Fiber NIC Card: Definition, Types and Applications

Network interface cards, which are also called fiber NIC cards. Fiber NIC cards can provide fast and reliable network connections for users computers or network servers. And there are several common types of network interface cards in the market, such as fiber NIC card and wireless network card. This article will shed light on fiber NIC cards and their different applications.

What Is Fiber NIC Card?

Fiber NIC card is also called fiber LAN card or fiber server adapter. It is like a circuit board which are designed to allow computers or servers to communicate with a network. The fiber network card has a unique physical network address, also referred to as a MAC address. Fiber NIC card is usually a separate adapter card that can be inserted into one of the server’s motherboard expansion slots. The side plate of the fiber NIC is usually built with an interface like SFP, SFP+ or QSFP+ port. The card can translate computer data into electrical signals and the signals are compatible with the network., which is easy to exchange information. In the next part, some common types of fiber optic NIC cards will be elaborated in detail.

Common Fiber NIC Card Types Overview

Gigabit fiber network card, 10G fiber network card, 25G fiber NIC card and 40G fiber NIC card are common types of fiber NIC cards. Some basic information about them will be elaborated in the following part.

Gigabit Fiber Network Card

The gigabit Ethernet fiber network card, which is also known as the 1000Mbps optical network card. Usually, its maximum transmission speed can reach 1000Mbps and only provide a fixed transmission speed. According to different bus interfaces, gigabit fiber network card can be divided into PCI gigabit network card, PCI-X gigabit network card and PCI express gigabit network card. Based on different network interfaces, it can be grouped into RJ-45 gigabit fiber network card and SFP gigabit fiber NIC card.

10G Fiber Network Card

10G fiber network card uses a 32/64-bit PCI bus network interface card to establish a connection between the PC and the switch to solve the bottleneck problem of the server network card in the intranet mode. SFP+ single mode or multimode fibers and DAC/AOC cable can be used in 10G fiber network cards. The integrated communication control chip of 10G fiber network card relieves the pressure of CPU data processing. And 10G fiber NIC cards, especially 10Gbase-t NIC card, are frequently used in computers due to its relatively low transmission speed.

25G Fiber NIC Card

25G fiber NIC card typically operates at the physical or data link layer and has a unique physical address (MAC address). In addition, the 25G fiber NIC card has one or two SFP28 ports on the side panel, which is mainly used to connect the optical module to the switch. Common SFP28 optical module or the SFP28 high-speed cable (DAC) can be used in 25G fiber NIC card. The 25G fiber NIC card is mainly used for the connection between the servers and the switches.

40G Fiber NIC Card

40G fiber NIC card has a 40G QSFP+ interface that supports 40Gbps transmission bandwidth. It supports the PCI-e x8 standard slot to ensure efficient and stable operation. Usually, the 40G fiber NIC card also has single port and dual ports. And 40G fiber NIC cards in some companies have different functions. For example, 40 Gigabit Ethernet adapters in Intel can provides traffic separation (VMS) for virtual machines, state offload and use server and network virtualization. While 40 Gigabit Ethernet adapters in Mellanox are the highest performing interconnect solution for enterprise data centers, cloud computing, high-performance computing, and embedded environments.

Application of Fiber NIC Cards

Fiber NIC cards have two major applications. They can applied to the connection between network servers, computer or storage and switches to realize 10G, 25G, 40G or up to 100G data transmissions. Here gives an specific application scenario of 10G fiber NIC cards. Just show as the below picture. The 10GBASE-T network card connects the ToR switch or EoR usage models via Cat6a/Cat7 UTP cables.

Conclusion

From what has mentioned above, you may likely to have a general idea about different fiber NIC cards. When you decide to choose different fiber NIC cards, it is very important for you to find the suitable ones based on your own needs. FS provides products such as 10G, 25G, 40G fiber NIC cards at competitive prices. If you need any help, feel free to contact us at sales@fs.com.