Cisco SPA-4XOC3-POS Full Official Technical Specification Document

1. Product Overview

Official Full Designation

Core Definition

SKU Naming Breakdown

1. SPA: Shared Port Adapter, Cisco I-Flex modular expansion interface architecture
2. 4XOC3: Four independent physical OC-3 (155.52 Mbps SONET) ports
3. POS: Packet over SONET framing mode for IP packet transmission over SONET/SDH transport infrastructure
4. =: Standard spare part suffix for factory-new standalone replacement kits (SPA-4XOC3-POS=)
5. -RF: Cisco Refresh certified refurbished spare SKU variant (SPA-4XOC3-POS-RF)

Product Lifecycle Notice

• Official Global Release Year: 2009
• End-of-Sale (EoS) Status: Discontinued; Cisco permanently ceased manufacturing new SPA-4XOC3-POS hardware units
• Direct Upgrade Replacement Models: SPA-4XOC3-POS-V2 revised low-power low-jitter hardware variant, SPA-8XOC3-POS (8-port OC3 POS SPA), high-speed OC-12 POS SPAsCisco
• Minimum Supported IOS/IOS-XE/IOS-XR Software Version: IOS 12.2(33)SR for Cisco 7600 / Catalyst 6500 Series; IOS-XE 3.10S for ASR 1000 Series; IOS-XR 4.2 for CRS Carrier Routing Systems and XR 12000 Series RoutersCisco
• Software Maintenance Status: Only critical security vulnerability patches are provided for customers holding active Cisco SMARTnet or DNA Advantage service contracts; no new interface feature enhancements will be developed for this legacy POS SPA
• Legacy Status: End-of-life legacy hardware; certified refurbished SPA units, validated IOS/IOS-XE/IOS-XR firmware images and 24×7 priority Cisco TAC engineering technical support remain available through authorized Cisco global distribution partners

Supported Router & Switch Platform Compatibility

1. Cisco ASR 1000 Series Aggregation Services Routers (ASR1002-X, ASR1004, ASR1006, ASR1009-X)
2. Cisco 7600 Series Service Routers and Catalyst 6500 Series Switches (7600-SIP-400/600 interface processors supporting half-height SPA slots)
3. Cisco 7304 Series Routers
4. Cisco 12000 / XR 12000 Series Internet Backbone Routers
5. Cisco CRS Series Carrier Routing Systems
6. Cisco ASR 9000 Series Aggregation Routers (V2 variant primary support)

Deployment Restrictions

1. OIR operational requirement: Full zero-impact Online Insertion and Removal functionality requires deployment of the minimum specified IOS/IOS-XE/IOS-XR software releases; outdated firmware versions may trigger temporary packet loss or traffic outages during SPA or SFP hot-swap maintenance operations.
2. Half-height slot limitation: This SPA occupies only one half-height SPA bay on a SIP processor card, allowing mixed deployment of other half-height SPAs on the same SIP interface processor.
3. SFP transceiver lock-in: Only Cisco-certified OC-3 SFP optical transceivers are fully validated, monitored and supported; uncertified third-party SFP modules may trigger link flapping, DOM telemetry failure or incompatibility errors.
4. SIP slot resource sharing: Multiple SPAs installed on a single SIP interface processor share the internal Multigigabit Fabric bus bandwidth; simultaneous full line-rate traffic across multiple SPAs on the same SIP may introduce minor forwarding latency under extreme aggregate load conditions.
5. SONET/SDH compliance limitation: The SPA strictly follows ANSI T1.105, Telcordia GR-253 and ITU-T G.707 standards for OC-3/STM-1 framing; it cannot be reconfigured for ATM or clear-channel TDM operation without separate ATM SPAs.
6. Framing constraint: Only concatenated OC-3c/STM-1c framing is supported; non-concatenated channelized SONET modes are not available.

Standard Factory Complete Bundle Contents

1. SPA-4XOC3-POS half-height quad-port OC-3 POS Shared Port Adapter expansion card
2. Anti-static ESD protective storage bag and custom shock-absorbent foam packaging
3. Quick-start hardware installation guide covering ESD static discharge prevention protocols, SIP slot OIR insertion/removal procedures, SFP transceiver installation best practices, IOS/IOS-XE/IOS-XR SPA interface configuration command reference examples
4. Global product regulatory compliance, electrical safety, and electromagnetic interference (EMI) certification documentation packet

Core Integrated Functional Capabilities

1. Four Independent Hot-Swappable SFP OC-3c/STM-1 POS Ports: The SPA provides four separate line-rate 155.52 Mbps physical ports via field-replaceable SFP transceiver slots, fully compliant with ANSI T1.105 SONET and ITU-T G.707 SDH standards for OC-3/STM-1 concatenated transport framing. The SPA supports bidirectional POS encapsulation following RFC 1662 (PPP over HDLC-like framing) and RFC 2615 (PPP over SONET/SDH). All SFP optics support real-time Digital Optical Monitoring (DOM) telemetry for transmit/receive optical power, laser bias current and transceiver internal temperature tracking via IOS CLI and SNMP monitoring tools. The module supports 1+1 SONET Automatic Protection Switching (APS) and SDH linear protection switching for carrier-grade network resiliency.
2. Full Line-Rate Wire-Speed Packet Processing Hardware Offload: Dedicated on-board SONET framer and multi-channel packet processing FPGA fully offloads all Layer 2 HDLC/PPP framing, Layer 3 IPv4/IPv6 routing, MPLS label switching, QoS traffic prioritization and ACL packet filtering tasks from the host router’s main route processor CPUCisco. The ASIC sustains full non-oversubscribed 155.52 Mbps bidirectional throughput per port with zero packet loss under maximum concurrent traffic load. The chipset supports hardware acceleration for IP header checksum calculation, HDLC FCS generation/verification and multi-level MPLS label stack manipulation.
3. Comprehensive SONET/SDH & POS Layer 2 Feature Suite: Native hardware and software support for carrier-grade SONET/SDH and POS transport functions: OC-3c concatenated framing, full SONET overhead processing (section, line, path overhead), B1/B2/B3 error parity counting, signal degrade (SD-BER) and signal fail (SF-BER) threshold monitoring, J1 path trace byte processing, C2 payload label validation, local diagnostic loopback and line network loopback modes, RFC 2427 Multiprotocol Interconnect over Frame Relay, HDLC keepalive and PPP authentication (PAP/CHAP). Complete SONET alarm monitoring including LoS, LoF, PLOP, PPLOM, PUNEQ and remote defect indicators (PRDI, PREI).
4. Advanced Layer 3 & MPLS Carrier-Grade Service Feature Support: Fully integrated carrier-grade Layer 3 routing and MPLS transport capabilities, including static/dynamic IP routing protocols (BGP, OSPF, EIGRP, IS-IS), policy-based routing (PBR), NAT address translation, EoMPLS Ethernet over MPLS pseudowires, VPLS virtual private LAN service, MPLS traffic engineering (TE) and segment routing. The SPA supports up to 5000 source/destination MAC accounting entries for ingress/egress traffic metering per SPA card.
5. Rich Hardware-Accelerated QoS Traffic Prioritization: On-board multi-queue QoS FPGA enables per-port, per-VLAN and per-flow traffic classification, marking, policing and queuing at wire speed without CPU intervention. Supported QoS mechanisms include 802.1p CoS marking, DSCP IP precedence marking, weighted fair queuing (WFQ), low-latency queuing (LLQ) for real-time VoIP and video streaming traffic streams, traffic shaping and hierarchical policing for service provider bandwidth tiering and SLA enforcement policies.
6. Zero-Disruption Online Insertion and Removal (OIR): Full OIR compliance supports hot-swap maintenance for both the entire SPA card within the SIP slot and individual SFP optical transceivers on the SPA front panel. Network traffic on other active SPA interfaces hosted on the same SIP processor remains completely unaffected during hot-swap operations, eliminating costly multi-hour planned maintenance windows for production carrier and enterprise networks.
7. Unified IOS / IOS-XE / IOS-XR Single-Pane CLI Management: All SPA interface configuration, traffic monitoring, fault troubleshooting and optical DOM telemetry functions are fully managed via the host chassis’s native Cisco IOS, IOS-XE or IOS-XR command-line interface (CLI). Network operators can view SPA hardware status, per-port SONET alarm state, real-time ingress/egress throughput statistics, packet error counters, SFP DOM optical metrics and hardware fault alarms alongside all other router SIP/SPA interfaces within a single consistent unified management environment.
8. Comprehensive Real-Time Diagnostics & Remote SNMP Monitoring Toolset: Built-in IOS diagnostic utilities for OC-3 POS port troubleshooting: real-time link up/down state reporting, bidirectional ingress/egress byte and packet traffic counters, granular error frame logging (CRC errors, HDLC drops, BER error events, policy discard packets), per-flow traffic metering and SFP DOM optical link health monitoring. The SPA implements standard Cisco SPA/SONET interface SNMP MIBs (RFC 2558 SONET MIB) for remote network monitoring, with automatic SNMP trap generation triggered for critical port link failures, SONET alarm events, SPA hardware faults and SFP optical power threshold violation events.

2. Hardware & Performance Specifications

Core Quad OC-3 SFP POS Port Technical Specifications

SFP OC-3c/STM-1 POS SONET/SDH Interface

• Standard Compliance: ANSI T1.105, Telcordia GR-253-CORE, ITU-T G.707, RFC 1662, RFC 2615 POS over SONET/SDH
• Operating Line Rate: OC-3c concatenated SONET / STM-1 SDH, 155.52 Mbps bidirectional wire speed per port
• Framing Mode: Exclusive POS Packet over SONET framing (PPP/HDLC encapsulated IP packets); no ATM cell mapping
• Supported Transceiver Types: All Cisco-certified OC-3 SFP optics (1000BASE-SX multimode short-reach, IR-1 intermediate single-mode, LR-1/LR-2 long-reach single-mode)
• Digital Optical Monitoring (DOM): Full real-time telemetry support for transmit/receive optical power, laser bias current, transceiver internal operating temperature
• Duplex Operation: Full-duplex only, synchronous SONET clock recovery (network recovered loop timing or internal local timing)
• Loopback Modes: Local diagnostic loopback (SPA internal), line loopback (network side SONET loop)
• Jumbo Frame Support: Maximum configurable MTU payload size of 9188 bytes for POS encapsulated packets
• SONET Alarm Monitoring: LoS (Loss of Signal), LoF (Loss of Frame), SF-BER Signal Fail BER threshold, SD-BER Signal Degrade BER threshold, J1 path trace mismatch, C2 payload label mismatch, B1/B2/B3 parity error counting, PLOP loss of pointer, PPLOM payload mismatch, PUNEQ unequipped path, PRDI/PREI remote defect indicators
• Protection Switching: 1+1 APS SONET linear protection switching support

Layer 2 / Layer 3 Forwarding Performance Metrics

• Line-Rate Throughput: Full 155.52 Mbps bidirectional non-oversubscribed wire-speed packet forwarding per port for IPv4, IPv6 and MPLS packets
• MAC Accounting Entries: Up to 5000 source/destination MAC traffic metering entries per SPA card
• Supported L3 Encapsulations: IPv4, IPv6, MPLS (all multi-level label stack depths), EoMPLS pseudowires, HDLC, PPP
• Supported QoS Queues: Per-port multiple egress priority queues with LLQ low-latency real-time voice and video traffic support

Front Panel LED Indicator Definitions

1. STATUS LED (Global SPA Hardware Operational State)
   • Off: No power delivered to the SPA card, improperly seated SPA within the SIP slot, or catastrophic on-board framer/FPGA hardware failure rendering the SPA non-functional
   • Solid Amber: SPA powered, undergoing boot initialization, firmware download or minor hardware fault detected
   • Solid Green: SPA card powered, fully recognized by the host SIP/route processor, all on-board SONET framer and packet processing FPGAs initialized and operational, all four OC-3 POS ports ready for bidirectional traffic forwarding
   • Blinking Green: SPA undergoing IOS/IOS-XE/IOS-XR hardware initialization sequence during chassis boot or post-OIR hot-swap reactivation
2. Per-Port CARRIER/ACTIVE LED (Four identical indicators for each OC-3 SFP POS port)
   • Off: No SFP transceiver installed in the SPA slot, software disabled port, loss of SONET signal (LoS) or SFP transceiver hardware failure
   • Solid Amber: SFP installed, port enabled, but persistent SONET alarm state (LoF, SF-BER, payload mismatch) with no valid carrier detected
   • Solid Green: Stable error-free OC-3 SONET physical carrier link established with remote connected carrier network device (SONET ADM, core router, cross-connect)
   • Blinking Green: Active bidirectional data traffic transmitting and receiving over the OC-3 POS port link; blink frequency proportional to aggregate traffic load

Electrical & Thermal Specifications

Power Consumption

• Typical idle power draw (SPA powered on, no SFP transceivers installed, zero traffic): ~10 Watts typical total module power dissipation
• Typical medium-load power draw (four standard LR SFP installed, moderate mixed OC-3 POS traffic flow across multiple ports): ~14 Watts typical total power dissipation
• Maximum full-load power consumption (all four ports running full line-rate 155.52 Mbps bidirectional traffic, DOM telemetry continuously active): ≤17 Watts maximum peak thermal dissipation
• Power Delivery: 3.3V DC power supplied exclusively via the SIP slot internal backplane bus; no external auxiliary power connectors on the SPA hardware

Thermal & Environmental Operating Parameters

• Certified Continuous Operating Temperature Range: 0°C to 40°C (32°F to 104°F) standard enterprise and carrier datacenter equipment room ambient environment
• Extended Short-Term Operating Temperature Range: -5°C to 70°C (23°F to 158°F) temporary commercial wide-temperature operating range
• Non-operating Storage Temperature Range: -40°C to 70°C (-40°F to 150°F) unpowered long-term storage conditions
• Operating Relative Humidity: 5% to 85% RH, non-condensing ambient humidity
• Storage Relative Humidity: 5% to 95% RH, non-condensing unpowered storage humidity
• Operating Altitude: Certified operational altitude range from -60m to 2,000m (-200ft to 6,500ft); extended validated altitude support up to 4,000m (13,000ft)
• Cooling Design: Fully passive thermal dissipation architecture with integrated stamped aluminum heatsink mounted on the SPA PCB; no onboard rotating cooling fans. Chassis horizontal forced airflow from the host router’s internal cooling fans provides continuous convection cooling across the SPA heatsink under full peak quad-port OC-3 line-rate traffic load.
• NEBS Compliance: Meets GR-63-Core, GR-1089-Core NEBS environmental and surge immunity standards for central office deployment

Physical Form Factor & Weight

• Form Factor: Standard half-height Shared Port Adapter (SPA) form factor, occupies one single half-height SPA bay on compatible SIP processor cards
• Bare SPA Module Net Weight (excluding SFP transceivers, cabling and retail packaging): Approximately 340 grams (0.34 kg / 12 ounces)
• Physical External Dimensions (H × W × D): 20.3mm (0.8in) × 171.5mm (6.75in) × 184.9mm (7.28in)

3. Regulatory & Compliance Certifications

1. Electrical Safety Standards: UL 60950-1, CSA C22.2 No. 60950-1, EN 60950-1, IEC 60950-1, AS/NZS 3260, GB 4943 Chinese national IT equipment safety standard, EN 60825 laser safety Class 1
2. Electromagnetic Compatibility (EMC/EMI) Standards: FCC CFR Title 47 Part 15 Class A, VCCI Class A ITE, EN55022 Class A, CISPR 22 Class A, ICES-003 Class A, CISPR 24, EN 61000 series surge, ESD and radiated immunity standards
3. SONET/SDH & SPA Architecture Compliance: ANSI T1.105, Telcordia GR-253, ITU-T G.707 OC-3/STM-1 transport standards, RFC 1662/RFC 2615 POS over SONET, SFP MSA Multi-Source Agreement, Cisco I-Flex SPA/SIP modular interface architecture specifications
4. Environmental Compliance Directives: EU RoHS Restriction of Hazardous Substances directive full compliance, EU WEEE Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment recycling directive compliant

4. Core Deployment Advantages

1. Modular I-Flex SPA/SIP Quad-Port OC-3 POS High-Density Architecture Delivers Unmatched Network Deployment Flexibility: The SPA-4XOC3-POS leverages Cisco’s industry-standard I-Flex modular SPA/SIP design, enabling network architects to mix and match single/multi-port OC-3 POS SPAs, OC-12/OC-48 high-speed POS SPAs, Gigabit Ethernet SPAs, ATM SPAs and serial T3/E3 SPAs within a single SIP processor card. This eliminates the need to deploy dedicated fixed-port SONET line cards for quad-port OC-3 aggregation connectivity, allowing customized, scalable interface deployments tailored to exact site bandwidth and service requirements, drastically reducing upfront capital expenditure and eliminating hardware over-provisioning for enterprise and service provider network edge and aggregation points. The pay-as-you-grow modular model reduces spare parts inventory OpEx through common SPA sparing across multiple router platformsCisco.
2. Wire-Speed Dedicated SONET Framer Offload Eliminates Host Router CPU Performance Bottlenecks: All SONET overhead processing, HDLC/PPP POS framing, Layer 3 IP routing, MPLS label switching, QoS traffic prioritization and ACL packet filtering operations are fully offloaded to the SPA’s dedicated on-board SONET framer and multi-channel packet processing FPGA at line-rate 155.52 Mbps throughput per port. This removes all CPU-intensive packet manipulation workloads from the host router’s main route processor, preserving critical CPU resources for core control-plane tasks including BGP/OSPF routing protocol adjacencies, device management and system logging, preventing routing protocol churn, packet latency spikes or service outages during peak quad-port OC-3 aggregate traffic loads.
3. Zero-Disruption OIR Hot-Swap Maintenance Minimizes Production SONET Network Downtime: Complete Online Insertion and Removal (OIR) functionality supports hot-swap replacement of both the entire SPA card within the SIP slot and individual SFP optical transceivers on the SPA front panel without power cycling the host router chassis. All other active SPA interfaces hosted on the same SIP processor continue forwarding traffic without interruption during hot-swap maintenance procedures, eliminating costly multi-hour planned maintenance windows for production carrier SONET/SDH backbone networks, drastically improving mission-critical OC-3 WAN service availability and reducing operational maintenance overhead for network operations teams.
4. Comprehensive Carrier-Grade SONET/POS/L2/L3/MPLS/QoS Feature Suite Supports Full Converged Service Deployments: The SPA integrates a complete portfolio of enterprise and service provider-grade networking features fully implemented in hardware acceleration, eliminating reliance on slow software-only packet processing. Native support for full SONET overhead alarm monitoring, POS HDLC/PPP encapsulation, APS linear protection switching, loopback diagnostics, QinQ stacked VLAN trunking, jumbo frames, MAC ACLs, MPLS pseudowires, VPLS, segment routing, hierarchical QoS and LLQ real-time voice/video prioritization enables operators to deploy fully converged unified communications, broadband residential carrier services, enterprise MPLS VPNs and metro SONET aggregation workloads over quad-port OC-3 POS SPA interfaces, removing the requirement for separate dedicated interface hardware for distinct network service types and further reducing total network hardware TCO.
5. Passive Fanless Heatsink Thermal Architecture Delivers Superior Long-Term Hardware Reliability and Low Lifecycle Maintenance Costs: The SPA-4XOC3-POS utilizes a fully passive convection cooling design with a solid integrated aluminum heatsink, containing no onboard rotating cooling fans. This completely eliminates all mechanical hardware failure risk vectors associated with fan motor wear, dust accumulation, fan power supply faults and airflow blockages, enabling stable 24/7 continuous unattended operation in remote unmanned central office equipment closets, carrier aggregation racks and off-site regional network edge locations with minimal long-term on-site maintenance requirements. Low idle and peak full-load power consumption reduces overall router chassis energy draw and enterprise/carrier datacenter cooling operational energy costs over multi-year hardware service lifecycles, delivering substantial long-term total cost of ownership savings for large-scale distributed multi-site carrier network deployments.
6. Unified IOS/IOS-XE/IOS-XR Single-Pane CLI Management Simplifies Multi-Platform Network Operations and Troubleshooting: All SPA hardware configuration, port SONET alarm/POS encapsulation/QoS/ACL provisioning, real-time traffic throughput monitoring, packet error counter analysis and SFP optical DOM telemetry tracking operations are fully managed through the host chassis’s native Cisco IOS, IOS-XE or IOS-XR command-line interface. Network administrators can monitor the SPA’s operational status, SONET link health and traffic statistics alongside all other router SIP/SPA interfaces within a single consistent unified management environment, eliminating the need for separate standalone interface management software or dedicated out-of-band monitoring infrastructure for quad-port OC-3 POS SPA line cards. This drastically reduces network administrator training overhead, streamlines network change management workflows and accelerates critical OC-3 SONET WAN service fault resolution troubleshooting for distributed enterprise and carrier network environments.

Supplementary Product Specification Notes

UNSPSC Classification Code

K9 Security Compliance Note

Factory Hardware Warranty Terms