Major 10GbE rollouts lack system electronics

Interoperability testing is holding up the availability of 10Gbit/s copper cabling systems

Structured cabling firm Systimax today launched its first shielded cable design in Europe. The Systimax GigaSpeed X10D Foiled Twisted Pair (FTP) supports the IEEE 802.3an 10GBase-T standard and is capable of 10Gbit/s data transfer up to 100 metres over twisted copper pairs.

The product is mainly aimed at the German market, where firms normally specify shielded cabling systems for their network rollouts, but it is also available to UK firms that prefer shielded cabling to unshielded systems.

Systimax marketing director James Donovan said, “Our preference is for unshielded twisted pair (UTP) cabling, but we have customers whose preference is for a screened solution. FTP may suit some industrial applications where there is a lot of high frequency interference, and also there are customers who traditionally always used screened cabling.”

The new offering complements Systimax’s LazrSpeed 10GbE optical fibre kit and its copper-based 10GbE GigaSpeed X10D UTP-based cabling systems.

The IEEE 802.3an 10GBase-T standard for structured copper twisted pair cabling capable of 10Gbit/s data transfer was ratified in June, raising hopes among cabling firms such as Systimax, Brand Rex and Siemon that the technology will gain mainstream acceptance.

“I haven’t got detailed numbers on take-up, but it’s my belief that the market is still waiting for the electronics to appear. We’re certainly seeing some of our major customers future-proofing buildings by putting our cabling in, but although the IEEE standard was ratified in June we’ve yet to see 10GbE electronics to fully appear,” said Donovan.

Force10 Networks’ corporate marketing vice-president Steve Garrison agreed that take up is being limited by the lack of 10GbE electronic systems for copper connectivity, but he noted that there are firms moving quickly to develop these systems.

“Companies like Solarflare and KeyEye are racing to ship standards-compliant components, but they have to be interoperable and we’re looking to next June at the earliest for this. They’re Asic- [application specific integrated circuit] based systems and at the end of the day no one wants users to be debugging the technology,” Garrison said.