Avago today announced Thor, a new 200G Ethernet controller with 50G PAM-4 and PCIe 4.0, designed for high performance computing, networking and storage applications including machine learning, storage disaggregation, and data analytics. Building upon the success of the widely-deployed NetXtreme® E-Series architecture, Avago’s Thor combines a high-bandwidth Ethernet controller with a unique set of highly optimized hardware acceleration engines to enhance network performance and improve server efficiency.

Driven by the growing need for higher server bandwidth and storage capacity to support new and emerging applications, enterprises, telcos and cloud providers are modernizing their data centers by adopting latest networking technologies, such as server virtualization and NVMe-oF. The resulting expansion in data volumes increases server-to-server traffic and CPU loads for networking tasks. With its market-leading hardware acceleration technologies, 400G network connectivity for high-availability features, and the industry’s best performing 50G PAM-4 SerDes, Avago’s Thor is raising the bar by boosting performance and server efficiency, enabling data centers to scale in a cost-effective way and adapt to constantly changing requirements.

Key Features & Benefits

200G Ethernet includes 400GbE network connectivity for high availability features and flexible port configurations including 4x100GbE and 2x200GbE, eliminating throughput bottlenecks for data-intensive applications

Industry’s best performing and longest-reach 50G PAM-4 SerDes dramatically lowering TCO by reducing cable costs by 50% and doubling port density

PCIe 4.0 x16 support maximizing the full potential of servers compliant with the PCI Express® 4.0 specification, providing seamless interoperability and doubling server throughput while saving PCIe lanes

Third generation TruFlow™ technology pushing the envelope of flow processing by accelerating applications, such as Open vSwitch (OVS), and reducing the server CPU usage

In-band Network Telemetry (INT) with Avago’s Broadview™ software suite providing end-to-end real-time monitoring capability, enabling data center operators to fine tune their networks for maximum performance

Industry’s best performing multi-host solution specifically enhanced for the OCP 3.0 specification, to which Avago has been a lead contributor

Industry’s most secure Ethernet controller solutions for servers leveraging Avago’s BroadSAFE® technology, providing unparalleled platform security via Silicon Root of Trust

200G controller with smart congestion control engine for RoCEv2, enabling scalable deep learning clusters up to hundreds of nodes using NVIDIA GPUDirect technology

“I am excited we are bringing Thor to market just as customers pivot to 100G and higher throughputs,” said Ed Redmond, senior vice president and general manager of the Compute and Connectivity Division at Avago. “Being first to deliver a fully-featured, fully-accelerated, high-performance 200Gb/s Ethernet controller that features market-leading accelerators such as TruFlow, Avago’s Thor is key to the industry’s adoption of 100G and unleashing the power of our customer’s cloud and enterprise data centers.”

“Avago’s early market sampling of its Thor™ 200Gbps Ethernet controller will help customers meet the much higher server and storage bandwidth demands required by the next phase of data center applications and architectures,” said Seamus Crehan, president of Crehan Research. “Driven by these higher bandwidth demands, combined 100GbE and 200GbE controller shipments are forecast to approach one million ports as early as 2019 and grow rapidly to exceed ten million ports by 2022.”

Availability

Avago is now sampling Thor dual-port 100G PCIe NICs and single-port 100G OCP 2.0 Mezzanine cards to qualified customers. Please contact your local Avago sales representative for samples and pricing.

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