Can the ZCU106 support 1G Ethernet?

[HengHsu]

Hello, I’m a student currently practicing 1G Ethernet implementation on the VCU108 board, and it has been working correctly. However, due to a recent project requirement, I need to switch to the ZCU106 board. I noticed that in your example designs, only 10G Ethernet is provided for the ZCU106.

I would like to ask: does the ZCU106 support 1G Ethernet? If not directly, are there any recommended solutions or workarounds to implement 1G Ethernet on this board?

Thank you very much for your guidance.

[alexforencich]

There is no PL-accessible base-T port on the board. So, you have two options:

• Add a base-T port via FMC or pmod
• Run the SFP+ at 1G and use an SFP+ to base-T adapter

For the second one, you can use the Xilinx 1G PCS/PMA core. See the VCU118 example design. Eventually I will add my own 1G PCS to taxi, but for now the Xilinx one works fine.

[HengHsu]

Hello, thank you for your reply.

I have a question regarding your 10G Ethernet example design for the ZCU106 board:

At first, I intended to use 1G Ethernet because I thought I didn’t have any SFP+ expansion modules. However, I later realized that both 1G and 10G Ethernet require an SFP+ to Base-T (RJ45) adapter for testing via Ethernet cables. Given this, I’m now considering whether I could directly use your 10G Ethernet ZCU106 example design to test Ethernet functionality.

However, my host machine’s network card only supports up to 1G (1000baseT/Full). So I’d like to ask:

• If I use an SFP+ to RJ45 adapter and connect the ZCU106 to a host machine with a 1G NIC, can I still run your 10G Ethernet example (e.g., sending/receiving UDP packets or loopback testing)?
• Or does the host-side NIC also need to support 10G for the design to work properly?

Also, regarding your suggestion to refer to the VCU118 1G PCS/PMA design — may I confirm whether you’re suggesting to:

• Reference the entire design, or

• Only refer to how the 1G PCS/PMA IP is used?

I noticed that the VCU118 design includes additional modules such as mdio_master.v, while the VCU108 also uses the same IP but seems to have a simpler code structure. I wanted to clarify which one you’d recommend I start from.

Apologies if any of my questions seem naive — I’m still a beginner and really appreciate your guidance and support. Looking forward to your reply!