VIAVI has spent many years testing Ethernet as a service, fueling its management place in testing modules, cables, and Ethernet ICs on the PHY layer. We even have merchandise that cowl the total stack to L7, providing breadth and depth of protection.
Just a few years in the past, we decided present merchandise available on the market for high-scale Ethernet testing at L1 and better had critical shortcomings for the wants of 400Gb and above. Drawing on our expertise from the deepest (darkest) PHY by way of PCS and FEC as much as L7, we got down to develop a product that addresses the challenges at 800G and 1.6Tb.
Testing at Scale from the Floor Up
One factor we shortly famous is which you can now not simply ‘decouple’ the bodily layer. For the reason that creation of PAM-4 modulation and FEC, the perception and administration of the PHY layer (CMIS 5.xx) is vital to testing, validation and debugging.
Our ONT product line has lengthy led the marketplace for module check and validation with distinctive functions corresponding to superior error evaluation and dynamic skew, that are vital for debugging at 800G and above. The problem we confronted was scaling this to larger layers and bigger port counts whereas guaranteeing precision administration and complete perception into each facet of the PHY layer.
Designed for Challenges of Velocity and Scale
We designed our award-winning ONE LabPro™ platform to combine the important thing architectural wants required at 800Gb and above. It blends insightful bodily layer testing capabilities with multi-port, multi-flow, higher layer Ethernet testing – facilitating information aircraft and management aircraft testing, high-scale site visitors technology, and precision delay testing with a Python-based superior automation framework.
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The VIAVI ONE LabPro acquired a Lightwave Innovation Award on the OFC24 convention in San Diego
Some notable options of the ONE LabPro platform embody:
- Bodily layer visibility and administration – a check port for 800G and above should provide deep PHY layer perception, concise and built-in module administration, and it should meet the ability and cooling expectations for each consumer and pluggable coherent optics. Our management within the 800G ZR improvement wave has taught us a terrific deal in help cooling above 30W per module.
Perception into the true PCS and FEC efficiency – Fingerprinting an error lets the character and actual margin of the error at a look.
- Nanosecond precision at scale – trendy functions, particularly within the AI/ML area, mandate nanosecond latency precision. A check system wants cautious design and structure to permit nanosecond precision on a per packet foundation throughout tons of of ports.
- Dense and extremely scalable configuration with unbiased module administration – as much as 128 x 800Gb check ports might be stacked or distributed and centrally-managed by a single controller with versatile, easy-to-use, web-based software program instruments. The system can synchronize blended combos of check ports from 100Gb/s to 1600Gb/s.
 With the best ranges of management and scalability out there, the VIAVI ONE LabPro platform blends insightful bodily layer testing capabilities with multi-port, multi-flow Layer 2-3 Ethernet testing
The Journey to 1.6T is Selecting up Velocity
1.6Tb could be very completely different, even in contrast with 800Gb. It isn’t merely about overcoming the challenges of the 224G electrical PHY, it additionally entails the testing and validation of the progressive FECi idea. This idea is an integral a part of our newest ONE LabPro structure. We are going to tackle particular 1.6T testing issues in future blogs.
We invite you to discover our VIAVI ONE LabPro merchandise. You’ll uncover a contemporary structure that has been optimized for each 800G and 1.6Tb. Importantly, these merchandise are designed from the bottom up, and never tied to legacy merchandise that have been designed for 100G and beneath NRZ.
VIAVI Can Assist!
To get an insightful view of your high-speed optical module efficiency utilizing testing options that meet the best business requirements, communicate to our VIAVI functions group.
Along with the hyperlinks offered within the weblog, please take into account our different current content material: Bamboozled by Bit Errors?, When Simply Good Sufficient Isn’t Good Sufficient,  800GB From Chips to Techniques.
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