Ahead, Warp Factor Ten!
From the darkness of an early winter evening, I remember entering the computer lab at 180 Queen’s Gate in London. Flanked on either side by Victorian townhouses, the austere modernism of its concrete structure was as exciting as it was foreboding. While I was there to finish a coding assignment, my attention was drawn to a heavy cable protruding from the back of my workstation. It ran through a grey metal duct to a low false ceiling connecting my computer to others on campus and yet more elsewhere. While it appeared quite ordinary, its technology was so exceptional, that it would change my life and those of many others in the decades to follow.
While radically innovative, the initial version was far from convenient. Connecting a computer to the network required a technician to gain access to the ceiling duct, drill a carefully calibrated hole in a thick shared cable, attach a large transceiver (see figure 1 below) and run a new cable between the transceiver and the computer.
While it had its flaws, the technology allowed many computers to connect to a high speed network and share information. As it gathered momentum, it started to evolve. The second version used a thinner cable and convenient twist-on/twist-off connectors avoiding the need to drill cables (see figure 2 below). However, what it had gained in convenience, it had lost in reliability. As I was later to become responsible for managing a lab network, I knew how many hours could be burned finding loose connectors, missing terminators or, worst of all, cables which were outwardly similar but electrically incompatible.
As the number of computers connecting to the network increased, the time wasted in solving problems multiplied. The next iteration could not arrive soon enough.
The third version removed the shared cable and replaced it by a central hub. As each computer was connected to the hub through its own dedicated cable, the new version was much more reliable (see figure 3 below). Moreover, as it used an enhanced version of a telephone cable, it was both cost effective and easy to install. It soon became the standard.
The 1990's brought a period of rapid innovation with tenfold jumps in performance appearing every five years. Starting from a base of 10 megabits per second (10Mbps), speeds soon increased to 100Mbps and then 1Gbps.
This innovative technology had gone from a lab in Palo Alto, California, passing another at 180 Queen’s Gate to become a global phenomenon. It provided the connective tissue to bind data centres together and tether homes to the digital world. While it became so common as to be almost invisible, the Internet would not have been possible without the development of Ethernet.
As the millennium arrived and the Internet boomed, the growth of laptops and mobile devices created a need for greater convenience. A wireless variant of Ethernet provided the answer. Now known as WiFi, it supported the same network access but without the wires. It became so popular as to become synonymous with the Internet to which it provided access.
Meanwhile in the data centre, the exponential growth in network speed was expected to continue unabated. 10Gbps Ethernet was set to replace 1Gbps soon thereafter. However, it was not to be. By the time it launched in the late 2000’s, few could afford it. Another decade passed before it became the standard in data centres.
Meanwhile my own home network like most others was stuck at 1Gbps. Processing speeds and storage volumes had continued to grow, but my home network bandwidth was bound to the gigabit standard launched two decades before. Large images and video files were creating particular challenges. A simple replication between two servers which might have taken one day a decade before, now took five or six days to complete. It was time to make a change.
However, upgrading my server network from 1Gbps to 10Gbps would require major transformation: a new switch, new network cards and new cabling. The first two were easy enough: a few hours scanning online reviews and stores allowed me to identify and purchase the necessary components.
Cabling was a more fundamental challenge. My home had an extensive installation of category 6 cables. While this was good for 1Gbps, I would need category 7 cables to reach 10Gbps: at least that was the theory. However, replacing all the cabling would have been prohibitively expensive. Thankfully some online articles suggested that my existing cable might work for cable runs up to 50 metres. I decided to take the chance while investing in category 7 patch cables to ensure the final connections used the highest possible specification.
Get Matthew G. Johnson’s stories in your inbox
Join Medium for free to get updates from this writer.
With all the orders placed, it was time to wait for the parts to land. As one cardboard box arrived after another, my anticipation grew. Sooner than expected, the full kit was assembled. I called my friend and we arranged a time to launch our grand experiment.
After completing some overdue cable management in the main rack, we started on the installation. My friend started on the first server, while I started on the switch. As it had arrived with the wrong configuration, I needed to make updates. Soon we had the first two components operating successfully at full speed. While this a hopeful start, it was expected. Both the switch and the first server were in the same rack and connected by a single two metre category 7 cable.
Located in a separate room and connected by the lower grade category 6 cable, the next server was going to mount a greater challenge. While it was running the same card and operating system, it chose not to cooperate. However, it hadn’t counted on the technical prowess of my friend, and was soon hacked into submission. I installed bandwidth testing tools on both servers and took a deep breath. Thankfully, all worked perfectly.
We arrived at the final server. The card and driver installation proceeded well, however tests yielded a maximum of 2.5Gbps. A large improvement on the 1Gbps it replaced, but well short of the 10Gbps target. We tried everything we could but the bandwidth remained resolutely lodged at 2.5Gbps. Then a question suddenly arose…
“Hey, did you install the cat 7 patch cables?”
“No, sorry didn’t get around to it.”
#facepalm
“… maybe we give it a try?”
With the patch cables upgraded, the installation was finally complete and successfully tested at 10Gbps. Time to celebrate!
The growth of Ethernet from its origin at Xerox PARC in 1974 to its global domination in 2021 is inspiring. However, the story of its technical development is all the more fascinating. From thick shared cables with hand-drilled connections, across plug-in hubs and switches, to seamless WiFi access, the scale of its evolution is enthralling.
Can you imagine sitting down in a café and asking the barista for help to drill a hole in the network cable so you could update your social media status? The idea seems ridiculous now and yet without the thick network cable and the developments which came after, social media would never have existed.
However, for me, the story of Ethernet is not about technical marvels or social revolution. For me, Ethernet is an emotional thread spanning continents, relationships and personal growth. From a dark winter evening in London to a tropical afternoon in Singapore, it had reached a new milestone.
Ahead, Warp Factor Ten!
Many thanks to Kent, Pearl, Ravi, Hardeep and Charles for your support and feedback. I couldn’t do this without you.
