The Cisco Interface Flexibility (I-Flex) design combines shared port adapters (SPAs) and SPA interface processors (SIPs), taking advantage of an extensible design that facilitates service prioritization for voice, video, and data services. Enterprise and service provider customers can take advantage of improved slot economics resulting from modular port adapters that are interchangeable across Cisco Systems routing platforms. The Cisco I-Flex design maximizes connectivity options and offers superior service intelligence through programmable interface processors that deliver line-rate performance. Cisco I-Flex enhances speed-to-service revenue and provides a rich set of quality-of-service (QoS) features for premium service delivery while effectively reducing the overall cost of ownership. This data sheet contains the specifications for the Cisco 1-Port 10 Gigabit Ethernet Shared Port Adapter, Version 2 (Cisco 1-Port 10-GE SPA; Figure 1 shows a SIP with 10 Gigabit Small Form-Factor Pluggable [XFP] optics).

The Cisco 1-Port 10-GE SPA is available on high-end Cisco routing platforms, offering the benefits of network scalability with lower initial costs and ease of upgrades. The Cisco SPA/SIP portfolio continues the company's focus on investment protection along with consistent feature support, broad interface availability, and the latest technology. The Cisco SPA/SIP portfolio allows deployment of different interfaces (packet over SONET/SDH [POS], ATM, Ethernet, etc.) on the same interface processor.
Within a central office or data center or in a metropolitan-area network (MAN), 10 Gigabit Ethernet interfaces are commonly used to interconnect routers or other devices. The Cisco 1-Port 10-GE SPA meets customers' needs for various applications. With this SPA, users can mix and match SPA ports with other types of interfaces in the same slot. The Cisco 1-Port 10-GE SPA is IEEE 802.3ae standards-based for compatibility and interoperability.