Now, fiber optic cables have been widely used in a wide variety of communication networks, but copper network equipment and cables in local area networks (LANs) still occupy an important position. How to combine modern optical fiber communication technology with traditional copper network communication equipment is one of the important topics of network engineers. The emergence of fiber media converter is a perfect way to seamlessly connect fiber optic cables and copper cables, commonly used in Ethernet copper networks that cannot be covered and must use fiber to extend the transmission distance of the network applications while helping to connect the fiber to the last mile line Network and more outside the network has played a huge role. Depending on the applicable network, fiber media converter can be divided into Ethernet fiber media converter and time division multiplexing (TDM) fiber media converter. This tutorial will detail these two fiber media converters and their applications.

Ethernet fiber media converter

Ethernet fiber media converters comply with IEEE 802.3 standard, support Ethernet, Fast Ethernet, 10 Gigabit Ethernet devices, but also support 10/100 / 1000M adaptive network equipment. This kind of fiber media converters is widely used, commonly used in point-to-point networks, campus networks, and redundant applications.

Point-to-point application

In point-to-point applications, Ethernet fiber media converters need to be used in pairs. As shown in the following figure, the fiber media converters are used between the two Ethernet switches (or routers, servers, etc.), and the middle is connected by fiber.

Park-district applications

The following figure shows an example of a cell application for a fiber media converter. The fiber optic transceivers are installed on a high-density rack to connect the electrical interface switch (A) of the network core layer and the electrical switch (B) of the work area and other devices ( C and D), where the fiber media converters can be connected directly to the optical switch:

Redundant applications

The storage and forwarding mechanism of a fiber media converter can forward data that cannot be forwarded when the data link is saturated, and then forwards it in the converter's cache, waiting for the network to be idle. This reduces the possibility of data collision and ensures data transmission reliability. The following figure is a fiber media converter in twisted pair and fiber redundant link in the application diagram:

Time division multiplexing (TDM) fiber media converter

Time division multiplexing (TDM) fiber media converters, including T1 / E1 fiber media converters and T3 / E3 fiber media converters, can be used to effectively and effectively extend the traditional time division multiplexing (TDM) link with fiber. Such fiber media converters are generally used in pairs while extending the transmission distance while avoiding noise, improve service quality and network security and other aspects can play an important role.

T1 / E1 fiber media converters

T1/E1 Fiber media converters meet T1 (transmission rate of 1.544Mbps line) and E1 (transmission rate of 2.048Mbps line) standards, AMI, B8ZS and HDB3 line coding. This type of fiber media converters has a diagnostic function that facilitates the installation and maintenance of T1 and E1 transmission lines.

T3/E3 fiber media converters

The T3 / E3 fiber media converters conform to the standard of T3 (transmission lines up to 44.736 Mbps) and E3 (transmission rates up to 34.368 Mbps), B3ZS and HDB3 line codes, which can be connected with fiber-optic dedicated PBXs, multiplexed Devices, routers, video servers and other equipment. The following figure is a common example of a T3/E3 fiber media converter:

Conclusion

Fiber media converters support a wide range of protocols, transmission rates, and transmission media. It provides real-time non-blocking transport switching performance while providing balanced traffic, isolation conflicts, and detection errors to ensure high security during data transmission and stability.