Fiber Optic Cabling has become the preferred choice for network data transmission in Canada. With the advancement of new technologies and extensive use of fiber optic cabling, the prices of fiber-optic has come down considerably making it an ideal choice for network transmission.
I like copper cable which uses the copper metal for transmission, fiber-optic instead use digital light pulses at very high frequencies. The light source is usually either a laser or LED. The fiber-optic cables are optimized for one or more wavelengths of light. Because fiber-optic use light as a transmission media, it offers tremendous amount of speed and also longer transmission capabilities. Apart from capacity to carry data at higher rates, fiber-optic also offers immunity to electromagnetic interference.
Copper cables are highly susceptible to electromagnetic interference and therefore are not recommended in the areas where there is a high potential of electrical data transmission. Fiber-optic cables on the other hand are immune to crosstalk because the fiber-optic does not conduct electricity and only uses light signals in a glass fibers rather than electrical signals along a metallic conductor to transmit data. You either have to install a shielded copper cable or go over the fiber-optic for these kind of environments.
While copper data cables have a limitation of 100 metres or 300 feet, fiber-optic cables are capable of caring data transmission to as long as 75 km without using any signal boosting repeaters. This makes fiber-optic cable a perfect choice for long distance runs such as connecting to campuses, connecting buildings, cities and remote areas.
Installation of fiber-optic cables is much easier than copper cables. Because they are lightweight, it is much easier to pull these cables.
Fibre cable comes in many configuration however can be broadly segregated by fibers strands namely single mode and multimode. They come in various configurations including armoured, non-armoured, gel filled, tight buffered and more. Single mode fibers are is used for long-distance fibre runs requiring very high speeds while multimode cables are used for shorter distances. Based on the number of optical fibers these can be divided into the following:
- Simplex cables
- Duplex cables
- Multi-fiber cables
Increases in available fiber-optic cable–manufacturing capacity have lowered cable prices to levels comparable to high-end UTP on a per-foot basis. Fibre cabling is not doubt the future of network cabling in Toronto.