Inter La Ken Technology White Paper
Inter La Ken Technology White Paper
Inter La Ken Technology White Paper
08 March 2007
© 2007. Cisco Systems, Inc., Cortina Systems, Inc., and Silicon Logic Engineering, Inc. All rights reserved.
Interlaken Contents
White Paper
08 March 2007
Contents
1.0 Abstract .......................................................................................................................................... 3
Figures
1 Effective Bandwidth Scales with the Number of Lanes ................................................................... 4
2 Flexibility of Interlaken Allows ICs of Different Capacities to Connect ............................................ 5
3 Flexibility of Interlaken Allows Multiple Connection Options............................................................ 5
4 Lane Striping ................................................................................................................................... 7
5 Non-interleaved Transfers ............................................................................................................... 7
6 Interleaved Transfers....................................................................................................................... 8
7 Burst Control Word with Channel Field ...........................................................................................8
8 Burst Control Word with Flow Control Field..................................................................................... 9
9 Out-of-Band Flow Control................................................................................................................ 9
10 Burst CRC24 Coverage .................................................................................................................10
11 Metaframe .....................................................................................................................................10
12 Diagnostic CRC32 Coverage ........................................................................................................12
1.0 Abstract
Serial link technology has multiplied device interconnect bandwidths in advanced
communications equipment. Interlaken is an interconnect protocol optimized for high-
bandwidth and reliable packet transfers. It uses bundles of serial links to create a logical
connection between components with multiple channels, backpressure capability, and
data-integrity protection to boost the performance of communications equipment. This
white paper gives an overview of Interlaken’s features and an implementation case study.
2.3 Scalability
Interlaken’s scalability is achieved by its ability to run over a varying number of lanes. The
following two parameters determine the connection bandwidth:
1. Number of serial lanes in the interface
Any number of serial links (or “lanes”) can be used in an Interlaken interface. Effective
bandwidth corresponds directly with the number of lanes. For example, an eight-lane
interface can carry twice the payload of a four-lane interface running at the same per-
lane speed, as shown in Figure 1.
2.4 Flexibility
Interlaken’s ability to run over a varying number of lanes provides high flexibility in
component interconnects. Different-capacity ICs in a single physical interface can be split
up into multiple lower-speed physical interfaces. For example, as shown in Figure 3, eight
physical lanes can be organized as a single 40 Gbps interface, two 20 Gbps interfaces, or
four 10 Gbps interfaces. In this example, a higher-bandwidth IC can therefore connect to
multiple lower-bandwidth ICs to provide an increased system port count.
2.5 Channelization
In many applications it is important to provide many logical channels across a physical
interface. For example, different channels can be used to carry traffic destined for
separate physical ports, logical SONET channels, or traffic priority flows.
Interlaken is designed to natively support 256 channels, extendable up to 64 K channels,
by using a dual-use channel-field extension that meets the requirements of most
applications.
2.6 Resiliency
Bit errors can occur across any serial link. Interlaken minimizes the impact of bit errors by
avoiding scrambling error multiplication and by using strong cyclic redundancy check
(CRC) protection for each transfer. The health of each serial link is continuously and
transparently monitored.
3.0 Functionality
Channel 1 2 1
Channel 2
2 1
Channel 3
Channel 4
Because full-length packets are sent, buffers on each side of the interface must be
capable of absorbing data on the other channels while a packet is transferred on one
channel. Since full packets are sent without fragmentation, no reassembly is needed
on the receiving side.
• Interleaved packet transmission:
Each channel transmits only a small fragment of a packet before moving to the next
channel (see Figure 6).
Channel 1 2 1
Channel 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 1 1 1 1 1
Channel 3
Channel 4
3.3 Channelization
Interlaken is designed to support multi-channel or multi-port applications with ease. The
burst control word has a channel field that contains the ID of the channel or port being
carried across the interface. Through this mechanism, many applications can be
supported.
In a trivial but still common application, a single port or channel is carried across the
interface, one burst at a time, with the channel field always set to the same value. A more
typical application might be a 24-port Ethernet MAC. In this case, the traffic on each port
would be sent with a unique channel ID on the Interlaken interface. At the extreme end,
applications that support thousands of channels can be supported by using the dual-use
field combined with the normal 8-bit channel field. In this way, up to 64 K channels can be
supported. This is enough for even the most demanding applications such as highly
channelized SONET/SDH interfaces.
The layout of the burst control word is shown in Figure 7 (with the channel and dual-use
fields highlighted).
1
Burst Cont Flow Control Channel Dual Use CRC24
0
1
Burst Cont Flow Control Channel Dual Use CRC24
0
Out-of-band flow control is carried on a simple 3-bit bus. This is more appropriate when
the applications are unidirectional or when the source and sink are not in the same device.
Figure 9 shows the out-of-band flow control bus.
FC_CLK
FC_DATA … Ch0 Ch1 Ch2 Ch3 CRC0 CRC1 CRC2 CRC3 Ch0 Ch1 …
FC_SYNC
010 001 001 001 001 001 001 001 001 010 001 001 001 001 010 010 001 001 001 001 001 001 001 001 001 010 010 010 010 001 001 001 001 001 001 001 001 001 001 001 001
Control
Control
Control
Control
Control
Control
Control
Control
Byte 0 D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D
Byte 1 D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D
FC FC FC FC FC FC FC FC
Byte 2 D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D
Byte 3 Ch D D D D D D D D Ch D D D D Ch Ch D D D D D D D D D Ch Ch Ch Ch D D D D D D D D D D D D
Byte 4 DU D D D D D D D D DU D D D D DU DU D D D D D D D D D DU DU DU DU D D D D D D D D D D D D
Byte 5 D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D
CRC24
CRC24
CRC24
CRC24
CRC24
CRC24
CRC24
CRC24
Byte 6 D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D
Byte 7 D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D
3.6 Metaframes
As the control and data words are striped across the available serial lanes, each lane
encapsulates those words into its own “metaframe.” A metaframe includes a
synchronization word, scrambler-state word, skip words, and a diagnostic word as shown
in Figure 11.
Figure 11 Metaframe
Synchronization
Synchronization
Scram State
Scram State
Diagnostic
Diagnostic
Skip
Skip
3.8 Scrambling
Interlaken uses a scrambler to provide sufficient clock transitions for the receiver to
recover the transmitted clock. A set/reset scrambler was chosen instead of a
self-synchronous scrambler to prevent error multiplication at the receiver. The
combination of error multiplication and the striping of data across many SerDes lanes
would make it difficult to ensure that errored packets could be adequately detected.
With a set/reset scrambler, errors are not multiplied on the receiver side and therefore are
more likely to be detected. Since Interlaken uses a set/reset scrambler, there must be a
methodology to synchronize the receiver to the scrambler-state. As part of the
metaframe’s scrambler-state word, the scrambler state is fed forward to the receiver. The
receiver uses the recovered scrambler-state to synchronize its scrambler and then
de-scramble the data stream.
Diag
Synchronization
Synchronization
Diag
Scram State
Scram State
Skip
Skip
Control and Data Words
CRC32
CRC32
Typically 2K Words (16k Bytes)
3.11 AC Coupling
High-speed AC-coupled SerDes interfaces pose a number of electrical challenges.
Among the challenges is maintaining a DC balance on the line so that the receiver can
correctly decode the high-speed stream. Some codes such as 8B/10B maintain DC
balance over a very short duration (several 10B symbols). Other codes such as 64B/66B
maintain DC balance only statistically by scrambling the data. If a code is not balanced
then at the receiver there will be an offset (called baseline wander). This voltage offset,
depending on the link budget, can cause errors on the line. Simulations show that with a
code like 64B/66B there can be a DC imbalance of thousands of bits. For some links the
DC offset created by this is not a problem, but for more demanding links such an offset
might not be tolerable.
Since Interlaken is designed for many different applications, an extra inversion bit in the
code (hence the 64B/67B) has been added to the protocol to better control DC balance.
This extra inversion bit allows the protocol to maintain DC balance within a disparity of
plus or minus 65 bits.
Interlaken can be built on top of high-speed SerDes from either ASIC vendors or FPGA
vendors. This enables field programmable gate array (FPGA) prototyping using the same
Interlaken IP core that the eventual ASIC product will employ. Also, systems that are built
using both FPGAs and ASICs will be able to use the same IP core in all their devices,
improving the reuse of both the IP and its associated firmware.
5.0 Conclusion
When compared to available interconnect protocols, Interlaken offers many advantages in
scalability, reduced pin count, and data integrity. Its channelization, flow control, and burst
interleaving features make it appropriate for a wide variety of applications. Finally, the
availability of a third party IP core minimizes the cost of adopting the new technology and
makes Interlaken the obvious choice for next-generation communications equipment.