Ixia demos 400 Gigabit Ethernet via eight PAM4 electrical lanes

Test systems vendor Ixia (NASDAQ: XXIA) says it has demonstrated 400 Gigabit Ethernet (400GbE) via eight electrical lanes of 50 Gbps each. The electrical lanes leverage PAM4 modulation, as called for in the 400GAUI-8 interface specification created by the IEEE 802.3bs Task Force, which is developing the specifications for 400 Gigabit Ethernet.

Ixia held an invitation-only demonstration of the capability before what the company described as "key members of the 400GbE ecosystem" at an event the week of January 9 in Huntington Beach, CA, according to company-related sources. The sources would not specify the nature of the event, but IEEE 802.3 held an interim meeting in Huntington Beach during that timeframe.

The eight-lane presentation followed Ixia's public demonstrations of 16-lane 400GbE at various trade shows and other venues in 2016. This includes ECOC 2016 in Dusseldorf, Germany, when Ixia showed off the capabilities of its 400GbE load module in partnership with Viavi Solutions (see "Viavi, Ixia demo 400 Gigabit Ethernet test system with forward error correction").

Ixia also says it is closely involved with related industry initiatives, including such optical transceiver multi-source agreements (MSAs) as double-density quad small-form-factor pluggable (QSFP-DD) MSA, and Octal Small Form Factor Pluggable (OSFP). Both transceivers should see use in 400GbE applications.

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