Thecus C10GT ethernet card - Anyone got one of these?

[Mark R]

This is quite an interesting card - the first 10 Gb ethernet card to break the $500 barrier. Not only that, but it gives you 2x 10 Gb ports (one copper, and one modular - just add a transceiver for Cat6 cable or optical fiber).

I'm not sure it's quite prosumer level yet, but it's getting close.

Switches also appear to be coming down nicely in price - you can now get 10GbE switches for under $500/port (prices based on a 72 port 1U switch - OK. I accept, that's not really home equipment). However, small scale 10 Gb switches don't really appear to have hit the market at all - it seems to be aimed fairly squarely a data centers.

 

[yinan]

I cant wait till 10GB gets cheaper. Will make syncing media libraries and running VMs off of network shares so much better.

 

[cmetz]

What we need are cheap, low-power 10GBaseT. Once that hits the market, the floodgates will open. Same thing happened with 1000BaseT. Once it got to its third generation on the market and got the cost/power/size down, the floodgates opened. I remember buying one of if not the first model of SOHO 5-port 1000BaseT switch and putting on an IXIA to test - as I and my co-workers were in total disbelief that a $100 switch could actually move 5Gb/s full line rate under worst-case conditions (it really did). This was when 8-port 2U 1G enterprise switches were still many thousands of dollars.

FYI, the first-gen Intel AT NIC TDP = 25W, second-gen Intel AT2 NIC TDP = 15W, if the third-gen can come in at 5-7.5W we're getting to LOM territory. 25W/port per end (~50W per link) is clearly a no-go when you scale up to even a modest server farm, while at 5W/port per end you'd be pretty compelling. And from a cost perspective, getting the heat down is a big deal - heat sinks and fans have a cost of goods that can't be reduced much.

Soon. It's coming close to within prosumer reach.