with the QSFP+ mechanical form factor

To further expand its portfolio of innovative parallel fiber optic products, Avago is releasing a new QSFP+ transceiver that is not only 40Gb Ethernet compliant, but also interoperable with any 10GBASE-SR compliant transceiver at link distances up to 100 meters over OM3 multi-mode fiber (MMF). It is named QSFP+ SR4 with “i” for interoperable.To keep up, higher performance switching hardware is needed to provide suffi cient I/O bandwidth to avoid blocking. To accommodate the new demands for bandwidth, many newer access switches off er 48-ports of 10Gb Ethernet for connection to downstream servers and 2- or 4-ports of 40G Ethernet for connection to the core switches. These 40G interconnects, which are often implemented using QSFP+ transceivers, provide suffi cient bandwidth to enable fully non-blocking switch fabrics.The net result is a further increase in I/O bandwidth and density with the QSFP+ mechanical form factor.The 40GBASE-SR4 PMD addresses the modern need for 40 Gbps interconnects in the data center and takes advantage of lower cost 850 nm Vertical Cavity Surface Emitting Laser (VCSEL) technology that is widely deployed throughout networking industries. As each of the 4 lanes in 40GBASE-SR4 operates at the same serial bit rate as a 10Gb Ethernet link, there is an opportunity for switching hardware vendors to utilize 40GBASE-SR4 as 4 separate 10Gb Ethernet interconnects.