Understand 100G Ethernet Standards

People want 100G Ethernet, meanwhile, they want to reduce the cost and increase the port density to the most. Driven by the combination of elements like that, 100G Ethernet standards and related optical transceivers have improved a lot in the past few years. As so many 100G Ethernet standards and package form factors are used, people might be confused by them easily. This post offers a detailed introduction about 100G Ethernet standards.

The first 100G Ethernet standard was approved in 2010. After that tremendous changes have happened in 100G technology in many aspects. The first generation of the 100G standards use the 10x10G lane in electrical signaling. For media signaling, some use 10x10G and some use 4x10G. The second generation 100G Ethernet standards apply 4x10G signaling for both electrical and media. In terms of transmission distances, different standards can support different transmission distance. Now there are more choices for transmission distances ranging from 1 meter to 40 kilometers. Meanwhile, the package form factors also changed a lot. The first 100G transceivers CFP is much larger than that of the new one QSFP28. To offer an intuitive way to illustrate these 100G Ethernet standards, I will list them in the following table.

Name	Distance	Media Type	Module Type	Media Signaling	Electrical Signaling	Standard
100GBASE-KP4	1m	Backplane	Backplane	4x25	4x25	June 2014 IEEE 802.3bj
100GBASE-KR4	1m	Backplane	Backplane	4x25	4x25	June 2014 IEEE 802.3bj
100GBASE-CR4	5m	Twinax Copper	CFP2, CFP4 QSFP28	4x25	10x10	June 2014 IEEE 802.3bj
100GBASE-CR10	7m	Twinax Copper	CXP, CFP2 CFP4, QSFP28	10x10	4x25	June 2010 IEEE 802.3ba
100GBASE-SR4	OM3: 70m OM4: 100m	Parallel MMF	CFP2, CFP4 CPAK, QSFP28	4x25	10x10	March 2015 IEEE 802.3bm
100GBASE-SR10	OM3: 100m OM4: 150m	Parallel MMF	CFP, CFP2, CFP4 CPAK, CXP	10x10	10x10	June 2010 IEEE 802.3ba
10x10-2km	2km	Duplex SMF	CFP	10x10	10x10	March 2011 10x10 MSA
10x10-10km	10km	Duplex SMF	CFP	10x10	10x10	August 2011 10x10 MSA
100GBASE-LR4	10km	Duplex SMF	CFP, CFP2, CFP4 CPAK, QSFP28	4x25	10x10	June 2010 IEEE 802.3ba
10x10-40km	40km	Duplex SMF	CFP	10x10	10x10	August 2011 10x10 MSA
100GBASE-ER4	40km	Duplex SMF	CFP, CFP2	4x25	10x10	June 2010 IEEE 802.3ba

The above table contains the 100G standards that published by IEEE and MSA, which are listed by the transmission distance from the top to the bottom. According to reports from many marketing reports, 100G optical component market will surge in 2016. FS.COM provide 100G solutions including transceivers, patch cable, cable management products, etc. Kindly contact sales@fs.com or visit FS.COM for more details about 100G Ethernet and products, if you are interested.

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How to Connect Fiber Media Converter to Network

Fiber media converter is a device which can connect two types of medias, like copper to fiber optic and single-mode fiber to multimode fiber. As a cost-effective device that can connect two dissimilar cable media, it has been widely used in today’s network, especially FTTH systems. Although fiber media converters come into various types according to the parameters like data rate, interfaces, form factors, power options and Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP), the purposes to use fiber media converters in networks are usually simple. They are often used in pairs to extend a network over fiber by inserting a fiber segment into a copper network, or be used individually to accomplish the conversion between two different cable types. This post will introduce the connection guide of fiber media converters.

Interface Types of Fiber Media Converters

Before connecting fiber media converters, the interface of them should be firstly acknowledged. The following picture shows the most commonly used connectors that a fiber media converters may use. The ST connector is designed for fiber using a bayonet locking system. SC connector and LC connector are the most popular small-form-factor fiber connectors. The MT-RJ connector is a RJ-style connector which has a molded body. The RJ45 is the familiar to most people, which is designed for copper cable and can be found on most of our devices that need to be connected to the Ethernet. The above mentioned interfaces of the fiber media converters can be connected to the target devices directly by patch cords. However, for SFP, SFP+ and XFP transceivers, there are two methods for connecting the media converters to the network. The connection methods will be introduced in the following.

Connecting Fiber Media Converters to Network

There is one of the most important things about fiber media converters, which is they are often used in pairs. The two fiber media converters should be connected to each other for single transmission and conversion.

The above picture shows an application example of fiber media converters. For fiber media converters with fiber optic interface of LC/ST/SC/MT-RJ, the interfaces on the two media converters can be connected directly by a length of fiber optic patch cable that has the corresponding connector type. The RJ45 port of each media converter is connected to 10/100Base-TX HUB and computer server separately. The two fiber media converters should be supported by electricity.

For fiber media converter that has a SFP/SFP+ or XFP transceiver interface. The connection between the two media converters is a little bit different from the others. Two optical transceivers are needed. Additional optical transceiver should be inserted to the port firstly and then the two media converter should be connected via ports of the two optical transceivers. If the port support 10G and the transmission distance between the two converters is less than 100 meters, then a length of SFP+ to SFP+ AOC can be used.

Conclusion

The above mentioned fiber media converters connections are just the most basic methods. As there are a variety of media converters and their functions are different from each other. Connecting the fiber media converters largely depends on the practical using. Kindly visit FS.COM or contact sales@fs.com for more details. Our professional sales and technical support are willing to solve your problems about media converters.

Source: http://www.fiber-optic-tutorial.com/how-to-connect-fiber-media-converter-to-network.html