China Telecom Guangzhou's Research Institute and Huawei have completed the first 400 Gigabit Ethernet (400GE) test, confirming that the technology possesses the qualities required for commercial deployment.
The tests over China Telecom Guangzhou's network and terminal key laboratory verified 400GE port functions including line-speed forwarding, multi-service stacking, and fault reporting.
China Telecom Guangzhou Research Institute was responsible for determining network requirements and test case design and overseeing the test. Huawei supplied backbone routers supporting 400GE port forwarding.
Huawei said that under real-world network traffic conditions at full bandwidth 400GE ports experienced zero packet loss in line-speed forwarding.
Multi-service stack tests also indicated that bundled 400GE and 100GE ports could implement precise load balancing, that the transmission distance was as far as 10 km and that protocol-based forwarding, loopback and fault reporting functions were all normal.
The trial was conducted as part of the two companies' 400GE R&D partnership, which they announced in 2016. This partnership is aimed at developing live-network service requirements, application scenarios, standards formulation, and technology R&D.
"In the final release of the 400GE technology standard, China Telecom Guangzhou Research Institute and Huawei performed the world’s first 400GE port tests based on requirements of the live network, realizing a combination of network requirements and technical R&D,” China Telecom Guangzhou Research Institute IP technology research owner Zhu Yongqing said.
“The test results reached expectations. In the future, we will cooperate with Huawei and other partners to promote development of the 400GE industry and maturation of the supply chain, ultimately driving the development of China Telecom’s network and the national broadband infrastructure."
The standardization process for 400GE is expected to be complete by the end of the year.