History
The result of research done at Xerox PARC in the early 1970s, Ethernet evolved into a widely implemented physical and link layer protocol. Fast Ethernet increased speed from 10 to 100 megabits per second (Mbit/s). Gigabit Ethernet was the next iteration, increasing the speed to 1000 Mbit/s. The initial standard for gigabit Ethernet was produced by the IEEE in June 1998 as IEEE 802.3z, and required optical fiber. 802.3z is commonly referred to as 1000BASE-X, where -X refers to either -CX, -SX, -LX, or (non-standard) -ZX.
IEEE 802.3ab, ratified in 1999, defines gigabit Ethernet transmission over unshielded twisted pair (UTP) category 5, 5e, or 6 cabling and became known as 1000BASE-T. With the ratification of 802.3ab, gigabit Ethernet became a desktop technology as organizations could use their existing copper cabling infrastructure.
IEEE 802.3ah, ratified in 2004 added two more gigabit fiber standards, 1000BASE-LX10 (which was already widely implemented as vendor specific extension) and 1000BASE-BX10. This was part of a larger group of protocols known as Ethernet in the First Mile.
Initially, gigabit Ethernet was deployed in high-capacity backbone network links (for instance, on a high-capacity campus network). In 2000, Apple's Power Mac G4 and PowerBook G4 were the first mass produced personal computers featuring the 1000BASE-T connection. It quickly became a built-in feature in many other computers.
Higher bandwidth 10 Gigabit Ethernet standards have since become available as the IEEE ratified a fiber-based standard in 2002, and a twisted pair standard in 2006. As of 2009 10Gb Ethernet is replacing 1Gb as the backbone network and has begun to migrate down to high-end server systems.
Read more about this topic: Gigabit Ethernet
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“The history of work has been, in part, the history of the worker’s body. Production depended on what the body could accomplish with strength and skill. Techniques that improve output have been driven by a general desire to decrease the pain of labor as well as by employers’ intentions to escape dependency upon that knowledge which only the sentient laboring body could provide.”
—Shoshana Zuboff (b. 1951)
“It is remarkable how closely the history of the apple tree is connected with that of man.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“The only history is a mere question of one’s struggle inside oneself. But that is the joy of it. One need neither discover Americas nor conquer nations, and yet one has as great a work as Columbus or Alexander, to do.”
—D.H. (David Herbert)