PEX8718, PCI Express Gen3 Switch, 16 Lanes, 5 Ports

© PLX Technology, www.plxtech.com

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10Sep12; v1.0

Highlights

o 16-lane, 5-port PCIe Gen3 switch

- Integrated 8.0 GT/s SerDes

o Typical Power: 2.9 Watts

o Standards Compliant

- PCI Express Base Specification, r3.0

(compatible w/ PCIe r1.0a/1.1 & 2.0)

- PCI Power Management Spec, r1.2

- Microsoft Windows Logo Compliant

- Supports Access Control Services

- Dynamic link-width control

- Dynamic SerDes speed control

o High Performance

 performancePAK

 Multicast

 Dynamic Buffer/FC Credit Pool

- Non-blocking switch fabric

- Full line rate on all ports

- Cut-Thru with 154ns max packet latency

- 2KB Max Payload Size

o Multi-Host & Fail-Over Support

- 1 Configurable Non-Transparent ports

- Failover with Non-Transparent port

o Quality of Service (QoS)

- Traffic Class Queuing

- Eight traffic classes per port

- Weighted round-robin source

port arbitration

o Reliability, Availability, Serviceability

 visionPAK

 Per Port Performance Monitoring

 SerDes Eye Capture

 PCIe Packet Generator

 Error Injection and Loopback

- 1 Hot-Plug port with native HP Signals

- SSC Isolation on up to 4 ports

- ECRC and Poison bit support

- Data Path parity

- Memory (RAM) Error Correction

- Advanced Error Reporting

- Port Status bits and GPIO available

- JTAG AC/DC boundary scan

The ExpressLane

switching capability enabling users to connect multiple hosts to their

respective endpoints via scalable, high bandwidth, non-blocking

interconnection to a wide variety of applications including servers, storage

systems, and communications platforms. The PEX8718 is well suited for

fan-out, aggregation, and peer-to-peer applications.

Multi-Host Architecture

The PEX8718 employs an enhanced architecture, which allows users to

configure the device in legacy single-host mode or multi-host mode with up

to two host ports by using NT capability. This powerful architectural

enhancement enables users to build PCIe based systems to support high-

availability, failover, redundant and clustered systems.

High Performance & Low Packet Latency

The PEX8718 architecture supports packet cut-thru with a maximum

latency of 154ns (x8 to x8). This, combined with large packet memory,

flexible common buffer/FC credit pool and non-blocking internal switch

architecture, provides full line rate on all ports for performance-hungry

applications such as servers and switch fabrics. The low latency enables

applications to achieve high throughput and performance. In addition to low

latency, the device supports a packet payload size of up to 2048 bytes,

enabling the user to achieve even higher throughput.

Data Integrity

The PEX8718 provides end-to-end CRC (ECRC) protection and Poison bit

support to enable designs that require end-to-end data integrity. PLX also

supports data path parity and memory (RAM) error correction circuitry

throughout the internal data paths as packets pass through the switch.

Flexible Configuration

The PEX8718’s 5 ports can be configured to

lane widths of x2, x4, or x8. Flexible buffer

allocation, along with the device's flexible

packet flow control, maximizes throughput

for applications where more traffic flows in

the downstream, rather than upstream,

direction. Any port can be designated as the

upstream port, which can be changed

dynamically. Figure 1 shows some of the

PEX8718’s common port configurations in

legacy Single-Host mode.