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Analyzing network reliability up to 800G - Impact of SNR thresholds on BER for Coherent (16QAM) and Non-Coherent (PAM4) high speed transceivers under environmental variations#

ITNOG9 digest Program Core pick 19–20 May 2025

Slides

Thomas Weible

  • Why: Transceiver reliability under real environmental conditions (temperature, SNR margin) is exactly the kind of physical-layer grounding the PM values when evaluating pluggable strategies — especially at 400G/800G where coherent-vs-PAM4 is a live architectural decision for DC and DCI links.
  • What: An analysis of how SNR thresholds map to BER for coherent (16QAM) and direct-detect (PAM4) transceivers at speeds up to 800G, under environmental variation. No abstract was published and no source text was extracted, so the depth of the empirical work (sample size, test conditions) cannot be verified from the program. (title only — no abstract available)
  • How: Presumably comparative BER-vs-SNR characterization of the two modulation families under temperature/environmental stress, per the title; methodology unconfirmed.
  • Where applicable: Relevant to link-budget and transceiver-selection decisions in DCI/metro. Note the speaker is from Flexoptix (transceiver vendor), so treat conclusions with the usual vendor-analysis caution.