An SFP module provides either a 1000Base-X or SGMII interface protocol to a host and provides a 1000Base-T media dependent interface (MDI). If the SFP module is coupled a host that only implements the 1000Base-X protocol then the SFP module translates the 1000Base-X protocol to the 1000Base-T protocol so that the host MAC sees the 1000Base-T SFP module as if it were an optical transceiver. If the host implements SGMII then the SFP performs auto-negotiation of speed and communicates with the host implement data transfer at a selected rate, e.g., 10, 100, or 1000 Mbps.