sheet

Lee's Saltshaker Rating

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