Method (100) performed by an
Ethernet device (500) comprising a
transmitter (516, 517) and a
receiver (518, 519), comprising the following steps: Sending (102)
autonegotiation (AN) base pages via the sender (516, 517) to an
Ethernet link peer (552) to offer that the
Ethernet device (500) has the capability to support at least one IEEE (“Institute of Electrical and
Electronics Engineers”) 802.3 Ethernet specification that supports an AN; Detect (104) at the
receiver (518, 519) using a first detection mode, a valid
signal sent by the Ethernet link peer (552) that does not support
autonegotiation (AN); and Detect (104) at the
receiver (518, 519) using a second detection mode, of AN pages sent by the Ethernet link peer (552) using an Ethernet IEEE-802.3 link specification that supports an AN, wherein the first detection mode includes: Detect (108) whether a
signal received at the receiver (518, 519) is a valid
signal sent by an Ethernet link peer (552) that does not support AN; in response to the detection (108) that the signal received at the receiver (518, 519) is a valid signal sent by an Ethernet link peer (552) that does not support AN, starting (110) an
autonegotiation wait
timer; and Detect (112) whether both a single_link_ready state and an autoneg_wait_
timer_done state are true, and the Ethernet connection, which does not support AN, is a 10
Gigabit-per-second direct link cable (10G-DAC) connection, further comprising: in response to the detection (112) that both the single link_ready state and the autoneg_wait_
timer_done state are true, Disable (114) the AN transmission and switch the
transmitter (516, 517) to a 10G-DAC mode.