Keysight extends digital 800G test portfolio to improve power efficiency in data centres

Author: Beatrice

Keysight Technologies has expanded the company’s portfolio of high-speed digital 800G test solutions to enable the optical transceiver ecosystem to improve the power efficiency of components and modules used in data centre equipment. 

Hyperscale data centres are adopting 800G, the latest data centre connectivity technology, to address a rise in the use of cloud-native, 5G, artificial intelligence (AI) and internet of things (IoT), as well as data-hungry applications such as video conferencing, streaming and digital entertainment. The latest addition to Keysight’s existing portfolio of 800G test solutions are new design and validation solutions that support multimode interfaces, which are critical for an energy efficient data centre infrastructure. The 800G multimode test solutions uniquely support high-speed data interconnect speeds of up to 100 gigabit per second (Gbps).

“An ever-increasing growth in data traffic, compounded with data centres’ need to reduce their energy footprint, has prompted Keysight to launch the new 800G multimode test solutions,” says Dr. Joachim Peerlings, vice president of Network and Data Centre solutions at Keysight Technologies. “These new solutions will help reduce power consumption in data centre equipment. Energy conservation and efficiency in data centres has a significant positive impact on the health of the planet.”

In December 2020, Keysight launched industry-first 800G test solutions to help speed development of next generation data centre technologies. The 800G multimode test solutions enable users to verify the performance of a wide range of optical transceiver modules and components, including vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers (VCSELs), photodiodes, modulator drivers, transimpedance amplifiers (TIAs) and physical layer (PHY) chips.

The extended portfolio supports 400G and 800G design validation, in accordance with standards defined by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), across the entire product lifecycle, from early research and development to manufacturing. Industry-leading test capabilities from Keysight include:

• Multimode component characterisation using Keysight’s N4373E lightwave component analyser
• Conformance and interoperability validation using Keysight’s N1077B 64Gbaud multimode optical and electrical clock recovery solutions
• Transceiver module performance evaluation using Keysight’s A400GE-QDD and G800GE layer 1 multiport test solutions.