Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
10 Gbps
- Thread starter max2
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
robbieduncan
Moderator emeritus
It'll be a long time until it's standard in most machines. Granted you can get 10G in some prosumer stuff (e.g. there are 10G desktop switches for £120-200 now, whereas a few years ago you were looking at having to get used enterprise gear). It's still relatively expensive though. If you think that a 5 port 1G switch can be had for less than £10, whereas the cheapest prosumer 4 port 10G SFP switch is still £120.
In terms of adapters, a USB 1G adapter is around £5. A USB 2.5G adapter is around £30. 10G adapters (either base-t or SFP+) hover around the £200 mark.
We should start seeing multi-gig in more kit soon hopefully (e.g. 2.5G adapters are now becoming cheap). The reason behind that is that it's reliable over most existing cabling. 10G stuff can be quite flaky over Cat 5e, which is what most homes/offices are cabled with.
And then there's the cost of cabling. 100M of (good enough) Cat 5e can be had for around £30. 100m of (decent) Cat 6a will set you back £80-90. The same runs in OM3 will probably cost around the same as Cat 6a, but then you've got the cost of tranceivers, etc, which quickly bulk out the price. And let's face it, fibre cabling isn't really suitable for most homes. It's fragile, and you'll probably need pre-terminated runs which means drilling much larger holes, etc.
I currently have a mix of 10G and 2.5G at home. 10G to my server (DAC), my iMac and the core fabric (both fibre/SFP). with 2.5G going to laptops. It works well, but is completely unnecessary for the majority of home users.
In terms of adapters, a USB 1G adapter is around £5. A USB 2.5G adapter is around £30. 10G adapters (either base-t or SFP+) hover around the £200 mark.
We should start seeing multi-gig in more kit soon hopefully (e.g. 2.5G adapters are now becoming cheap). The reason behind that is that it's reliable over most existing cabling. 10G stuff can be quite flaky over Cat 5e, which is what most homes/offices are cabled with.
And then there's the cost of cabling. 100M of (good enough) Cat 5e can be had for around £30. 100m of (decent) Cat 6a will set you back £80-90. The same runs in OM3 will probably cost around the same as Cat 6a, but then you've got the cost of tranceivers, etc, which quickly bulk out the price. And let's face it, fibre cabling isn't really suitable for most homes. It's fragile, and you'll probably need pre-terminated runs which means drilling much larger holes, etc.
I currently have a mix of 10G and 2.5G at home. 10G to my server (DAC), my iMac and the core fabric (both fibre/SFP). with 2.5G going to laptops. It works well, but is completely unnecessary for the majority of home users.
Last edited:
satcomer
Suspended
I tend to think until the 10g network setting to replace 1g networking won’t go forward until they get the extra heat generated down! So until around 2025 until we see devices cheap enough manufacturing might pick it up!
Plus if in PCs with Gen3 PCIe port to install a 10g PCIe card!
Last edited:
satcomer
Suspended
robvas
macrumors 68040
The joke was that most laptops don’t even have Ethernet ports anymore
I would hope we start to see 2.5 Gbps or 5 Gbps becoming the standard. All this WiFi 6 equipment is starting to appear for home users and the only option to backhaul it is 1 Gbps...
Never. Even after all these years of just 1Gbps, the great majority of average users still have no need for anything more than that and most don't really even need wired networking at all anymore. Consumer laptops/pcs are geared towards average consumers and all they use their home networks for is basic internet stuff, streaming Netflix, etc.
10Gbps is for data centers, businesses, enthusiasts, etc. For average consumers, wifi is more than good enough.
While I don't think we'll see 10GBASE-T become common, at some point 2.5GBASE-T and/or 5.0GBASE-T chips will have to become more of a commodity that gets put in everything because better, faster wifi access points and routers still need to plugin via something and those devices will need those chips. We've had multi-gig wifi for a while, but it doesn't mean much if it is bottlenecked by 1 Gbps ethernet.
10G is too sensitive and needs expensive cable. 2.5GBASE-T is a drop-in upgrade for anyone 1000BASE-T gear and most with 100BASE-T using existing cable and connectors. Trust me, the marketing teams are ready to sell this to consumers as soon as the hardware is ready.