The rise of encircled flux emphasizes fiber's growth

Fiber-optic cabling has been rising in a variety of network settings, particularly in areas like the data center or as backhaul to support wireless networks. As fiber becomes more pervasive many standards bodies and equipment manufacturers have been working to develop more effective components to eliminate optical power loss. Cabling Installation & Maintenance magazine reported that many companies are exploring more advanced fiber networks, leading to an environment in which encircled flux solutions are increasingly necessary during network testing.

Better testing becomes necessary as fiber becomes more prominent. Encircled flux capabilities could play a major role in enabling organizations to establish fiber networks while maintaining a low total cost of ownership by minimizing maintenance expenses over time.

Looking at the growing role of encircled flux solutions
The problem, the report explained, is that organizations are dealing with better fiber network components that enable them to significantly reduce optical power loss. This is leading to optical power budgets that are extremely strict and will not tolerate variance between testing hardware. This presents a major problem as two different testers, even with advanced reference connectors, LED sources and jumper reference systems, can experience power loss variance as high as 40 percent.

The news source explained that businesses cannot settle for that amount of variance in an era in which optical network components are so advanced that organizations are using component specifications to determine power loss budgets instead of depending solely on standards. This leads to a need for extremely precise testing methodologies and that 40 percent variance is too great to be dealt with. This is where encircled flux comes into play. Encircled flux capabilities provide a more precise point of reference for the modal power throughout the network, making it much easier to accurately measure power loss.

Cabling Installation & Maintenance magazine reported that encircled flux is becoming so prominent that it will likely soon be considered a mandatory specification for some standards-based tests.

Optical power budgets and media converters
Organizations must keep the diverse components of the network in mind when establishing their optical power loss budgets. This can present major problems in mixed media climates like campus networks that move data back and forth between copper and fiber cabling. Fiber to Ethernet media converters that limit optical power loss play a critical role in supporting effective performance and the growth of fiber testing emphasizes the rising need to incorporate low-loss components, like advanced media converters, into the network.

Perle has an extensive range of Managed and Unmanaged Fiber Media Converters to extended copper-based Ethernet equipment over a fiber optic link, multimode to multimode and multimode to single mode fiber up to 160km.