November 8, 2004 Camarillo, CA -- Vitesse Semiconductor Corp. has announced the availability of its VSC5600EV-01 SFP PRO reference design platform, a 1- to 4-Gbit/sec rate-selectable small-form-factor pluggable (SFP) module design with firmware that enables OEMs and ODMs to quickly bring a low-cost module to market.
The VSC5600EV-01 reference design incorporates the VSC7964 (a monolithic laser driver and post amplifier) and the VSC7977 (a bandwidth-selectable transimpedance amplifier), both announced in August of this year. The devices are designed to work seamlessly together, reducing the number of components needed by 50%, as well as minimizing the total PCB layer count. As a result, the SFP PRO reference design contains only four PCB layers (signal/ground/power/signal) and limits the component assembly to the top of the board, significantly reducing overall manufacturing costs.
According to iSuppli, an analyst firm, 7 million SFP transceivers will be used in the network storage market next year, and 1.4 million OC-48 SFP transceivers in the metro and telecommunications SONET/SDH market during the same time period.
This Vitesse design incorporates 1-Gbit/sec, 2-Gbit/sec, and 4-Gbit/sec rate-selection capability to support the bandwidth adjustment requirements of 4-Gbit/sec INCITS/T11 Fibre Channel standards. Measured results exhibit 40% margin to the 4G Fibre Channel eye mask and greater than 50% margin to the 1G/2G eye mask. The optical sensitivity at the 4-Gbit/sec data rate adds over 6 dB of margin to the standard. This bandwidth-selection capability provides module manufacturers with up to 2.5 dBm of additional receiver sensitivity at 1G data rates.
Unlike some existing solutions, the Vitesse design uses a standard, off-the-shelf microcontroller from Atmel (the SL828), which allows customers the flexibility of taking the Vitesse-supplied code and modifying it to differentiate their products or to incorporate end-customer-specific features. Other advantages include lower cost, fault isolation, as well as enhanced calibration capabilities such as LOS threshold calibration, peaking adjustment, and bias current adjustment.
SFP PRO reference design is complete with SFP-compatible housing as well as ROSA, TOSA, and Vitesse-designed flex circuits for interfacing the optical components to the PCB. A "bent lead" version of the design is available for customers interested in eliminating the need for flex circuits.
The VSC5600EV-01 design package includes schematic, layout, fabrication files, firmware, and performance data, allowing customers to copy the design "as-is" or to customize it as required for a specific application. The design targets 850-nm VCSEL applications up to 4 Gbits/sec, and can be expanded to cover 1310-nm Fabry-Perot and DFB laser applications. The VSC7964 has also been shown to have excellent performance up to 8.5-Gbit/sec, opening the door to emerging 8G Fibre Channel applications.
The VSC5600EV-01 is available now.