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by the_biot 76 days ago
Yup, that's the sort of thing that's typically missing from cable testers. I have a USB cable that normally works fine, but introduces errors when doing full blast USB 2.0 bulk transfers. I keep it around just in case I ever come across a tester that can show me this in hard numbers.
1 comments

Products that do exactly that do exist, although are prohibitively expensive. [0]

It is difficult to send 10Gbps, 20Gbps, 40Gbps or even 80Gbps, then receive it, then validate it.

[0] - https://www.totalphase.com/products/advanced-cable-tester-v2...

I'm sure it's hard to do a detailed eye analysis at those speeds. But come on, I can get a hub that does 10Gbps per lane (so 20Gbps equivalent) for $13, 40Gbps SSD enclosures for $40, and 80Gbps SSD enclosures for $150. Making that signal do a loop, maybe adding some artificial attenuation, and checking how many bits get corrupted shouldn't need fancier hardware than that.