10GbE technology nowadays is becoming more pervasive as enterprises grow their networks and support more bandwidth-intensive application. In the meanwhile, 10GbE functionality can provide immediate performance benefits and safeguard a company’s investment well into the future. The supporting 10G fiber optic transceivers are designed for 10Gbit/s data transmission applications including 10 Gigabit Ethernet, 10 Gbit/s Fiber Channel, Synchronous optical networking. After years of development, there has been various different form factors and optics types introduced—10G XENPAK, 10G X2, 10G XFP and 10G SFP+. This article will have a brief introduction to these 10G optical transceivers.

XENPAK

XENPAK is the first 10G fiber optic transceiver. It is a highly integrated, serial optical transponder module for high-speed, 10Gbit/s data transmission application. XENPAK modules designed XAUI interface and knowledge shaping (CDR) function, which comply with the XENPAK MSA protocol and satisfy the application of 802.3ae Ethernet protocol 10GB. The working distance of Xenpak can reach up to 10km over G652 single-mode fiber. Newer Xenpak while using 10GBASE-LX4 standard operated using wavelengths on legacy multimode fibers at distance of up to 300 meters, eliminating the necessity to reinstall cable in a building when upgrading certain 1 Gbit/s circuits to 10 Gbit/s.

X2

10G X2 has the same function with Xenpak modules and provides robust thermal performance and electromagnetic shielding, but it is only half the size of Xenpak transceiver. X2 is initially centered on optical links to 10 kilometers and is ideally suited for Ethernet, Fibre Channel and telecommunication switches and standard PCI (peripheral component interconnect) based server and storage connections. The 10GB X2 fiber optic transceivers series include X2-10GB-SR, X2-10GB-LR, X2-10GB-ER and X2-10GB-ZR, they are designed based on the X2 MSA and IEEE802.3ae. They’re created for the integrated systems solution, fiber optics distributor along with other IT distributors.

XFP

Developed after 10G X2 module, XFP is really a standard for high-speed computer network and telecommunication links which uses optical fiber. They sometimes operate at near-infrared wavelengths (colors) of 850 nm, 1310 nm or 1550 nm. Principal applications include 10 Gigabit Ethernet, 10 Gbit/s Fibre Channel, synchronous optical networking (SONET) at OC-192 rates, synchronous optical networking STM-64, 10 Gbit/s Optical Transport Network (OTN) OTU-2, and parallel optics links. They can operate over a single wavelength or use dense wavelength-division multiplexing techniques. XFP modules make use of an LC fiber connector type to achieve high density. The 10G XFP fiber optic transceivers series include XFP-10G-MM-SR, XFP-10GLR-OC192SR, XFP-10G-L-OC192-SR1 and XFP-10GZR-OC192LR. XFP-10GLR-OC192SR is Cisco 10GBASE-LR/LW XFP operating at wavelength of 1310nm for a distance of 10km.

SFP+

10G SFP+ transceivers are multi-purpose optical modules for 10Gbit/s data transmission applications at 850 nm, 1310 nm and 1550 nm. The transceiver complies with Gigabit Ethernet as specified in IEEE 802.3 and Fiber Channel FC-PH, PH2, PH3 and FC-PI 10.0. Additionally, it provides a unique enhanced digital diagnostic monitoring interface, which allows real-time access to device operating parameters such as transceiver temperature, laser bias current, transmitted optical power, received optical power, and transceiver supply voltage.

This SFP+ hot-pluggable transceiver features duplex LC connector and provides up to 1.25 Gbps bi-directional data transfer rate. It supports transmission distances of up to 300 m (984.25 ft) for 62.5/125μm MMF and 500 m (1640.42 ft) for 50/125μm MMF fiber cabling. The 10G SFP fiber optic transceivers series include SFP-10G-SR, SFP-10G-LRM, SFP-10G-LR, SFP-10G-ER, SFP-10G-ZR, SFP-10G-LW, SFP-10G-LH, SFP-10G-LX and SFP-10G-ZW. Cisco 10 gig SFP like SFP-10GB-SR is 10GBASE-SR SFP+ with DOM support. It provides 10GBase-SR connectivity for up to 300 meters with multimode fiber. This 10 Gigabit Ethernet SFP+ transceivers module provides excellent performance port-dense networks with challenging thermal environments, which are ideally suited for datacom and storage space network (SAN/NAS) applications based on the IEEE 802.3ae and Fibre Channel standards, Fibre Channel, 1000Base-SX Ethernet.

To sum up, XENPAK is the very first MSA transceiver module for 10GE coupled with the biggest form factor. X2 was later competing standards with smaller form factors. XFP came after X2. SFP+ offers a smaller form factor and also the ability to offer 1G/10G combo ports on hardware.