40Gb/s And 100Gb/s Ethernet Project Reaches Milestone Vote
Made Possible by Broad Cooperation and New Relationship with ITU-T
Piscataway, NJ - The development of faster Ethernet communication standards reached a major milestone this week when the IEEE 802.3 Working Group approved forwarding the draft of their next higher speed standard to Working Group ballot. The project is now on plan to meet its target June 2010 approval as a standard by the IEEE Standards Board.
IEEE P802.3ba will be known by its full name of "IEEE Standard for Information Technology - Telecommunications and Information Exchange Between Systems - Local and Metropolitan Area Networks - Specific Requirements Part 3: Carrier Sense Multiple Access with Collision Detection (CSMA/CD) Access Method and Physical Layer Specifications - Amendment: Media Access Control Parameters, Physical Layers and Management Parameters for 40 Gb/s and 100 Gb/s Operation."
The project will extend the existing IEEE Std 802.3 Ethernet standard to operating speeds of 40Gb/s and 100Gb/s in order to provide a significant increase in bandwidth while maintaining maximum compatibility with the installed base of IEEE Std 802.3 Ethernet interfaces, previous investment in research and development, and principles of network operation and management. The project will provide a family of physical layer specifications that target various interconnection needs for application spaces, such as data center, internet exchanges, backbone trunking, high performance computing and video-on-demand delivery.
"Ethernet has become the technology of choice for networking communications," says John D'Ambrosia, Scientist, Force10 Networks and Chair, IEEE P802.3ba 40Gb/s and 100Gb/s Ethernet Task Force. "Establishing a standard for 40Gb/s Ethernet will enable the next generation of servers, while 100Gb/s Ethernet will be utilized for aggregation nodes. Together, these two rates will enable the next phase of the Ethernet ecosystem."
"The development of IEEE P802.3ba has been enhanced by our strengthened relationship with the International Telecommunication Union's Telecommunication Standardization Sector Study Group 15 (ITU-T SG15)," says David Law, Consultant Engineer, 3Com and Chair for the IEEE 802.3 Working Group. "The bilateral relationship between the two organizations continues to grow," says Law, "allowing for closer coordination. Working together, the two bodies have come up with a solution that will ensure support of 40Gb/s and 100Gb/s Ethernet in next-generation Optical Transport Networks."
"The IEEE P802.3ba Task Force has experienced broad support, from individuals from many different companies and organizations from multiple industries, representing everyone from component suppliers, system vendors, and the actual end-user community," says D'Ambrosia.
"The entire industry is committed to creating the best standard possible for 40Gb/s and 100Gb/s Ethernet to enable its rapid adoption to alleviate the bandwidth crunch being experienced by many."
For more information on the IEEE P802.3ba 40Gb/s and 100Gb/s Ethernet Task Force, visit http://ieeestandards.org/ct.html?rtr=on&s=8nv,15gna,24iv,fkxz,9d24,dljj,dheb .
SOURCE: IEEE