We present test results and characterization of a data transmission system
based on a last generation FPGA and a commercial QSFP+ (Quad Small Form
Pluggable +) module. QSFP+ standard defines a hot-pluggable transceiver
available in copper or optical cable assemblies for an aggregated bandwidth of
up to 40 Gbps. We implemented a complete testbench based on a commercial
development card mounting an Altera Stratix IV FPGA with 24 serial transceivers
at 8.5 Gbps, together with a custom mezzanine hosting three QSFP+ modules. We
present test results and signal integrity measurements up to an aggregated
bandwidth of 12 Gbps.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figures, Published on JINST Journal of Instrumentation
proceedings of Topical Workshop on Electronics for Particle Physics 2010,
20-24 September 2010, Aachen, Germany(R Ammendola et al 2010 JINST 5 C12019