what is line rate and wire speed?

[gavinhans]

what is line rate and wire speed? what's difference between them?

[Bhavin Yadav]

can you please specify what hardware you are talking about? Is this about MDS / Nexus switches? There may be different explanations. 

[gavinhans]

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@Bhavin Yadav wrote:

can you please specify what hardware you are talking about? Is this about MDS / Nexus switches? There may be different explanations. 

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Nexus

[Sergiu.Daniluk]

Hi @gavinhans 

Although many people are using these terms interchangeably, where is a slight difference between them.

According to RFC 8238 section-5.1:

The line rate or physical-layer frame rate is the maximum capacity to send frames of a specific size at the transmit clock frequency of the DUT. 

The term "nominal value of line rate" (which in my opinion is the one called wire speed) defines the maximum speed capability for the given port -- for example (expressed as Gigabit Ethernet), 1 GE, 10 GE, 40 GE, 100 GE.

<snip>

Line rate SHOULD be measured in frames per second (FPS).

Hope it helps,

Sergiu

[gavinhans]

what's DUT?

[Christopher Hart]

Hi Gavin!

"DUT" is an acronym for "Device Under Test". You'll see this terminology (along with similar terms, such as UUT [Unit Under Test] and SUT [System Under Test]) used in the networking world occasionally, especially when working with network testing equipment (such as traffic generators and such.)

Thank you!

-Christopher