$5 Intel 100G CWDM4 QSFP28

Notice: Page may contain affiliate links for which we may earn a small commission through services like Amazon Affiliates or Skimlinks.
DavidWJohnston

DavidWJohnston

Active Member
Sep 30, 2020
242
191
43
Cool! I look forward to hearing peoples' experiences with these. I'm in Canada so mine will take a while.

The NICs can be a bit tricky to buy cheaply. Your most likely good deal is going to be the Mellanox Connectx-4; Single port: MCX455 or Dual port: MCX456. The lowest price I've got is around $100 USD but patience is needed to get that price.

The first 100G cards I bought were HP-branded QLogic Fastlinq 45000 and I got super lucky with the pricing.

With the CX4s, a lot of them are from HPC clusters and ship running in InfiniBand mode. There is a fairly easy command-line procedure to switch them to Ethernet.

Here is a large lot being sold-off at $120: Mellanox ConnectX-4 VPI EDR IB 100GbE adapter card CX455A Both Brackets NEW 772286740245 | eBay - If you buy a few of them and offer $100 it has a good chance of success.

Good Luck!
 
  • Like
Reactions: itronin
I

iZohanX

New Member
May 21, 2021
16
10
3
I hate this forum lol
Not only do I not need 100GbE optics.... I don't even have optics or cards that support it... (let alone a switch)
And yet I just grabbed 10 of these....

That's not even the reason I logged into STH... I was looking for some info on low-cost Epyc servers/processors for a new proxmox server....

Curse you ADHD
 
  • Like
  • Haha
  • Love
Reactions: blunden, ***, Sacrilego and 6 others
A

awedio

Active Member
Feb 24, 2012
776
225
43
The ebay seller I used was @fifakingdom (aka @esiso) - very reliable seller.
I'll probably buy a few more & keep as spares.
 
N

NachoCDN

Active Member
Apr 18, 2016
111
91
28
53
iZohanX said:
I hate this forum lol
Not only do I not need 100GbE optics.... I don't even have optics or cards that support it... (let alone a switch)
And yet I just grabbed 10 of these....
Click to expand...
Same! no idea what i'm gonna do with these but i had to buy them! that's gotta be the sign of something, right?
 
Sacrilego

Sacrilego

Now with more RGB!
Jun 23, 2016
136
160
43
iZohanX said:
I hate this forum lol
Not only do I not need 100GbE optics.... I don't even have optics or cards that support it... (let alone a switch)
And yet I just grabbed 10 of these....

That's not even the reason I logged into STH... I was looking for some info on low-cost Epyc servers/processors for a new proxmox server....

Curse you ADHD
Click to expand...
LOL! Same here.
Thinking about getting this switch. Amazon.com: MikroTik CRS504-4XQ-IN Cloud Router Switch 650MHz 4xQSFP28 Compatible with 40G, 25G, 10G, and 1G Fiber Connections : Electronics
I swear, this forum might someday be the cause of my divorce :oops:
 
  • Haha
Reactions: Aluminat and DavidWJohnston
DavidWJohnston

DavidWJohnston

Active Member
Sep 30, 2020
242
191
43
LOL... I don't have a wife so I have a really big homelab. :)

I also have an EDGE-CORE 7512-32X (32x100G) destined for e-waste, as I can't find any OS to run on it. There's a post on STH somewhere about a guy who got it to work L2 only. It's an Accton/Cavium ASIC that supposedly has an open-source driver so I'm sure someone could get it going.

If you want a cheap 100G (maybe) switch that sounds like a jet at takeoff, let me know. Actually with proper drivers loaded the fans do ramp down.

I was thinking of posting it for sale but I don't think it's worth anything.
 
K

klui

Well-Known Member
Feb 3, 2019
834
457
63
This Edgecore uses the Atom C2000 for management plane and likely to use its LPC pins for boot. If it's manufactured before mid-2017 its CPU will be the B0 stepping.

Besides that there is a SONiC build that you could try. As long as the fans are in the support module you can modify the fancontrol file to turn them down.
 
Sacrilego

Sacrilego

Now with more RGB!
Jun 23, 2016
136
160
43
DavidWJohnston said:
LOL... I don't have a wife so I have a really big homelab. :)

I also have an EDGE-CORE 7512-32X (32x100G) destined for e-waste, as I can't find any OS to run on it. There's a post on STH somewhere about a guy who got it to work L2 only. It's an Accton/Cavium ASIC that supposedly has an open-source driver so I'm sure someone could get it going.

If you want a cheap 100G (maybe) switch that sounds like a jet at takeoff, let me know. Actually with proper drivers loaded the fans do ramp down.

I was thinking of posting it for sale but I don't think it's worth anything.
Click to expand...
Thanks for the offer. But, I already got a jet engine sitting in the closet unused due to extremely low WAF points :).
 
DaSaint

DaSaint

Active Member
Oct 3, 2015
282
79
28
Colorado
DavidWJohnston said:
LOL... I don't have a wife so I have a really big homelab. :)

I also have an EDGE-CORE 7512-32X (32x100G) destined for e-waste, as I can't find any OS to run on it. There's a post on STH somewhere about a guy who got it to work L2 only. It's an Accton/Cavium ASIC that supposedly has an open-source driver so I'm sure someone could get it going.

If you want a cheap 100G (maybe) switch that sounds like a jet at takeoff, let me know. Actually with proper drivers loaded the fans do ramp down.

I was thinking of posting it for sale but I don't think it's worth anything.
Click to expand...
Sadly had one of these and tried to do the same as you, i tried recompiling SONIC many times and ended up in failure which i returned to seller on ebay as there was no way to compile the old version due to missing code, or compilers consistently failing on random issues that were solved in later code but then couldnt compile...

I feel ya tho.!
 
C

cookiesowns

Active Member
Feb 12, 2016
234
83
28
28
I would avoid these. They are being sold cheap for a reason. Friend at a hyperscaler mentioned high failure rates compared to other CWDM4 stuff.
 
Sacrilego

Sacrilego

Now with more RGB!
Jun 23, 2016
136
160
43
Just got my ten pack. They look like they're in really good shape. Lets see what the Cisco C9500-24Y4C (configured to work with unsupported transceivers) thinks of them...
 
  • Like
Reactions: NachoCDN
T

timd

Member
Dec 12, 2016
53
24
18
51
DavidWJohnston said:
I bought a few of these earlier today.

www.ebay.ca

SPTSBP2CLCKS INTEL 100G-CWDM4 1271-1331NM OPTICAL TRANSCEIVER MODULE NEW | eBay

Find many great new & used options and get the best deals for SPTSBP2CLCKS INTEL 100G-CWDM4 1271-1331NM OPTICAL TRANSCEIVER MODULE NEW at the best online prices at eBay! Free shipping for many products!
www.ebay.ca
Click to expand...
@DavidWJohnston Thank you for the post sir! They have a killer deal on 40gig LR4 optics which is really really hard to find. I definitely owe you one!
 
  • Like
Reactions: Sacrilego, zunder1990 and DavidWJohnston
DavidWJohnston

DavidWJohnston

Active Member
Sep 30, 2020
242
191
43
Just got my 10 pack of CWDM4s this morning up here in Canada. All good with the DX010!! Now I'm wondering if I should sell some of my MPO cables and transceivers - If after this blowout they're still worth anything!
 
A

ano

Well-Known Member
Nov 7, 2022
649
269
63
definetly worth something, beware theese fail often, and doesnt handle higher temps most DC's will see
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top Bottom