Know What Makes Fiber Optic Cables Future Proof?

Internet connectivity over an optical cord has become a precious standard for fast and high-quality data transmission. This technology is relatively new. This new nature of it can leave some in a dilemma. Some would even be unwilling to invest in it. Some would still prefer go old school and use convention network cables.
Over the years, with the technical progress, even conventional cable has risen to new horizons. But, which technology is better? Both copper and glass or optical cords have their benefits. Both have unique features. If something is better for others does not necessarily make it better for you. So, the right question to ask is which means would suit your business?
Fiber Optics Cable
The conventional copper wires transmit data via electricity. Fiber wire relies on light. It does not transmit data through the flow of electrons. This enables much faster internet connection. In fact, it also enables handling of a higher bandwidth. Sometimes, even during the peak demand, the performance of fiber wire stands out.
The cost of optical deployment has seen a dramatic reduction recently. Moreover, the fiber optic cable is future proof. This gives it an edge over the use of copper cables. It surely has a better prospect in the world market. Let us compare fiber and copper on these five determinants to decide which one is better and suits your purpose.
Cost
As mentioned above, the cost of fiber components has seen a decrease recently. Once, the cost of optical cord was twice that of a copper wire. Now the cost difference is minimal. In fact, if we consider the overall cost, copper cable can get costlier. This is if we consider the cost of wiring closet. This includes cost of uninterrupted power source, data ground and HAVC (Hybrid Automatic Voltage Control). Overall, an all fiber LAN is more cost efficient than a copper-based network.
Bandwidth
Copper is sufficient for voice signals. Even though it has a limited bandwidth of up to 60Gbps. Fiber cords are capable to provide 1000 times as much bandwidth as copper. It can also travel for a longer distance in lesser time. In simple terms, a 500-meter fiber wire can transmit 1GHz. Whereas, a twisted pair copper wire (Cat 6) can transmit 500Mhz just up to 100 meters. Moreover, the signal loss is negligible in an optical cable. Copper has higher losses at higher frequencies. It is also noisy.
Transmission Speed & Distance
This is literally the battle between photons and electrons! Photons do not achieve 100% efficiency in achieving the speed of light. But, even with 31% slow speed, it is much faster than the speed of electrons. You cannot overlook the significant difference which exists between fiber and copper. Moreover, copper wires also have the limitation of 100 meters. This is not the case with fiber cables. In optics, the distance can range from 550 meters for 10 Gbps single mode and up to 40 Kms for multi-mode!
Reliability
Fiber optics is not susceptible to damages from the surrounding environment. Copper has the trait of losing quality over certain distance under conditions. In fact, if we use a fiber optic cable over the same distance, under the same condition, it would provide you reliable data transmission. Moreover, fiber is immune to environmental and climatic factors. Temperature variation or any electromagnetic variation will not tarnish its performance. Copper is sensitive to these factors. You can deploy fiber optic cables near industrial equipment without worry. Likewise, you can also lay down fiber into deep oceans.
Security
One can trap the electrical signals from the copper cable. In addition, it also radiates signals. If someone traps the signals, the entire system can fail. On damages, it gets difficult to identify the leakages. In case of a fiber wire, detection of a broken wire is easier. This is because several monitoring techniques are in practice for detecting its flaws. Copper wire can cause a short circuit which can even result in a fire.
Conclusion
The usage of fiber cable with its ever reducing cost and other advantages is making it future proof. Increase in bandwidth, ridiculous increase in transmission speed and many more features make it better and reliable medium for networking. It is one of the most significant mediums for innovative installations and upgrades.

Why Should You Invest into Superior Quality Fiber Optic Cables?

When it comes to having a robust network infrastructure, Fiber Optic cables are the best choice. And if you have zeroed upon this choice, it is important that you undertake the task properly. If the cables are mediocre and cheap, they are sure to give troubles like faulty performance, hazardous environment, and low performance.
Hence, you must invest into superior quality fiber optic cables. Below given are the reasons as to why you should do so:
Offer Fast Connections
Slow internet speeds are one of the biggest issues that people face. This majorly happens they tend to lose signals due to poor quality cables. If you keep using mediocre quality cables, the network speeds are sure to suffer. Moreover, you might lose customers and as they might look out for other service providers.
At places like US, the fiber optic patch cords are faster and more reliable than other broadbands. This ensures data transmission without any glitches and enabling you to stream internet smoothly. Sometimes, the quality of speed does depend on the type of connection. But in most cases, these cables rarely fail.
Protect Your Equipment
Let’s say you conduct a network performance test to figure out that your server is outdated. And let’s say you invested into a new one. But the problem still persists. Well, if you keep using low quality cables, they will lead to dB and power loss resulting into slow network that damages your equipment in a long run.
A good quality cable will ensure that your network remains intact and keeps away from potential threats. One of the major benefits of these cables is that they do not pose a fire hazard or produce EMI. Due to these reasons, your equipment will never get damaged.
Make More Space
If the cables and racks are unkempt, they will take up a lot of space in your data center. This will lead you into making an expansion and spending finances over it. The best part about fiber optic cables is that you can optimize them for space and include other equipment in that space.
When it comes to installing the fiber cables, one needs to follow some basic guidelines. It includes supporting the cable and not over bending it. All these cables have a minimum threshold for bend radius. If you do not go above these values or press against edges during installation, you will never have issues pertaining to space.
Enhanced Communication
“Hello! Can you hear me? Your voice is trailing off!” This is a usual common saga when the network connections are weak. Result? Business losses and difficult relationships. Through good quality fiber optic cables, you can render uninterrupted data, voice, and video communications. All you need to do is find the right fiber optic system and install it in the right way.
Remember, nobody likes data loss and dropped signals that lead to miscommunication. Once you install the cables, make sure that your network is running at the desired speed and in a glitch free manner. If you are a cable expert, you are good to go. If not, you can always seek advice from professionals. They might charge a minor fee for the same and some more on the installation services.
Inclusion And Adoption Of Fiber Cables
Every company wants to ensure that their data keeps secure and safe. And it is difficult and illegal to hack or cut the cables. This is why businesses don’t share details about their network connections with others. Exclusive fiber connections make the data safe, secure and better as compared to copper cables.
fiber-mart.com Cable is one of the most popular names in the USA when it comes to buying multimode/single mode duplex fiber optic connectors and cables online. Apart from fiber optic patch cords, we also provide ethernet cables, USB cables, power cords as well as other PC accessories.
Find out more about our products on our website. ISO 9001-2000 registered manufacturers make most of our products and hence, you do not have to worry about their quality. What more could you ask for? Get in touch with us now!

Know the Right Time to Adopt Fiber Optic Technology

Fiber optic cables are capable of supporting most of the world’s internet telephone system, and cable television. They contain strands of glass fibers inside an insulated case. They support the long distance, high performing data, and telecommunications operations. These cables are capable to provide higher bandwidth which can transfer data over longer distances in a matter of minutes.
Throughout the years when fiber cables faced a revolutionary period, it became a bit tricky to consider the situations where you need to adopt these cables. Let’s go through a list of considerations which help you to decide when is the correct time to upgrade to fiber optic cables.
New Projects:
If you have your networking system built under copper system, it makes more sense to stick to the existing system. But there comes one point when it might become more cost effective to use fiber. At this juncture, a cost-benefit analysis helps you determine when to use fiber optic cable. Therefore, whenever there is a big new project just around the corner, it is wise to invest in installing a fiber system.
When Hurricane Sandy came, it damaged decade old copper cables due to water intake. Following to this natural disaster, New York City replaced its copper infrastructure with fiber. The investment in fiber optics made much more sense when such natural calamity occurred which reduced the performance quality. Service providers like Verizon chose to upgrade to fiber to ensure longevity, reliable internet access, and better service.
If you are the owner of a building and thinking about upgrading to Fiber optic technology then the building tenant’s requirements can give you a proper idea about the right time. If they want to use the new and renovated technology for the long term, a fiber investment may help them. Otherwise, keeping the future requirements in mind if you go with a new copper system, it might need a replacement in the near future itself.
Building Type And Application
When you look to successfully implement a fiber networking system, it is important to understand the venue first. You must consider the following things:
The usage of cable
Is cable going to stay outside and/or in between buildings
Does this venue support large crowds like sports stadium?
Are you going to use wireless frequently?
Number of connections
One of the important things from the above points is to look at the number of connections. The reason behind this is the small cross-sectional area of the fiber, a total number of cables and connections you can place together could be greater than a copper system.
Large User Base:
Overall internet speed and usage is dependent on the number of users who are going to use this service. Moreover, it depends on the usage of each individual. If we consider the past records, big market players like Apple, Facebook, and Google were the heavy users of fiber because they have a large number of employees with devices and the amount of data transfer that took place every day. If we consider today’s scenario, products like high-rise hotels, university campuses and corporate offices might experience similar needs.
In such cases, one common thing is a large number of users are involved. You can anticipate that each of them at least brings two devices together, for instance, one laptop and a smartphone which would demand high-quality connectivity.
The main reason is that at these places for example campuses, there will be real-time lectures, access to assignments, and submissions. At hotels, a wireless connection would be the number one demand of guests. They would need to stream content, upload photos online and access other public networks. On the other side, employees would be in constant communication with onsite and remote staff via online calls and video connections. Hence, places where there is a large number of users involved, there is a likely scenario that users access cloud services all day to receive and send large files.
Future Proof Your Networks
Fiber Optic Technology is a great technology for large bandwidth usage. At present most of the fiber bandwidth does not have any limitations by cables. That means that it doesn’t matter which type of new fiber optic electronics come into the market you can always utilize them at their best with these cables installed.
Summing it up…
Fiber optic technology has replaced traditionally used copper cables in most of the industries. Plus, their prices have also decreased in the past years. When you see that there is no sign of slowing down the bandwidth and capacity needs, people might get such questions where they want to know when is the right time to invest in fiber optic systems. The above mentioned instance describes almost all the situations where they need to adopt fiber optic options. If you still have questions about their usage, let us know. We would be happy to help!

The Future of Network Cabling: Fiber & Copper Together

With the technological advancements & increasing internet speed raises a question as to whether to use traditional copper as the physical interconnector or upgrade to fiber to support these higher speeds.
In this blog post, we are going to see the main difference and consequences of using both on the same platform.
Size And Space:
The main difference will be fluctuation in size and weight. Everyone has seen a traditional Cat5/Cat6 and a fiber cable. The clear difference here is that a duplex fiber optic cable provides 25 percent space savings and 50 percent weight savings over shielded bulk cat5e cable. Moreover, optical fiber cables are lighter, thinner, and more efficient than their copper counterparts. However, it is important to note that fiber cables are a bit more fragile and require special tools to terminate connections.
Transmission Speed:
Traditional Cat5 twisted pair copper cables support a transmission rate of 100 Megabits per second. On the same side, Cat 6 supports an impressive rate of 10 Gigabits per second up to a distance of 300 feet.
Whereas new fiber cables and new transmission protocols are booming each and every day. For mobile military platforms, fiber can support anywhere from 100Mbps up 10 Gbps. However, in data centers and service provider interconnects, fiber support the speed of 40, 50, 75, and 100 Gbps. And you can even see 400Gbps speed tested and implemented.
Signal Loss:
One of the major disadvantages of copper bulk ethernet cable is that they experience mass signal loss over long distances. If we look at the effective limit of a copper run, that is about 100 meters. Other distances longer than that require ethernet switch, ethernet extender or media converter that can basically link two runs of copper together. Another way is to terminate the copper run and add a link to a fiber connection for the additional distance.
On the other hand, fiber optic cables can run without significant signal loss over longer distances. As new technologies are constantly coming ahead, a single mode fiber can support up to 100 Gbps up to 10km without any significant signal loss.
EMI And Cross Talk:
Copper cabling is responsive to crosstalk and both radio frequency and EMI as it transfers an electrical signal. Cat6 Ethernet cables lessen the interference, but it does not escape it. The interference can be controlled with several measures which include an internal spline to separate the twisted pairs.
As the fiber optic cable doesn’t carry electricity but light, it is immune to the interference problem which can plague copper cabling.
Environmental Concerns:
Copper cables can potentially be a fire hazard in the long run. Because there is an electrical current passing through a plug which can wear over time. Whereas there is no electricity involved in the transmission of fiber optic signals, there is no concern of fire. Many users believe that fiber’s size and weight make it less resistant to the installation. But the fact is fiber is more durable with a higher tension limit than copper and stands up to environmental changes.
But why till date many of the platforms still use traditional bulk cat5e cable/cat 5 cables?
Till the date, fiber was an expensive cable. The overall economics of fiber has changed globally over the years; hence, the cost is becoming a less mitigation factor.
Fiber is sensitive metal. It reacts on twisting and kinking. It is a complex install. It changes rapidly with newer fibers, connectors and installation tools.
There is a huge installed base of copper, which is here to stay. Hence, many of them feel that the change of copper cables to fiber is optional.
A huge number of devices which need to connect still have only copper connector interfaces.
In the meantime, there are various ways to handle this situation. Many bulk ethernet cables and switches support the connection of copper as well as fiber. This way, devices connected with either physical medium will be able to communicate with each other. In such a scenario, physical media converters can act as a bridge between the two media offering a range of configurations which support fiber in/copper out or copper in/fiber out or many other configurations.
When it comes to big enterprises and data service providers, they have the way to replace copper with fiber in almost every new deployment. However, mobile and airborne platforms lag behind this evolution for many reasons. Speed requirements are not that much in demand, but field repairs and deployments are often harder. And finally, there comes the cost factor. We can expect to see the continued evolution from copper to fiber, but at a controlled pace. In the meantime, we can continue seeing the physical intermediary technologies that co-exist for many years to come.

Fiber Optic Patch Cables: Here’s All You Should Know

The basic definition of patch cables means an electronic cable which connects electronic devices. It allows the transmission of data between them. There are different types of patch cables in the market with fiber optic patch cables being one of the types. Other types include microphone, headphones, RCA, and ethernet.
Fiber optic patch cable, cord or often known as optical jumper, is a fiber cable terminated with fiber optic connectors (LC, SC, MTRJ, ST, and more) at each of their ends. These connectors allow the cord to stay connected to an optical switch or other computing devices. These cords are ideal for indoor use in server rooms, data centers, medical imaging, mechanical engineering, LAN applications, Cable TV networks, Telephone lines, and more.
If you are looking to buy fiber optic jumper for your system, first you should be aware of its types and functionalities. And then choose according to your requirements.
Let’s dive in!
Armored Fiber Patch Cord: It is stronger than the standard fiber patch cord containing all its features. Armored fiber patch cord is resistant to adults’ stepping and is anti-rodents. It is as flexible as a standard fiber optic patch cord.
Bend Insensitive Fiber Patch Cord: It is resistant to bend related damages. It contains a small cable bending radius and prevents additional bend damages by its inventive core design. And also because of its low macro-bending sensitivity. It supports data center, FTTH applications, and high-density cabling that have to be wrapped and adjusted in the tight corners.
Mode Conditioning Fiber Patch Cord: It is a duplex multimode fiber patch cord which has a small length of single mode fiber at the starting point of the transmission length. It is to solve technical issues involved when using single-mode equipment on the existing multimode cable plant. This type of cables’ major aim is to drive the distance of installed fiber plant beyond its original applications as well as to improve data signal quality.
Low Insertion Loss Fiber Patch Cable: It looks similar to common patch cable by its appearance. But its connectors at the ends contain relatively less insertion loss.
Uniboot Fiber Patch Cord: These cords terminate with specially designed LC uniboot connectors. This fiber patch cable unites two fiber in a single cable which delivers high better performance in the high-density cabling environment. It cuts down the cable count up to 50%. It represents the best fit for places where there’s a scarcity of place.
Switchable Fiber Patch Cord: It enables fast polarity change in the field without needing special tools or training. With a compact design, switchable fiber patch cord attributes to more efficient cable management in high-density environment.
And Here’s How To Choose The Right Fiber Optic Jumper:
Step 1: Choose The Right Connector Type
The ends of fiber optic patch cord contain different connectors including LC, SC, ST, FC, MPO, and MTP. Kindly note that these connectors are for different devices. If you want to connect similar ports type devices, use connectors with the same type of connectors on both ends such as LC-LC, SC-SC, MPO-MPO. If you want to connect different ports type devices, LC-SC, LC-ST, LC-FC cables might help.
Step 2: Consider The Mode
These patches are available in two types of modes: Single-mode and multimode. Single-mode patch cables are ideal for long distance data transmission. If you are looking for relatively shorter distances, multimode fiber optic patch cord could be an ideal choice.
Step 3: Simplex Or Duplex Cable?
Simplex means the fiber patch cable contains a single strand of glass or plastic fiber. It is generally used where only a single receive or transmit line is required between devices. Duplex means two fiber patch cables put side by side for common transceivers. Duplex cable type contains two strands of glass or plastic in comparison with the simplex cable.
Step 4: The Right Cable Length
These cables come in different length. Starting from 0.5m to 50m. It is of utmost importance to choose an appropriate length according to the distance between the devices you wish to connect.
Step 5: Connector Polish Type
There are two connectors available. APC and UPC. APC connectors are suitable for applications like FTTx, passive optical network and wavelength-division multiplexing. However, it is more expensive than UPC connector. For less sensitive digital system, UPC connects would be ideal.
Step 6: Choose The Cable Jacket Type
There are three jacket types: Polyvinyl chloride, Low smoke zero halogen, and Optical fiber nonconductive plenum.
PVC is ideal for horizontal runs from the wiring center.
LSZH is good to use between floors in commercial or residential buildings.
OFNP is good for vertical runs between floors and other applications.
Fiber products offer a wide selection of fiber optic jumpers with a variety of connectors, length, and cable types. The main thing is to consider your key requirement and choose the correct cable according to that to make the most out of it.

A custom configured solution for your cable management

How to Do Proper Cable Management
When you’re building or retrofitting your network infrastructure, you don’t always have the staff or resources to design your layout. Telect has a Custom Configured Solutions team with the expertise to design cable raceways and rack architecture.
This is the fifth in a Telect blog series, entitled The A-B-Cs of Cable Management. Application Engineer Jason Charette describes how a custom configured solution can save your company time and money.
Fiber optic cables often need to navigate through tight or awkward spaces, around corners and over ducts.
We’ve even had to route our CableLinks through a hole in the wall to connect an adjacent room.
Your optical fiber network needs to be logical and flexible. The increasing demand for more bandwidth, more capacity, faster speeds and lower latency is forcing us to consider growth and expansion. I’ve seen more than 570 fibers per run in one installation and I know — with the race to faster, bigger wireless service — that fiber counts are only going to keep going up.
That’s a lot of stress for network managers, especially when you know your company’s profit base hinges on your ability to scale your network.
When it comes to planning to densify your network, you need to ensure easy access to cable, clear identification and defined routing paths.
The right cable raceway design will help improve network performance, reduce energy costs, ease maintenance and lead to faster deployment during scaling efforts. Our end-to-end cable management solution, WaveTrax, accounts for the weight of the cable, bend-radius requirements, waterfall dropouts and other support methods that allow you to route cable without damage.
Do-it-yourself cable routing
If you’re roped into planning your cable pathway yourself, here a few tips to remember.
1. Be precise
Make sure you measure everything. When you’re accurate with your tape measure, you reduce the amount of waste and, in turn, cost.
2. Plan for later
Sure, measure for accuracy but make sure you have enough slack cable for maintenance and mining.
3. Stay true to the bend
Fiber cable is delicate and you have to ensure you’re paying attention to bend radius. Too far of a bend and you’re risking fractures and attenuation.
4. Keep the paths clear
You sometimes need quick access to cable. Keeping it on a defined route through your cable managers and vertical drops helps.
5. Don’t overfill
Overloading your trays can lead to excess weight and buckling. Too many fibers in your cable managers can clog up and give you a mess of spaghetti that makes identification and access nearly impossible.
6. Plan for growth
Allow for expansion with the fill capacity of Wavetrax. It’s easier to go one size up now then to have to retrofit later.
A better idea FOR CABLE MANAGEMENT
The Telect Custom Configured Solutions team has decades of experience in designing and building network infrastructure. We work hard to understand your network’s facility and how it’s probably unique to anything we’ve worked on before.
We take your specifications and develop a cable management solution with our WaveTrax and articulating CableLinks products. When you provide us with your floor plan, we create drawings on an overhead layout and a full Bill of Materials (BOM).
A solid cable pathway design can be the difference in your network running optimally and efficiently. It can help reduce the risk or duration of network downtime.
Instead of wondering where you went wrong when you can’t find cable or your network suffers, make sure it’s done right the first time.
Jason Charette and Brad Hawkins are Application Engineers at Telect. They have decades of experience designing cable management solutions for major telecommunications networks and enterprise data centers. There isn’t a hole in the wall they can’t find a solution for to make sure your fiber optic cable finds the right path.