Got one Ubiquiti Unifi 10G Ethernet Adapter, model UACC-Adapter-RJ45-USBC-10GE. In the past, I’ve mostly got StarTech adapters for 10G Copper, but right now they’re either sold out or going for double the price. The Unifi 10G is 150€ plus tax, it fits what I need.
First off, it plugged right in on my Linux laptop running kernel 6.14 and a MacBook Air. No fuss with drivers or anything. Here’s what the kernel spit out on Linux:
thunderbolt 0-1: new device found, vendor=0xa5 device=0x27
thunderbolt 0-1: Ubiquiti Inc. UACC-Adapter-RJ45-USBC-10GE
thunderbolt 0-0:1.1: new retimer found, vendor=0x8087 device=0xd9c
pcieport 0000:00:07.0: pciehp: Slot(12): Card present
pcieport 0000:00:07.0: pciehp: Slot(12): Link Up
atlantic 0000:03:00.0 eth0: atlantic: link change old 0 new 10000
TCP: eth0: Driver has suspect GRO implementation, TCP performance may be compromised.
Speeds
It showed up as expected, and speeds looked good from the start. One thing to Note: this adapter only works on Thunderbolt 3 or 4. Forget about regular USB-C it won’t work.
Some blogs go negative about Adapters PCIe lane requirements, like how your host needs enough lanes to hit full speed. But in my case, that wasn’t a problem.
I pulled 9.37 Gbit with iperf3, and OpenSpeedTest clocked around 9.6 Gbit. That’s basically as good as it gets for 10G, considering overhead. I tested it hooked to a Unifi XG 10Gbit switch over a 10m CAT 7 cable with a default MTU of 1500.
### iperf3 -P 4
[ ID] Interval Transfer Bitrate Retr
[ 5] 0.00-10.00 sec 2.47 GBytes 2.12 Gbits/sec 764 sender
[ 5] 0.00-10.00 sec 2.47 GBytes 2.12 Gbits/sec receiver
[ 7] 0.00-10.00 sec 3.03 GBytes 2.60 Gbits/sec 657 sender
[ 7] 0.00-10.00 sec 3.03 GBytes 2.60 Gbits/sec receiver
[ 9] 0.00-10.00 sec 3.02 GBytes 2.59 Gbits/sec 752 sender
[ 9] 0.00-10.00 sec 3.02 GBytes 2.59 Gbits/sec receiver
[ 11] 0.00-10.00 sec 2.39 GBytes 2.05 Gbits/sec 712 sender
[ 11] 0.00-10.00 sec 2.38 GBytes 2.05 Gbits/sec receiver
[SUM] 0.00-10.00 sec 10.9 GBytes 9.37 Gbits/sec 2885 sender
[SUM] 0.00-10.00 sec 10.9 GBytes 9.36 Gbits/sec receiver
### iperf3 -P 4 -R
[ ID] Interval Transfer Bitrate Retr
[ 5] 0.00-10.00 sec 2.74 GBytes 2.35 Gbits/sec 3820 sender
[ 5] 0.00-10.00 sec 2.73 GBytes 2.35 Gbits/sec receiver
[ 7] 0.00-10.00 sec 2.43 GBytes 2.09 Gbits/sec 3908 sender
[ 7] 0.00-10.00 sec 2.42 GBytes 2.08 Gbits/sec receiver
[ 9] 0.00-10.00 sec 2.76 GBytes 2.37 Gbits/sec 2279 sender
[ 9] 0.00-10.00 sec 2.76 GBytes 2.37 Gbits/sec receiver
[ 11] 0.00-10.00 sec 2.99 GBytes 2.57 Gbits/sec 4103 sender
[ 11] 0.00-10.00 sec 2.99 GBytes 2.57 Gbits/sec receiver
[SUM] 0.00-10.00 sec 10.9 GBytes 9.38 Gbits/sec 14110 sender
[SUM] 0.00-10.00 sec 10.9 GBytes 9.37 Gbits/sec receiver
Features
It’s built on an AQC113 chip from Marvell, which handles the 10GBASE-T side. The chip is capable of doing Multigig NBASE-T at 10G/5G/2.5G/1G/100M/10M.
Feature wise some to note:
- 8 QoS Classes
- WoL
- LSO, RSS, DCA
- PTPv2
- Multigen PCI Express: 4>3>2
Build
It is build all metal, fanless, so it stays quiet. I’ve read other reviews where it hits 44-45°C under load, around 40°C idle, which matches what I noticed, gets warm but nothing crazy. It’s smaller than the StarTech TB 10G adapters I own a few of, so that’s a win for portability. But tbh. I normally not taking those on travel anyway.
All in all, a solid buy. If you’re eyeing a portable 10G upgrade and have the right ports, it’s worth considering.
Comments
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