Author: Fiber-MART.COM

PLC splitter is a simple passive component which plays an important role in the applications of technologies like GPON, EPON and BPON. It allows a strand of fiber optic signal being equivalently splitted into several strands of optical signal, which can support a single network interface to be shared by many subscribers. When selecting it, split ratios should always be considered. However, with the network cabling environment becoming increasingly complex, various PLC splitters with different package form factors are being invented. Now the package form factor of it is also a key factor to be considered. This post will introduce the most commonly used PLC splitters in different package form factors for your reference during selection.

Bare Fiber PLC Splitter

Bare fiber PLC splitter is commonly used in FTTx projects. It leaves bare fiber on all its ends. Thus, they can be spliced by network engineer freely according to the applications. Meanwhile, it requires the least space during cabling. They can be installed in fiber optic splicing closure easily to provide FTTH signal distribution.

Blockless PLC Splitter

A blockless PLC splitter looks like a bare fiber splitter. The main differences are that the blockless one is usually terminated with fiber optic connectors and it uses a compact stainless tube package. It is also common that many bare fiber PLC splitters also use stainless tube package for the split chip.

Fanout PLC Splitter

Fanout PLC splitter generally uses 0.9mm buffer fiber, added with a length of ribbon fiber terminated with fanout kit behind the PLC split chip. The splitter ratios of it also come in various types. The following picture shows a 1:8 fanout version which is terminated with SC/APC connectors.

ABS PLC Splitter

ABS PLC splitter uses ABS plastic box to holding the splitter chip. The inbound fibers and distribution fibers are arranged on the same plate of this ABS box, which can provide easier and more flexible cabling. Except providing reliable protection, it can also be installed in a variety of boxes or enclosures. It is very commonly to install a it in a standard 19-inch rack unit.

LGX Box PLC Splitter

LGX Box PLC splitter looks like a MTP LGX cassette. It houses the whole splitter inside a metal box and leave fiber optic adapters for both inbound fibers and distribution fibers on its front panel. The LGX splitter can be used stand alone or be installed in the standard rack unit or fiber enclosures for better cabling.

Mini Plug-in PLC Splitter

Mini plug-in PLC splitter is now widely used in FTTx project, especially at the distribution points near the end users of the FTTx networks. It provides fast installation and low space requirement helping to alert the deployment of FTTs projects. Fiber pigtails for input and output can be directly connected with this passive component easily.

Tray Type PLC Splitter

Tray type PLC splitter also uses a space saving package form factor for better cable management. However, it uses a international 19-inch design which can be deployed in ODF for compact cable management and signal distribution. With this design, the ports on tray type splitter are clearly marked, which can reduce the faults caused by wrong connections.

Rack Mount PLC splitter

Rack mount PLC splitter is designed to meet the requirement of high cabling density for data centers or server room. It can be firmly installed on the data center or server racks. It is an ideal solution for high density cabling environment. fiber-mart.COM can provide PLC splitter ports up to 64 in 1U 19-inch rack. The following picture shows the details of a 1:8 rack mount one provided in fiber-mart.COM.

fiber-mart.COM PLC Splitter Solution

PLC splitter is a cost-effective passive optical component enabling a single network interface to be shared by two or more users. Selecting the right package form factor for it can help a lot during both the network deployment and maintaining. The above mentioned splitters in different package form factors are all being provided in fiber-mart.COM. Customized ones are also available in fiber-mart.com. Kindly contact sales@fiber-mart.com for more details if you are interested.

FTTH (fiber to the home) networks are installed in many areas covering indoor section, outdoor section, as well as the transition in between. To fulfill the cabling requirements from different areas, different types of fiber optic cable are well developed. Drop cable as an important part of FTTH network forms the final external link between the subscriber and the feeder cable. This blog post will focus on this special outdoor fiber optic cable.

The Basic of FTTH Drop Cable

Drop cables, as previously mentioned, are located on the subscriber end to connect the terminal of a distribution cable to a subscriber’s premises. They are typicality small diameter, low fiber count cables with limited unsupported span lengths, which can be installed aerially, underground or buried. As it is used in outdoor, drop cable shall have a minimum pull strength of 1335 Newtons according to the industry standard. Drop cables are available in many different types. The following part introduces three most commonly used drop cables divided according to the cable structure.

Flat Type Drop Cable, also known as flat drop cable, with a flat out-looking, usually consists of a polyethylene jacket, several fibers and two dielectric strength members to give high crush resistance. Drop cable usually contains one or two fibers, however, drop cable with fiber counts up to 12 or more is also available now. The following picture shows the cross section of a flat drop cable with 2 fibers.

Aerial Drop Cable is self-supporting cable, with the cable fixed to a steel wire, designed for easy and economical aerial installation for outdoor applications. This type of drop cable is fixed to a steel wire as showed in the following picture. Typical fiber counts of figure-8 Drop Cable are 2 to 48. Tensile load is typically 6000 Newtons.

Round Drop Cable usually contains a single bend-insensitive fiber buffered and surrounded by dielectric strength members and an outer jacket, which can provide durability and reliability in the drop segment of the network. The following shows the cross section of a round drop cable with one tight buffered optical fiber.

Drop Cable Connectivity Method: Splice or Connector?

It’s necessary to choose a right architecture for FTTH network from overall. However, drop cable as the final connection from the fiber optic network to customer premises also plays an important role. Thus, finding a flexible, efficient and economical drop cable connectivity method becomes a crucial part of broadband service. Whether to use a fiber optic connector, which can be easily mated and un-mated by hand or a splice, which is a permanent joint? The following will offer the answer and the solutions for your applications.

It is known that splice, which eliminates the possibility of the connection point becoming damaged or dirty with a permanent joint, has better optical performance than fiber optic connector. However, splice lack of operational flexibility compared with fiber optic connector. Fiber optic connector can provide an access point for networking testing which cannot be provided by splicing. Both methods have their own pros and cons.

Generally, splice is recommended for drop cables in the places where no future fiber rearrangement is necessary, like a greenfield, new construction application where the service provider can easily install all of the drop cables. Fiber optic connector is appropriate for applications which flexibility is required, like ONTs which have a connector interface.

Choosing the Right Splice Method

For splice, there are two methods, one is fusion splicing, the other is mechanical splicing. Fusion splicers have been proved to provide a high quality splice with low insertion loss and reflection. However, the initial capital expenditures, maintenance costs and slow installation speed of fusion splicing hinder its status as the preferred solution in many cases. Mechanical splicing are widely used in FTTH drop cable installation in countries, as a mechanical splice can be finished in the field by hand using simple hand tools and cheap mechanical splicer (showed in the following picture) within 2 minutes. It’s a commonly used method in many places, like China, Japan and Korea. However, in US mechanical splicing is not popular.

Choosing the Right Connector

For fiber optic connector, there are two types connector for drop cable connection. Field terminated connector, which contains fuse-on connector and mechanical connector, and pre-terminated drop cable, which is factory terminated with connector on the end of drop cable.

Fuse-on connector uses the same technology as fusion splicing to provide the high optical connection performance. However, it requires expensive equipment and highly trained technician, and more time like fusion splicing. Mechanical connector could be a replacement of fuse-on connector (showed in the following picture), if the conditions do not fit the mentioned ones. It could be a time-save and cost-save solution for drop cable termination.

If you have no limits in cost and want high performance termination in a time-save way, pre-terminated drop cable could be your choice. Many factories can provide you customized drop cables in various fiber types, fiber optic connector and lengths.

Conclusion

Customer demand for higher bandwidth will continue to drive the development of FTTH as well as its key component like drop cable. Choosing the right drop cable and drop cable termination method is as important as choosing the right network architecture in FTTH.

When deploying a fiber network, people nowadays not only appreciate the high-speed broadband services, but the maintenance of how long it will last. After all, optical fiber is a particular type of hair-thin glass with a typical tensile strength that is less than half that of copper. Even though the fiber looks fragile and brittle, but if correctly processed, tested and used, it has proven to be immensely durable. With this in mind, there are essentially factors that will affect the longevity of your fiber network.

Installation Strains

Stress, on the other hand, is a major enemy of fiber longevity, so the protection task is passed to the cable installer, who will ensure that the use of suitable strength elements limits the stress applied to the cable to much less than the 1 per cent proof test level. The installer then needs to ensure that the deployment process does not overstrain the cable. Figure 2 below illustrates a typical crew deployment for a trunk installation. The whole process should be paid more attention to the stress.

Of the three techniques commonly used—pulling, pushing and blowing, only pulling creates undesirable stretching (tensile stress). Unlike metal, glass does not suffer fatigue by being compressed, and so the mild compression caused during pushing causes no harm to the fiber.

Surface Flaws

Optical fiber typically consists of a silica-based core and cladding surrounded by one or two layers of polymeric material (see in Figure 3). Pristine silica glass that is free of defects is immensely resistant to degradation. However, all commercially produced optical fibers have surface flaws (small micro-cracks) that reduce the material’s longevity under certain conditions. The distribution of flaws on the surface of the silica-based portion of the fiber largely controls the mechanical strength of the fiber. fiber-mart.COM fiber optic cables are well tested to ensure less surface flaws, like LC to ST fiber cable.

To conquer this, reputable fiber suppliers carry out proof testing, which stretches the fiber to a pre-set level (normally 1 per cent) for a specified duration to deliberately break the larger flaws. And the user is then left with a fiber containing fewer, smaller flaws that need to be protected from unnecessary degradation. This means primarily stopping the creation of new flaws by coating the fiber with a protective and durable material for its primary coating.

Environmental Factors

Once deployed, the local environment has a big impact on fiber life. Elevated temperatures can accelerate crack growth, but it is the presence of water that has been historically of most concern. The growth of cracks under stress is facilitated by water leading to “stress corrosion”.

You can check what the tendency of a fiber to suffer stress corrosion is by reviewing its “stress corrosion susceptibility parameter”, much more conveniently referred to as “n”. A high n value (around 20) suggests a durable fiber and coating.

Calculating How Long Your Network Will Last

Bearing in mind the three factors above, how can you calculate the lifetime of your fiber network? In general, the chances of a fiber being damaged by manual intervention, such as digging, over the same time frame is about 1 in 1,000. Quality fiber, installed by benign techniques and by careful installers in acceptable conditions should, therefore, be extremely reliable – provided it is not disturbed.

It is also worth pointing out that cable lengths themselves have rarely failed intrinsically, but there have been failures at joints where the cable and joint type are not well matched, allowing the fibers to move – for example, due to temperature changes. This leads to over stress of the fiber and eventual fracture.

Conclusion

To tell the truth, the biggest enemies to the carefully engineered reliability of fiber jumper can be either humans or animals, rather than the fused silica itself. The provided fibers are stored and coiled correctly, it is quite possible that they turn out to be stronger than we at first thought and perhaps the original flaws begin to heal with time and exposure to water under low stress levels. fiber-mart.COM offers high quality fiber cable assemblies such as Patch Cords, Pigtails, MCPs, Breakout Cables etc. All of our products are well tested before shipment. If you are interested, you can have a look at it.

We all know that transmission system is the key part of a fiber optic system. The performance of transmission system can directly affect the performance of fiber optic system. So what is the transmission system? The transmission system is a system that transmits a signal from one place to another. If you want to make sure the good performance of a fiber optic system, you should first ensure the transmission system in a good state. Next, today’s article will give you a list of basic items that may affect general transmission system performance. Only understand the following aspects can you know how to ensure the good performance of fiber optic system.

Fiber Loss Factor

Fiber loss generally has the greatest impact on overall system performance. The fiber strand manufacturer provides a loss factor in terms of dB per kilometer. A total fiber loss calculation is made based on the distance x the loss factor. Distance in this case the total length of the fiber cable, not just the map distance.

Type of Fiber

Most single-mode fibers have a loss factor of between 0.25 (1550nm) and 0.35 (1310nm) dB/km. Multimode fibers have a loss factor of about 2.5 (850nm) and 0.8 (1300nm) dB/km. The type of fiber used is very important. Multimode fibers are used with L.E.D. transmitters which generally don’t have enough power to travel more than 1km. Single mode fibers are used with LASER transmitters that come in various power outputs for “long reach” or “short reach” criteria.

Transmitter

There are two basic type of transmitters used in a fiber optic systems. LASER which come in three varieties: high, medium, and low (long reach, medium reach and short reach). Overall system design will determine which type is used. L.E.D. transmitters are used with multimode fibers, however, there is a “high power” L.E.D. which can be used with Single mode fiber. Transmitters are rated in terms of light output at the connector, such as -5dB. A transmitter is typically referred to as an “emitter”.

Receiver Sensitivity

The ability of a fiber optic receiver to see a light source. A receiving device needs a certain minimum amount of received light to function within specification. Receivers are rated in terms of required minimum level of received light such as -28dB. A receiver is also referred to as a “detector”.

Number and Type of Splices

There are two types of splices. Mechanical, which use a set of connectors on the ends of the fibers, and fusion, which is a physical direct mating of the fiber ends. Mechanical splice loss is generally calculated in a range of 0.7 to 1.5 dB per connector. Fusion splices are calculated at between 0.1 and 0.5 dB per splice. Because of their limited loss factor, fusion splices are preferred. The following image vividly shows a good fiber connectivity and bad fiber connectivity, which may make a big difference in the insertion loss.

Margin

This is an important factor. A system can’t be designed based on simply reaching a receiver with the minimum amount of required light. The light power budget margin accounts for aging of the fiber, aging of the transmitter and receiver components, addition of devices along the cable path, incidental twisting and bending of the fiber cable, additional splices to repair cable breaks, etc. Most system designers will add a loss budget margin of 3 to 10 dB.

Selecting the Right Fiber Optic Cable

Of course, only knowing this is not enough. Fiber optic cable always plays an important part in the transmitting system. As a result, the quality of the fiber optic cable is of vital value to the whole fiber link. To choose a fiber optic cable, you need to know the following:

First: what type and grade of fiber is required? The system designer will have identified the fiber that is required for the network. Find the fiber type that is needed from the Fiber Specification and Selection Guide. Use the Fiber Type code to identify the fiber. This code becomes the first two digits of the catalog part number, replacing the XX notation. There are two common types of fiber optic cables—singlemode and multimode fiber optic cables.

Then, how many fibers are required? The system designer will also have identified the number of fibers that will be in each cable. Fibers are usually cabled in groups of 6, 12, 24, 48, or 72.

Last but not least: what cable construction is needed? The cable construction that is needed is based on a variety of factors. We have a full range of products for premises, outside plant and indoor/outdoor to solve nearly every application need. Using the catalog as a guide, identify the cable type and construction that is needed. For example, Pull tab LC cable is a type of cable that uses MPO-HD to LC-HD Push Pull TAB connector.

Summary

To ensure the better performance of your fiber optic system, you are supposed to keep the above recommendations in your mind firmly. If you feel puzzled about how to ensure the better performance of your fiber optic system, you can also turn to a reliable vendor to help you out. Fiberstore as a rising telecom manufacturer, is committed to provide first-class services and high-quality products to our customers. For fiber optic cables, you can find many kinds with good quality and reasonable prices in fiber-mart.COM. A new type of fiber optic cable (Push-Pull patch cable) is also provided. Any questions, please feel free to contact us.

Driven by the cloud computing and improvement of technology, 21st century witnesses a major shift from traditional enterprise data centers to much larger cloud data centers. These large data centers require a much higher-performance network, and need to interconnect many thousands of servers with predictable bandwidth and low-latency. Cisco 10G Catalyst 4500-X series switch is the highest throughput 10G Ethernet switch in the industry. It provides the high scalability, simplified network virtualization, application monitoring, and integrated network services for space-constrained environments in campus networks which meets the business growth objectives with unprecedented scalability. Some detailed information about Cisco 4500-X series switch and its optical solutions will be introduced to you, allowing you to easily deploy it in your network.

Cisco 4500-X Series Switch

The Cisco Catalyst 4500-X Series provides scalable, fixed-campus aggregation solutions in space-constrained environments. As you can see from the picture below, Cisco 4500-X Series Switch is available in three versions—32-port, 16-port, and 8-port. An additional 8 ports of 1000BASE-X (SFP) or 10GBASE-X (SFP+) are also available in a removable Ethernet uplink module that mounts in a bay on the front of the switch chassis, and the uplink module is hot swappable. Both 32-port and 16-port versions can be configured with optional network modules and maintain similar features and scalability.

One unique feature of this switch is that the SFP+ interface on this switch supports both 10 Gigabit Ethernet and Gigabit Ethernet ports, which allows users to use their investment in Gigabit Ethernet SFP and upgrade to 10 Gigabit Ethernet without having to do a comprehensive upgrade of the existing deployment.

Besides for providing the high bandwidth and performance, the Cisco Catalyst 4500-X series also offers the following primary innovations to address these requirements and to provide room for future growth:

Performance and Scalability: Delivers up to 800 Gbps of switching capacity with up to 250 Mpps of throughput, will be able to scale to 1.6-Tbps capacity with VSS. Future-proof investment with modular uplink and autodetect 10 Gigabit Ethernet/Gigabit Ethernet uplinks.

High Availability: Delivers the network availability demanded by business-critical enterprise applications through comprehensive network resiliency capabilities, including VSS, in addition to traditional control plane protocols such as First-Hop Resiliency Protocol (FHRP), Gateway Load Balancing Protocol (GLBP), Enhanced Interior Gateway Routing Protocol (EIGRP), and Open Shortest Path First (OSPF). Furthermore, device resiliency features such as redundant hot-swappable fans, power supplies, and AC to DC failover and vice versa remove single points of failure in the network.

Security: Support for Cisco TrustSec®* security, providing Network Device Admission Control (NDAC) to authenticate connecting switch, line-rate Media Access Control Security (MACsec)* data link-layer encryption, and role-based access-control list (ACL) and policy enforcement. Storm control and robust control plane policing (CoPP) to address denial of service (DoS) attacks and Internet worms.

Network Virtualization: Support for Layer 3 segmentation using VRF and EVN.

Simplified Operations: Support for Smart Install Director, providing a single point of management enabling zero-touch deployment for new switches and stacks in in campus and branch networks

Optical Solutions for Cisco 4500-X Series Switch

As noted before, the network interface ports on the Cisco 4500-X switch can be connected with 1G and 10G Ethernet optics. Take SFP+ cables as an example, the following chart presents the compatible SFP+ cables that can be used in Cisco 4500-X Series Switch.

These cables are called 10G direct-attach copper (DAC) cables. SFP+ DAC cables from Cisco are developed as a cost-effective alternative for very short links in high-speed interconnect application within racks and across adjacent racks. This SFP+ copper cable assembly uses twinax shielded cable with robust die cast connector interfaces for enhanced support of high frequency data rates, which means signals travel over parallel pairs of conductors. 10G SFP+ twinax copper cables contains 2 pairs—one for transmit (Tx) and one for receive (Rx) and each shielded pair is surrounded by an overall shield. Cisco passive twinax cables are offered in different lengths of 1, 1.5, 2, 2.5, 3 and 5 meters, such as SFP-H10GB-CU1M, SFP-H10GB-CU3M and SFP-H10GB-CU5M.

SFP-H10GB-CU3M is a Cisco 10GBase-CU SFP+ to SFP+ direct attach cable that operates over passive copper with a maximum reach of 3m. It has been programmed, uniquely serialized, and data-traffic and application tested to ensure 100% compliant and functional. 10G SFP+ DAC cables from fiber-mart.COM is built to comply with MSA (Multi-Source Agreement) standards. Our 10G SFP+ copper cables are well-tested before shipping worldwide and cost much lower than the original ones.

Summary

The world’s thirst for data is growing, and little seems to quench it. If your business is already starting to feel the pinch for data bottlenecks, an upgrade to 10 Gigabit Ethernet switches will put you back in the fast lane. The Cisco 4500-X Series Switch is always here to help you out, and to save budget, you should turn to a reliable OEM vendor for your 10G fiber optics. fiber-mart.COM offers a large selection of the compatible Cisco SFP+ transceivers and DAC cables. For example, SFP-10G-SR, SFP-10G-LRM, SFP-H10GB-CU1M, SFP-H10GB-CU3M, etc are all provided with very low price and high quality. If you are interested, please contact us directly.

Defined in 2002, XFP (10 Gigabit Small Form Factor Pluggable) is a hot-swappable and protocol-independent transceiver for 10G high-speed computer network and telecommunication links. Except for XFP, there are SFP and SFP+ transceivers available for 10G connectivity. These devices plug into a special port on a switch or other network device to convert to a copper or fiber interface. So what is the difference between them? The following passage will provide a satisfying solution to you.

What Is XFP?

XFP is 10 Gigabit transceiver operating at wavelengths of 850nm, 1310nm or 1550nm. This module combine transmitter and receiver functions in one compact, flexible, and cost-effective package. The physical dimensions of the XFP transceiver are slightly larger than the original small form-factor pluggable transceiver (SFP). XFP transceiver modules are available with a variety of transmitter and receiver types including the SR, LR, ER and ZR. The maximum working distance of XFP SR is 300 meters. 10GBASE-LR XFP transceivers have a wavelength of 1310nm and a transmission distance up to 10 km. For example, XFP-10G-L-OC192-SR1 covers a distance of 10km with LC connectors. XFP-10GLR-OC192SR is Cisco XFP 10GBASE-LR/-LW operating at wavelength of 1310nm over singlemode fiber with a links length of 10km. Both 10GBASE-ER XFP and 10GBASE-ZR XFP modules have a wavelength of 1550nm, and the maximum transmission distance of 40km and 80km, respectively.

What Is SFP/SFP+?

SFP is most often used for Fast Ethernet of Gigabit Ethernet applications and can support speed up to 4.25Gbps. It interfaces a network device motherboard (for a switch, router, media converter or similar device) to a fiber optic or copper networking cable. It is specified by the SFP transceiver multi-source agreement. The standard SFP transceiver, SFP+ supports speeds of 10Gbps or higher over fiber. The SFP+ product family includes cages, connectors, and copper cable assemblies. It is also similar to the performance requirements of SFF-8431 and also supports 8G Fiber Channel and 10G Ethernet applications. Take 46C3447 as an example, it is 10GBASE-SR SFP+ that can support a distance of 300m over OM3 cable.

What’s the Difference Between XFP and SFP+?

First of all, both of them are 10G transceiver modules and can contact with other types of 10G modules. The primary difference between SFP+ and the slightly older XFP standard is that the SFP+ moves the chip for clock and data recovery into a line card on the host device. This makes SFP+ smaller than XFP, enabling greater port density. Because of the smaller volume, SFP+ transfer signal modulation function, serial/deserializer, the MAC, clock and data recovery (CDR) and electronic dispersion compensation (EDC) function from the module to the Lord on the card. In addition, SFP+ compared to XFP, is a more compact factor package. The cost of SFP+ is also less than that to the XFP, X2 and XENPAK. It can connect with the same type of XFP, X2 and XENPAK as well. Therefore, SFP+ is more popular than XFP for 10G network.

Summary

10G optical transceivers are designed for 10G or 10Gbit/s data transmission applications including 10 Gigabit Ethernet, 10Gbit/s Fibre Channel, Synchronous optical networking. After years of development, there has been various different form factors and optics types introduced including XENPAK, X2, XFP and SFP+. But up to now, SFP+ is the most commonly used 10G transceivers available on the market. fiber-mart provides a large selection of 10G transceivers with minimum price and high quality. If you have any requirement of our products, please contact us directly.