What Is OSFP Transceiver?_
The OSFP (Octal Small Form-factor Pluggable) transceiver is a form factor designed for higher density and power handling than QSFP, supporting up to 800 Gbps per port via eight electrical lanes. It is commonly used for scale-out InfiniBand or Ethernet fabric connections between GPU servers and top-of-rack switches in AI clusters. The module uses a push-pull latching mechanism (no screw) and is keyed for insertion orientation.
Technical Details
OSFP modules are slightly wider than QSFP-DD and have an integrated heat sink to manage higher thermal loads, typically up to 15–20 W. They support both passive copper direct-attach cables (DAC) for short reaches and active optical cables (AOC) or pluggable optics for longer distances. The electrical interface uses eight lanes at 25 Gbps (NRZ), 50 Gbps (PAM4), or 112 Gbps (PAM4) to achieve aggregate rates of 200/400/800 Gbps. In GPU clusters, OSFP ports on switches connect to servers via MPO-12 or MPO-24 fiber jumpers for fabric connections; OSFP is also used for NVLink optical connections.
How Leviathan Systems Works with OSFP Transceiver
In our field deployments, we install OSFP transceivers in Mellanox or other InfiniBand switches during the networking phase, often after rack assembly and before commissioning. We handle these modules with care for dust caps and alignment, and we verify link status via switch CLI during fabric bring-up.
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