800G HiWire AECs decrease cabling volume by up to 75% less over traditional direct-attached copper cables while improving reliability and consuming 50% less power than optical cabling.
Credo, a global leader in connectivity solutions for 100G, 200G, 400G and 800G port-enabled networks, has announced the new 800G HiWire LP CLOS Active Electrical Cable (AEC) designed for distributed, disaggregated chassis (DDCs) used in hyperscale infrastructure.
This 8 x 112G per lane copper cable interconnect is the first member of Credo’s 800G AEC family.
At 400G and higher, AECs offer greater signal integrity and break through the physical weight, bend radius and range limits of passive copper Direct Attached Cables (DACs).
AECs also lower the power and economic barriers of Active Optical Cables (AOCs). The hot-swappable, front-plane cables enable a data center infrastructure shift from homogenous chassis designs with tightly coupled operating systems to DDC implementations.
DDC architectures deliver the freedom to mix-and-match servers, switches and operating systems to suit specific performance, power and price points.
“Credo sees 800G as the point where passive DACs hit the wall – they are far too thick and rigid for many customer applications and impose a high cost and engineering burden on switch manufacturers,” said Don Barnetson, Vice President of Product at Credo. “Credo’s new 800G LP CLOS AECs route like Cat6 cables and offer up to 100 times better reliability and half the power of optical cabling solutions. The future of connectivity is clearly purple.”
At just 32AWG, 800G AECs are about as thick as standard Cat6e cabling. This narrower gauge reduces cabling volume by up to 75% versus passive copper DACs. LP CLOS AECs are available in lengths up to 2.5m. Credo’s new AECs consume half as much power as optical cabling solutions and feature superior reliability with up to 100 million hours of Mean Time Between Failure (MTBF).
The LP CLOS AEC 800 PAM4 cables come in QSFP-DD800 (Quad Small Form Factor Pluggable Multi-Source Agreement Group) and OSFP (Octal Small Form Factor Pluggable) types. Integrated Credo retimers enable the cable to achieve high performance without needing additional external components, simplifying the design and lowering system cost and power.
As with all Credo AECs, the new 800G AECs are easily identified by their distinctive HiWire purple color sheath. Credo is sampling the LP CLOS AEC 800 now with general availability expected in early 2022.
