Sep 17 2010
Provider of semiconductor-based connectivity solutions, PLX Technology, has delivered a live demonstration of the world’s first PCI Express Gen 3 switch moving over the fiber-optic cable. The demonstration was conducted at the Intel Developer forum.
PCIe switch
The Gen3 switch transfers the data at 8 Gbp/s over the optical cable in combination with a new flash-based, server-deployed memory layer. The demonstration illustrates the use of PCIe Gen 3 switch as a box-to-box interlink for cloud computing and data center applications. The cloud computing and data center use low-priced optics and advanced PCI Express to allow server and GPGPU clustering applications.
PLX used the PCIe Gen 3 silicon in the demonstration that showed how Original Equipment Manufacturers of networking, storage and server systems can protect their designs using Gen 3 technology. The optical cable element used in the demonstration contained prototype boards with PCIe signals to illuminate on the optical cable. The memory tier used in the demonstration is a Fusion-io ioDrive Duo that featured a PLX switch on board. The PCIe-based Fusion-io is an innovative solution and is being used by major storage and server companies.
PCIe, when used over a fiber-optic cable, has the potential to provide high performance at reduced price ratio when compared to existing PCIe cable. The PCIe Gen 3 switch can transfer 64 GB of data at each second, which is six times greater than the 10 Gbit Ethernet and also requires less power.