Before the 100G QSFP28 transceiver(a module can support 100G transfer) appears, the 100G network’s development direction is 10G to 40G to 100G. After it appears, 10G to 25G to100G or 10G to 25G to 50G to 100G begins to spread widely in the industry, and some data centers use this method to achieve 10G upgrade to 100G.

Advantages of QSFP28 transceiver:
Data center’s cost and power consumption are the important power of optical communication market’s development. Review the progress of 100G transceiver, its package(CFP, CFP2 Optical Transceiver , CFP4 Optical Transceiver ) and standards’ development and improvement are mainly around the low cost and low power consumption. QSFP28 transceiver meets these requirements, following will compare QSFP28 with other 100G transceivers from port density, power consumption, and cost.

※ Port density
The first generation 100G transceiver is CFP transceiver,having large volume, then is CFP2 and CFP4. CFP4 is the latest generation of 100G transceiver, its width is only 1/4 of CFP transceiver. While QSFP28 transceiver’s package is smaller than CFP4, this means QSFP28 transceiver has a higher port density on the switch.

※ Power consumption
QSFP28 transceiver’s power consumption is usually less than 3.5W, while other 100G transceivers are usually between 6W and 24W. Therefore, QSFP28 transceiver’s power consumption is much lower than others.

※ Cost
Now the data center is mainly 10G network architecture, its interconnect solutions are mainly 10GBASE-SR transceiver and duplex LC multimode patch cord. It will save a lot of time and cost if directly upgrade to 40/100G network on the basis of the existing 10G network architecture.

Although QSFP28 transceiver has many advantages, it is just one of the solutions for 100G network. For data centers and server room and other specific applications, suitable is the best. So other 100G transceivers will also have a place in the 100G network. ETU-link Technology Co., Ltd believes that QSFP28 series transceiver brings new solutions for 100G applications and will promote 100G to develop more rapidly.