IEEE 802.3bp “Standard for Ethernet Amendment: Physical Layer Specifications and Management Parameters for 1 Gb/s Operation over Fewer than Three Twisted Pair Copper Cable” is currently under development by the IEEE P802.3bp Reduced Twisted Pair Gigabit Ethernet PHY Task Force and is anticipated to publish in May, 2015. This project will add one new Physical Layer (PHY) specification for 1 Gb/s transmission over three or fewer balanced copper twisted-pairs.
This project is being driven by automotive, industrial controls and automation, transportation (aircraft, railway and heavy trucks), and other, such as carbon footprint sensitive, applications that will benefit by a reduction in the number of wire pairs and magnetics used for 1 Gb/s Ethernet transmission.
The current focus of the IEEE 802.3bp Reduced Twisted Pair Gigabit Ethernet PHY Task Force is the development of a draft for Task Force review.
The IEEE 802.3 Reduced Twisted Pair Gigabit Ethernet PHY Call-For-Interest Consensus Presentation can be found here: http://www.ieee802.org/3/RTPGE/public/mar12/CFI_01_0312.pdf
The Project Authorization Request (PAR), approved on December 5, 2012, can be found here: http://www.ieee802.org/3/bp/P802.3bp.pdf
The project objectives, adopted on November 15, 2012, (refer to: http://www.ieee802.org/3/bp/Objectives.pdf) are as follows:
- Preserve the IEEE 802.3/Ethernet frame format at the MAC client service interface
- Preserve minimum and maximum frame size of the current IEEE 802.3 standard
- Support full duplex operation only
- Support a speed of 1 Gb/s at the MAC/PLS service interface
- Maintain a bit error ratio (BER) of less than or equal to 10-10 at the MAC/PLS service interface
- Support 1 Gb/s operation in automotive & industrial environments (e.g. EMC, temperature)
- Define optional Energy-Efficient Ethernet
- Define the performance characteristics of an automotive link segment and a PHY to support point-to-point operation over this link segment with less than three twisted pairs supporting up to four inline connectors using balanced copper cabling for at least 15m for the automotive link segment
- Define the performance characteristics of optional link segment(s) for the above PHY for industrial controls and/or automation, transportation (aircraft, railway, bus and heavy trucks) applications with a goal of at least 40m reach
- Define optional startup procedure which enables the time from power_on=FALSE to valid data to be less than 100ms