NVIDIA teamed up with TSMC to create new co-packaged optics technology for their upcoming network switches. They put silicon photonics right on the switch chips, cutting power use by 3.5 times compared to regular systems. The signal loss drops from 22 dB to just 4 dB with this setup. This fixes major power and connection problems in big GPU systems, especially those with more than 10,000 GPUs working together.
Their design places laser sources inside the switch frame, using only 2 watts per port instead of the usual 10 watts needed by plug-in modules. The built-in optical engines need just 7 watts versus 20 watts for standard signal processors. These changes slash total power needs from around 72 megawatts down to 21.6 megawatts when running a data center with 400,000 GPUs.
NVIDIA packed its Quantum 3450-LD InfiniBand switch with 144 ports running at 800 gigabits per second. This delivers 115 terabits per second of total bandwidth through four CPO sockets in a liquid-cooled case. Their Ethernet lineup includes the SN6810, with 128 ports at 800 Gb/s for 102.4 Tb/s bandwidth, plus the bigger SN6800, offering 512 ports at the same speed for a massive 409.6 Tb/s throughput.
The InfiniBand version uses one big switch chip with six CPO modules supporting 36 ports at 800 Gb/s each. For Ethernet, they built a multi-chip system with a central processor surrounded by eight smaller chips. Both designs run at 224 Gb/s per lane with four lanes in each port. You can buy Quantum-X switches during the second half of 2025, but Spectrum-X models arrive later in the second half of 2026.
Their design places laser sources inside the switch frame, using only 2 watts per port instead of the usual 10 watts needed by plug-in modules. The built-in optical engines need just 7 watts versus 20 watts for standard signal processors. These changes slash total power needs from around 72 megawatts down to 21.6 megawatts when running a data center with 400,000 GPUs.
NVIDIA packed its Quantum 3450-LD InfiniBand switch with 144 ports running at 800 gigabits per second. This delivers 115 terabits per second of total bandwidth through four CPO sockets in a liquid-cooled case. Their Ethernet lineup includes the SN6810, with 128 ports at 800 Gb/s for 102.4 Tb/s bandwidth, plus the bigger SN6800, offering 512 ports at the same speed for a massive 409.6 Tb/s throughput.
The InfiniBand version uses one big switch chip with six CPO modules supporting 36 ports at 800 Gb/s each. For Ethernet, they built a multi-chip system with a central processor surrounded by eight smaller chips. Both designs run at 224 Gb/s per lane with four lanes in each port. You can buy Quantum-X switches during the second half of 2025, but Spectrum-X models arrive later in the second half of 2026.
