SLYY224 November   2023 LMK3H0102 , LMKDB1108 , LMKDB1120

 

  1.   1
  2.   Overview
  3.   At a glance
  4.   A closer look at data centers
  5.   Clocking in data centers
  6.   Trend toward lower jitter
  7.   Greater integration
  8.   Conclusion
  9.   References

A closer look at data centers

As shown in Figure 1, data centers typically comprise racks of servers. On top of each server rack is a ToR switch that relays data packets between servers and the network. A spine or fabric switch is a higher-layer switch that connects the ToR switches to the network.

High data rates usually require active cables between servers and ToR switches and optical modules between ToR switches and spine or fabric switches to reduce losses. Figure 2 shows the server blocks that usually require clocking components.

GUID-20231110-SS0I-HR7Z-XBRP-578SBFQX60LV-low.svg Figure 1 Data center architecture.
GUID-20231110-SS0I-5VJZ-BBR5-WV7P4ZRHWL23-low.svg Figure 2 Server blocks.