On Tue, 20 Aug 2002, Dustin Puryear wrote: > Basically, what kind of equipment is needed? Personal experience, links, > articles, or whatever are appreciated.
Check to see if it is multi-mode or single-mode fiber. Single-mode fiber can go greater distances (up to 100km) but the transceivers are much more expensive. If it is multimode, you can do 100mb FX, or 1000mb SX (shortwave gigabit). Gig SX is actually cheaper than 100bFX, since SX is just a LED, whereas FX is an actual laser. But you can only go a few hundred meters (250-300) with SX. FX is good for up to 2km. So you'll need to check the distance of the fiber link. If it is singlemode fiber, you can do 1000mb LX (longwave gigabit). LX is good for at least 2km, but depending on the vendor and transceiver, some "long haul" LX transceivers can approach 100km. This gets really expensive though. You can probably do 100mb over single-mode with some fiber-to-copper media converters, which run a few hundred each. And this might be the cheapest route. But, the IEEE does not define 100mb on single-mode fiber, so you may have interoperability issues. If you go this route, stick with the same vendor. You don't need a CSU or anything, just some switches. The cable company will probably terminate the fiber in an SC (possibly ST) patch panel. The switch you buy will either have an SC or MTRJ connector. At this point, you simply buy an SC-SC or SC-MTRJ fiber jumper ($20-40). Unlike cat5, it is much cheaper and less hassle to buy the pre-made jumper rather than trying to make them yourself. Looks like there are some other fiber guys hanging out on the list... let us know if you have more questions. -Ray -- =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Ray DeJean http://www.r-a-y.org Systems Engineer Southeastern Louisiana University IBM Certified Specialist AIX Administration, AIX Support =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
