SFP28 and QSFP28

[j.a.m.e.s]

Dear All,

Could anyone tell me if as a general rule:

1.  SFP28 ports can accommodate SFP and SFP+ optics natively with no breakout cable or adapter needed? And, would one need to run a command on the port to get these 1Gbit and 10Gbit optics accepted?

2. Can QSFP28 ports generally accommodate the 40Gbit QSFP+ optics natively?

3. Can the QSA adapter (CVR-QSFP-SFP10G) be used inside a QSFP28 port to drop the speeds down to 1Gbit/10Gbit? Again, would any commands be needed to do this?

I ask in the context of the N9K-X97160YC-EX line card, which offers 48x SFP28 and 4x QSFP28. In addition, I realise there are some minimum NX-OS versions, but if anyone is familiar with this card, are there any restrictions around using different speed optics in adjacent ports?

Thank you in advance for taking the time to respond.

Regards

James.

[Bill Longman]

Q2 - The QSFP28 can support ODU2, ODU3 and ODU4 natively as well as be broken out into ODU2 and ODU1 lanes. Support for ODU0 will be available in upcoming versions of 6.1 IOS-XR

[j.a.m.e.s]

Hi Bill,

Thank you for your response. It sounds like there is quite a lot of flexibility in these newer standards. 

In your answer to Q1, could you clarify whether this means I can plug in an SFP or SFP+ directly into the SFP28 port and run a command to operate at 1Gbit/10Gbit (bearing in mind the transceiver matrix you reference above)? Additionally, could you share more information about how to configure the "port mode" please?
Regards

James.

[Bill Longman · Accepted solution]

You can set port mode on an optical controller with the port-mode command. For example,

controller Optics0/1/0/1
  port-mode Otn framing odu3

The available framing speeds will be determined by the actual pluggable in the port. You can determine those with a show controller command. For ethernet, you can similarly choose different framings for the speed you need. Simply assign port-mode to Ethernet instead of Otn.

RP/0/RP1:NCS4K1#show controllers Optics 0/1/0/1 portmode Capabilties | inc Ethernet
6       Ethernet       OPU Flex framing type GFP-F mapping type           05 (GFP mapping)                                  None
6       Ethernet       Packet framing type   None mapping type            NA                                                10GE
6       Ethernet       OPU2 framing type     GFP-F mapping type           05 (GFP mapping)                                  None
6       Ethernet       OPU2e framing type    BMP mapping type             03 (Bit synchronous CBR mapping)                  None
6       Ethernet       OPU2 framing type     GFP-F-Extended mapping type  09 (GFP mapping into OPU2)                        None
6       Ethernet       OPU Flex framing type GFP-F mapping type           09 (GFP mapping into OPU2)                        10GE
6       Ethernet       OPU Flex framing type GFP-F mapping type           09 (GFP mapping into OPU2)                        None

[j.a.m.e.s]

Hi Bill,

Thank you for your assistance, this is very helpful. I have a few platform specific questions around the Nexus 9k, so I will mark your answer as correct and create a new post in the Switching forum.

Regards

James.

[Bill Longman]

Q1 - in general, you would need to assign the port mode to the pluggable before use.

[Bill Longman]

I'm not sure if you have the pluggable module matrix page or not. Find it here.

[Joanna -10Gtek]

I'm not sure if you have the pluggable module or not, link of sfp28 and QSFP28 are available.

www.10Gtek.com