Arista CAB-Q-Q-100G-2.5-Arista | 100G QSFP28 Passive DAC Cable, 2.5m Twinax

Q: What is the difference between passive and active DAC cables?
A: Passive DAC cables like the CAB-Q-Q-100G-2.5 have no signal amplification and consume minimal power (typically under 1.5W per end), making them ideal for short-reach connections up to 5 meters. They are more cost-effective than active cables and do not require external power for signal processing.

Q: Is this cable compatible with other vendor equipment?
A: This cable is designed and coded for Arista switches and routers with QSFP28 ports. While physically compatible with standard QSFP28 interfaces, the EEPROM encoding is optimized for Arista platforms. Cross-vendor compatibility may require recoding or vendor-specific variants.

Q: What applications is this cable best suited for?
A: The 2.5m length is ideal for intra-rack and adjacent-rack connections in data centers, high-performance computing clusters, and telecom equipment rooms where 100G connectivity is required over short distances. It provides a cost-effective alternative to optical transceivers for these applications.

Q: Does this cable support breakout configurations?
A: No, this is a QSFP28-to-QSFP28 cable providing a single 100G link. For breakout applications (e.g., 100G to 4x25G), you would need Arista's CAB-Q-4S-100G series cables which have QSFP28 on one end and four SFP28 connectors on the other.

Q: What is the expected lifespan and warranty?
A: Passive copper DAC cables typically support 250+ insertion cycles and have excellent reliability due to their simple passive design. Warranty coverage varies by supplier but typically includes manufacturer defects. The cable meets hot-pluggable specifications for operational flexibility.