XENPAK is a multisource agreement (MSA), instigated by

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and

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, that defines a

fiber-optic An optical fiber, or optical fibre in Commonwealth English, is a flexible, transparent fiber made by drawing glass (silica) or plastic to a diameter slightly thicker than that of a human hair. Optical fibers are used most often as a means t ...

or wired

transceiver In radio communication, a transceiver is an electronic device which is a combination of a radio ''trans''mitter and a re''ceiver'', hence the name. It can both transmit and receive radio waves using an antenna, for communication purposes. The ...

module which conforms to the 10 Gigabit Ethernet (10GbE) standard of the

Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) is a 501(c)(3) professional association for electronic engineering and electrical engineering (and associated disciplines) with its corporate office in New York City and its operation ...

(IEEE) 802.3 working group. The MSA group received input from both transceiver and equipment manufacturers during the definition process. XENPAK has been replaced by more compact devices providing the same functionality.

History

The XENPAK MSA was publicly announced on March 12, 2001 and the first revision of the document was publicly released on May 7, 2001. The most recent revision of the MSA, Issue 3.0, was published on September 18, 2002. The result covered all physical media dependent (PMD) types defined by the IEEE at that time for 802.3ae 10GbE. Although the XENPAK agreement received early support, its modules were thought to be overly large for high density applications. , vendors generally changed to use

XFP The XFP (10 gigabit small form-factor pluggable) is a standard for transceivers for high-speed computer network and telecommunication links that use optical fiber. It was defined by an industry group in 2002, along with its interface to other e ...

modules for longer distances, and

Enhanced small form-factor pluggable transceiver Small Form-factor Pluggable connected to a pair of fiber-optic cables Small Form-factor Pluggable (SFP) is a compact, hot-pluggable network interface module format used for both telecommunication and data communications applications. An SF ...

s, known as

SFP+ Small Form-factor Pluggable connected to a pair of fiber-optic cables Small Form-factor Pluggable (SFP) is a compact, hot-pluggable network interface module format used for both telecommunication and data communications applications. An SF ...

modules, for higher densities. The newer modules have a purely

serial interface In computing, a serial port is a serial communication interface through which information transfers in or out sequentially one bit at a time. This is in contrast to a parallel port, which communicates multiple bits simultaneously in parallel. T ...

, compared to the four "lane"

XAUI 10 Gigabit Attachment Unit Interface (XAUI ) is a standard for extending the XGMII (10 Gigabit Media Independent Interface) between the MAC and PHY layer of 10 Gigabit Ethernet (10GbE) defined in Clause 47 of the IEEE 802.3 standard. The name i ...

interface used in XENPAK.

Description

XENPAK modules were supplied for physical layer interfaces supporting

multi-mode A transverse mode of electromagnetic radiation is a particular electromagnetic field pattern of the radiation in the plane perpendicular (i.e., transverse) to the radiation's propagation direction. Transverse modes occur in radio waves and microwav ...

and single mode fiber optic cables and

InfiniBand InfiniBand (IB) is a computer networking communications standard used in high-performance computing that features very high throughput and very low latency. It is used for data interconnect both among and within computers. InfiniBand is also used ...

copper cables with connectors known as CX4. Transmission distances vary from to for fiber and up to on CX4 cable. Newer XENPAKs using the 10GBase-LX4 standard operated using multiple wavelengths on legacy multi-mode fibres at distances of up to , eliminating the need to reinstall cable in a building when upgrading certain 1 Gbit/s circuits to 10 Gbit/s.

Replacement form factors

The XENPAK form factor was initially supported by numerous network equipment manufacturers and module makers. However, advances in technology led to more compact form factors for 10 Gigabit Ethernet applications. Soon after the standard was introduced in 2001, two related standards emerged: XPAK and X2. These two standards have the same electrical interface as XENPAK (known as

) but different mechanical properties. The XPAK group was announced on March 19, 2002, first published their specification on May 24, 2002, and version 2.3 on August 1, 2003. The X2 group was announced on July 22, 2002, and published their specification on February 13, 2003. Issue 3.0 of the XENPAK MSA was transferred to the

Small Form Factor committee The Small Form Factor Committee (SFF) is an ''ad hoc'' electronics industry group formed to quickly develop interoperability specifications (as a complement to the traditional standards process). The SFF Committee was formed in 1990 to define the ...

as document INF-8474 on September 18, 2002. The XENPAK MSA website existed through the end of 2008.

Use with modern optics

As of 2014, adapters are available which permit use of any modern

10Gb optic in a XENPAK interface.

References

{{Ethernet Hot-swappable transceiver