PMC-Sierra announces 10 Gigabit Ethernet and 10 Gigabit Fibre Channel transceiver - PMC-Sierra PM8358 QuadPHY 10GX

EDP Weekly's IT Monitor, June 9, 2003

PMC-Sierra, Inc. (Nasdaq:PMCS) has announced the PM8358 QuadPHY 10GX, a four channel, fully redundant 3.2 Gbit/s transceiver providing high speed serial I/O for both backplanes and line side network interfaces.

The new Serializer/Deserializer (SERDES) product supports a broad range of system applications that require multi-gigabit serial interconnect including Gigabit Ethernet (GE), Fibre Channel, 10 Gigabit Ethernet (10GE), 10 Gigabit Fibre Channel (10GFC), OC-48, OC-192 and InfiniBand (see figure 1). Using 0.13 micron CMOS technology, the QuadPHY 10GX is optimized for low power, small footprint and advanced signal integrity. The QuadPHY 10GX exceeds industry standards for jitter and reach by over 50 percent and reduces power by up to 40 percent compared to competitive solutions. The QuadPHY 10GX achieves error-free transmission in excess of 60 inches on a printed circuit board or over 20 metres of InfiniBand 4X cable, with low power of 1.2 watts.

"Our customers' emerging 10 Gigabit applications demand highly reliable, low power and flexible multi-gigabit serial interfaces," said Mark Stibitz, vice president and general manager, Enterprise and Storage Division, PMC-Sierra. "To meet all those requirements, PMC-Sierra has combined low power CMOS technology with our extensive SERDES design expertise to produce a superior, standards-based 10 Gigabit backplane solution."

The QuadPHY 10GX is a bi-directional XGMII to XAUI (10 Gigabit Attachment Unit Interface) transceiver with a fully redundant XAUI interface for working and protect switching architectures. The four channels of the device can be trunked to form a single logical link for SERDES of IEEE 802.3ae 10G Ethernet and T11 NCITS 10G Fibre Channel standard-compliant XAUI and InfiniBand 4X. Alternatively, the QuadPHY 10GX supports independent, lane-based operation running at 2.125 Gbit/s to 3.2 Gbit/s addressing a broad range of applications such as OC-48 and InfiniBand 1X high speed serial links.

The QuadPHY 10GX delivers extremely low power and standards-exceeding jitter performance by leveraging PMC-Sierra's 0.13um CMOS Rate Agile Serial I/O (RASIO) technology. The QuadPHY 10GX incorporates PMC-Sierra's fifth generation multi-gigabit serial technology with eight independent RASIO cores including features such as integrated SERDES, clock recovery, clock synthesis, byte alignment, trunking and 8B/10B encode/decode logic for both Primary/Redundant ports. The device dissipates only 1.2 watt in full operation at 3.2 Gbit/s.

The QuadPHY 10GX offers extensive flexibility in optimizing critical system signal integrity parameters. In particular, the device allows users to tailor signal integrity by fine-tuning transmitter pre-emphasis, receiver equalization and output voltage swing through over 36 programmable settings to optimally offset system-specific backplane and interconnect losses.

"PMC-Sierra's QuadPHY 10GX has achieved interoperability with Tyco Electronics' HM-Zd QuadRoute backplane, providing system designers with a fully-tested backplane solution," said John D'Ambrosia, manager, Semiconductor Relations, Tyco Electronics Corporation. "The two companies have worked closely together to ensure customers receive a low cost, low power, reliable platform solution for the most demanding and high volume multi-gigabit, serial interface designs."

Provides Flexible Design Options Interfacing to Optical Modules or Cabling

The QuadPHY 10GX provides customers with a high-speed, low cost alternative to fibre connections with a total throughput of 10 Gbit/s. The high bandwidth availability of the QuadPHY 10GX allows customers to use low cost copper cables for data transfers from shelf-to-shelf or rack-to-rack interconnections. The device successfully transmits 10 Gbit/s of data error free over 20 metres of InfiniBand 4X cabling. The QuadPHY 10GX is also designed to interface seamlessly with XENPAK/XPAK/X2 optical modules.

The PM8358 QuadPHY 10GX device is packaged in 19mm x 19mm, 289-pin, 1.0mm ball pitch CABGA package and priced at $45 in 1KU quantities.