How 3rd Party Optical Transceivers can Benefit Your Data Center
Optical transceivers are among the most useful pieces of hardware in a network. As long as you have equipment with SFP/SFP+ ports – which are found on most equipment – transceivers will allow you to switch between different uplink types to suit your current wiring, and the wiring you plan on installing later down the line.
They are simple, offering plug-and-play functionality and are hot-swappable. Having just a few optical transceivers at your disposal can prevent potentially thousands of dollars in new hardware costs.
Unfortunately, transceivers tend to be more expensive than they have to be. Outside of some specialty niche types, many transceivers are fairly cheap to create and mass-produce. This, of course, doesn’t stop name-brand networking companies marking up the costs and making massive profits from them.
Official documents show that third-party optical transceivers are 100% compatible with name-brand hardware. Realistically, there are absolutely no differences between the quality of third-party units supplied by 1000 GIG, and the branded originals.
Why would anyone want to pay more?
Three Reasons Third-Party Optical Transceivers Make Sense
1. Low Costs
It’s impossible to overstate the savings that come with third-party optics. Depending on which module you choose, a name brand transceiver can be anywhere between 50% and 1,000% more expensive than a third-party option.
Why should you pay hundreds of dollars for something that only takes fifty dollars, if that, to manufacture?
In most cases, having a complete loadout of third-party transceivers shaves off so much money from an upgrade budget that the money can be used to buy new hardware. Or they can get some extra equipment, which they wouldn’t have been able to do if they went with name-brand products.
2. Full Standards Compliance
Only a handful of factories around the world are creating optics, and they are making transceivers for everyone at the same time. The heavily-discounted third-party optics you find may have been created in the same facility as the more expensive official HP, Juniper, or Cisco units.
Given that transceivers are all specified by internationally agreed-upon standards as it is, there’s no risk at all of incompatibility. All you need is a code loaded on an EPROM to be included in the transceiver. This code identifies it to your networking hardware. With that, your equipment won’t be able to tell the difference.
3. Lifetime Warranty
Outside of having a higher cost associated with them, name-brand transceivers tend to have short-term warranty periods. It can last anywhere between just 90 days and a few years.
While it is rare for transceivers to malfunction, it’s unfortunate that they would be sold with such a small warranty period, especially compared to the hardware transceivers are used with.
However, if you get your third-party optic from 1000 GIG, you are guaranteed a lifetime warranty*, including a replacement unit in the rare event of failure. That’s just how certain we are that our units can match, if not exceed, the quality of a name-brand unit.
It Makes Sense to Use Third-Party Transceivers
There’s really no reason that you should pay more for a brand-name product. Much like buying a generic medicine, there’s no real difference outside of the name put on the packet. 1000 GIG transceivers are much cheaper, are 100% compatible, and are backed by a warranty that you’ll never see with a name brand.