Vendors establish LX4 Trade Group to promote 10GBASE LX4 interface for Ethernet
October 21, 2004 San Jose, CA -- EMCORE Corp., MergeOptics GmbH, Opnext Inc., Quake Technologies Inc., and WaveSplitter Technologies Inc. today announced the formation of the LX4 Trade Group (LX4-TG). The LX4-TG's mission is to promote interoperability and market awareness for the LX4 standard, which offers the ability to transmit 10-Gigabit Ethernet (10-GbE) data over existing multimode and singlemode fiber infrastructure.
LX4 products in the XENPAK form factor are readily available from multiple vendors, with X2 modules expected in the near future. Each of the 10GBase-LX4 modules from the members of the LX4-TG conform to the highly versatile multi-wavelength transmission format specified within the IEEE 802.3ae standard for 10-GbE, which was ratified in June 2002.
Designed to support LAN, access, metro, and core applications, LX4 technology provides value to end users by improving communications data rates over legacy multimode fiber that was originally installed to support 100-Mbit Ethernet, One-Gigabit Ethernet, or FDDI applications. Transmission distances are 300 meters over legacy multimode fiber, which is specified as a minimum modal bandwidth of 500-MHz(km in the 1310-nm window. LX4 modules from different vendors will interoperate, and a pluggable port format offers interchangeability via the front panel. In addition, pluggable LX4 technology enables a "Pay-as-You-Populate" cost structure during installation.
The 10-GbE (IEEE 802.3ae) standard offers several ways to transmit data over different physical media. The term 10GBase-LX4 references a multi-wavelength approach to fiber-optic transmission. The "10" stands for 10 Gigabits per second; "Base" means baseband communications; and "LX4" designates four optical wavelengths combined within the module and transmitted over fiber-optic cable. Other 10-GbE baseband interconnects include 10GBase-CX4, 10GBase-SR, 10GBase-LR, and 10GBase-ER. These interconnects are usually offered in integrated modules that insert into XENPAK, X2, or other pluggable port slots, mounted on switches, routers, servers, or storage systems.