Optical Fiber Capacity Growth 54
kastaverious writes: "I
found this on Scientific American. It talks about developments in all optical switching and the growth in capacity of optical fiber. The article has some interesting graphs of bandwidth demand and the growth in bandwidth availabilty. There is also a good explanation of some of the technical issues involved in increasing switching capacity, and efforts underway to overcome these problems." The article also has lots of good SciAm-style graphics. This short article at Janes also sheds some light on the world on undersea cable laying, which also recalls the article Neal Stephenson wrote for Wired a few years ago.
Staggering (Score:1)
From the article:
Every day installers lay enough new cable to circle the earth three times. If improvements in fiber optics continue, the carrying capacity of a single fiber may reach hundreds of trillions of bits a second just a decade or so from now--and some technoidal utopians foresee the eventual arrival of the vaunted petabit mark.
Good gravy! Too bad the ISPs will divvy that up into a billion megabit lines for you and me.
Sometimes nothing is a real cool hand.
Remember the fibre optic cable shortage in the 80s (Score:1)
one day... (Score:3)
One day our connection will be several gigs/sec.
One day there will be no keyboards.
One day etc etc...
This is all fine and good and it will be one day, however I do not think that fibre optic cabling will allow us all to do this. First of all it is VERY expensive and not easy to repair if it sits on the bottom of the ocean. I think better satellite systems and/or wireless will be the future. But currently that is what we have and we are making it work.
It impresses me how much cable has already been laid and how much more will be. The cost and resources must be staggering. I've been on ships and just trying to imagine laying cable behind the ship for THOUSANDS of miles if well and I quote...
"Whoa"
I still guess it is easier than laying down fibre optic networks on land b/c of all the construction etc necessary.
Until that day that we all have a direct fibre optic connection or satellite (not current crap satellites but good ones) connections I guess i'll be stuck with my 18 kb/sec DSL connection. I should not complain as I remember back when the 2400 baud modems came out and then the 9600 was revolutionary that we HAD to have even thinking "How can they make this better?"
just my 1:40 am half asleep at work opinion.
Lord Arathres
I have a (real) question. (Score:1)
Anyone have a supported answer?
Re:Staggering (Score:1)
Why is this bad? What's wrong with broadband connections for everyone?
Broken Lines (Score:1)
Copper wire (which is hardly fragile) gets broken seemingly often... I would assume this would only be worse with optic lines...
Of course, this is my "I'm about to go to sleep, can't use my moderation points since not too many people have posted, and I would really like some good discussion" post.
Re:one day... (Score:1)
Depending on who you are that might be a good thing.
Lord Arathres
Re:I have a (real) question. (Score:1)
Re:one day... (Score:1)
You mean by challenging our brains that God took the time to design, to show our appreciation by occupying it with things like HDTV, and using our resources that God gave us to make those designs happen? Somehow, I think even God doesn't design every snowflake, he just wrote a really good algorithim for making them. (In perl, of course)
Re:Remember the fibre optic cable shortage in the (Score:2)
Re:Staggering (Score:1)
Articles accurate but too fluffy. Smoke & Mirrors (Score:5)
DWDM is a start, but there are two major problems:
Finally, give up on rewiring the last mile. The DSP and other signal processing tricks will get faster and cheaper more quickly than any solution that requires rewiring. It makes financial sense to swap end point electronics rather than rip open walls. You may see many more COs making shorter runs to the houses, but either existing coax or twisted pair into the house will carry our future bandwidth. (Thanks to Brent and Richard for convincing me.)
I miss Sun, they had more interesting problems than running a non-profit. See the non-profit at TrueGift Donations [truegift.com].
Cheers!
Charles
Re:I have a (real) question. (Score:2)
Now project forward 10 years. 20 years ago Direct Broadcast Satelite on a small dish for home was thought impossible.
Re:Staggering (Score:2)
What would be your criteria, then, for deciding who should be allowed to have a broadband connection? Would it really be practical or fair to implement these criteria?
Well, first, we're gonna need some sort of moderation system, so that we can rate the worthiness of people's Internet usage... then we can set up a kind of 'karma' system for determining who should get how much bandwidth...
- cicadia
More bps is no use for me (Score:2)
So, this will not give web access to those who can not afford it now. I think wider web access is more important than more bps. Also, this will not increase the quality of the web, except for those who 'Download large image files from the busiest servers of the web'.
"Unlimited bandwidth" - When will they learn? (Score:3)
Re:I have a (real) question. (Score:1)
Re:I have a (real) question. (Score:1)
However, since they (BT) spent so long dragging their feet with unbundling the local loop ADSL I wouldn't bank on bits of glass ever poking through the skirting board.....
While they can make money feeding us incremental improvements why do anything else?
Re:More bps is no use for me (Score:1)
Re:Articles accurate but too fluffy. Smoke & Mirro (Score:1)
Having only one protocol at the bottom is only a problem if it's impossible, or undesireable to wrap the other protocols in it.
Witness the many articles here on slashdot mentioning odd or silly tunelling-schemes like tcp/ip over dns. I'd not be the least bit surprised if transporting sonet over ip works fine, and even if it doesn't, tranporting the payload of sonet over ip shouldn't be impossible.
Re:one day... (Score:1)
Re:one day... (Score:1)
Too much latency in satellite communication vs. fiberoptic.
-jerdenn
Re:I have a (real) question. (Score:1)
The report did not go into detail regarding hardware required to use the fibre or where/how it tied into the local service provider.
Answer: New construction with in five years will probably have fibre installed. Existing homes/ developments will likely not get the technology for 10-15 years due to the rewiring required.
Re:HTTP (Score:1)
While you are correct that HTTP is most commonly run over TCP/IP, please note that HTTP is completely separate from TCP/IP.
-jerdenn
Serious question about the article. (Score:2)
Re:"Unlimited bandwidth" - When will they learn? (Score:1)
Or another way, there are a finite amount of particles either in the universe, or that we can interact with (my fall back position).
My suggestion: replace 'unimaginable [to most non dreamers]' or 'incredible [for 2001]' with unlimited in the article.
Re:one day... (Score:4)
1. Copper cable is heavy. One mile of Copper cable is a few thousand pounds, compared to one mile of optic which is under one hundred pounds (depending on the type).
2. When used in telecommunications systems, copper wire needs repeater stations every 2-3 miles. These are stations that people have to routinely check and fix when something breaks. Fiber optic in contrast, only needs 1 repeater station every 300-500 miles.
3. I forget the actual sizes, but you can send more bandwidth on one little optic than you can send in a large diameter bundle of copper wires.
4. Glass is cheaper than copper. Once the manufacturing technology of glass fibers catches up to that of copper wire, than the prices for optical cable will be cheaper than that of copper.
Finally, I fail to see how copper wire is any easier or cheaper to repair than optical wire when it is on the bottom of the ocean. This is an argument for a wireless system, but I think that there would be too much latency in a wireless system.
Obfuscation (Score:4)
- 'Smoke' - it's hard to work out what you are talking about here - seems like the 'smoke' box is an add-drop multiplexer for DWDM, which puts multiple frequencies (aka wavelengths) from various input fibres on a single output fibre. DWDM is inherently multi-protocol of course, as each wavelength can carry a unique protocol.
- 'Mirrors' - this is just one of the many possible all-optical switching technologies that are under development. These include MEMS (tiny mirrors that can reflect light onto different fibres), electro-holographic Bragg gratings (completely solid state and with useful testing/monitoring features), and even a bizarre technology that involves using inkjet techniques to blow bubbles in and out of place, thereby affecting switching (from Agilent).
Further Reading (Score:2)
Nicely written analogies making many of the optics issues much easier to grasp.
Optical switches: If you own a hammer... (Score:1)
I was discussing SciAm's article about optical switching technology (which I read weeks ago in dead-tree format) with a friend who did his M.Sc. in laser crystalography. He pooh-poohed the bubble refraction/reflection switches, the nano-mirror switches, the delay loop/phase change switches... the only thing that will work, he insisted, was a set of specialized, pre-pumped lasing crystals that would boost signal power as they change the signal direction from one light path to another by refraction.
I observed that the crystals he was talking about would only work for one wavelength (so you couldn't stack signals) and in any case don't exist now, and won't exist for some time. "Doesn't matter," he said, "that's still the only technology that'll work."
He doesn't work on lasers and optics anymore, but if that's the kind of attitude that the telcom companies have, I'm glad there's more than one group trying to solve the problem.
Re:one day... (Score:1)
internet lag will always exist as the fiber will always be faster than the switches and routers.
I hope that our connections will not be several gig's per sec. 100baseT is more than anyone at home would ever need, one can watch hDTV video via that link while talking and surfing. (NOTE your set top boxes will be more like tvio's with a digital cable box and cablemodem combined. This is coming VERY soon.. I seen the beta units in testing)
no keyboards? why? I can type faster than most people can talk.
changes will happen... but most everything is already here. Just for the rich right now.
Re:Remember the fibre optic cable shortage in the (Score:1)
You forgot the fiber-optic christmas trees, and the little handheld flashlights with the fibers that you wave at night events
Re:Serious question about the article. (Score:2)
Such systems will be used for all kinds of scientific calculations, as well as telemedicine, distributed virtual reality caves, and so on. The Grid will eventually impinge on us all (e.g. running massive simulations to make a medical diagnosis as you sit in your doctor's surgery).
Depending on the sort of application, the bandwidth demands can be enormous.
Re:"Unlimited bandwidth" - When will they learn? (Score:1)
point-to-point interactive video everywhere (Score:2)
interactive video of broadcat TV quality or better
everywhere- office, school, home, vehicle.
This is the natural human-communications-computer
interface. We still have a way to go to figure
out computer-video interfaces. Text interfaces
are a passing form, mainly for academic use.
No. The last mile will be wireless. (Score:2)
The days of home-installed telco equipment are coming to an end. It is expensive and problematic for telco companies to maintain equipment in consumers homes, be it for phone or data. Added to which, rapidly changing standards prohibit any telco from dedicating any strategy to any particular technology. Consider the current state of optical computing - SONET is currently the main standard, but probably on the way out in the next few years. Hence no telco is going to roll out a SONET network to consumers homes because much of the equipment driving the network will become obsolete.
The better approach for voice and data is wireless. Not only does this allow location independence, but it also allows the telco to avoid the costly business of maintaining the line into the consumer's home.
Economics of the unavoidable fiber glut (Score:2)
In a bandwidth-starved world it seems odd to think that there is a glut of fiber, but the very soon will be if there already isn't.
If all of the fiber in the ground right now was lit, the cost of transmission would effectively drop to zero - its just a matter of who can ride out the inevitable shakeout in the market and consolidate the networks of the ones that can't compete. In the mide-term, consumers could actually see reduced capacity as the market consolidates.
Re:I have a (real) question. (Score:1)
I live on a new houseing estate (my house will be 3 years old this month), when the BT engineer came to 'install' the phone[1] I asked him whether it was copper or fibre to the house. He said it was copper all the way from the exchange, they tried to lay fibre in the next estate over, but they couldn't get it to work.
So BT are not only monopolistic and slow, they are also incompetent[2]
[1] 168 pounds to 'install' my line, all he did was come in, stick a handset in the socket and make sure there was a dial tone. Amazing what you can charge when there is no competition[3]
[2] Okay, so the estate was started _after_ BT announced they would do ADSL, so you would think that all new houses would be capable wouldn't you. No such luck, too far from the exchange and too much line impeedence
[3] The only services allowed to put connections to a new property are, gas, electric, water and BT. No other telco is allowed, no cable company is allowed. They have to wait until the top surface is put on the road, and them come and dig it all up again...
FTTH is almost here (Score:1)
http://www.fibercabletohome.com
is in the starting blocks and just about ready to starting their run.
I think the site isn't quite ready for primetime, there are still a few uncompleted links.
Their main financial premise seems to be the equity value of owning the 'last mile' to the customer. A customer on fiber is not likely to switch back to cable or DSL, so the company can capitalize on the long-term recurring revenues from the customers.
Maybe it will work for them, who knows?
To the Moon!
http://www.beefjerky.com
Uhhh, I donno (Score:2)
PowerPoint slides at industry conferences emphasize why the deluge is yet to come.
I think he hit the nail on the head, considering my only PowerPoint effort yeilded a 75 megabyte monster. When you understand this, 'metacomputing', 'web agents' and IT will all make sense.
there is a mistake in this article (Score:1)
They're doomed (Score:2)
Unless there is a major telco behind this, or another form of long term capital, this cannot take off.
Re:I have a (real) question. (Score:2)
Cable TV was the last great wiring build-out to consumers - no one is taking on that cost ever again. The last mile will be wireless.
Re:Economics of the unavoidable fiber glut (Score:1)
Re:there is a mistake in this article (Score:2)
If you are in the SF bay area and interested in this subject, Photonics West is currently happening at the San Jose Convention Center (through Thursday.) For information check here [spie.org].
Re:I have a (real) question. (Score:1)
Re:one day... (Score:2)
All major communications companies want to be laying fiber. It's widely accepted that it will be the communications medium of the future. I worked for Lucent Technologies as a summer intern, directly in optical switching and networking. I was told on a number of occasions that Lucent couldn't even produce enough fiber to meet the internal needs, much less fill the huge back order on cable.
This example is why fiber optics are expensive. Especially when you look at multi mode and single mode fiber. The price increase is huge. They can't make it quickly enough to meet demands.
Re:I have a (real) question. (Score:2)
Wireless communication is great for cell phones and GPS and a bunch of other things, but when you start talking monstrous bandwidth, you need cable. Say, for instance, that 5 million New Yorkers want internet connections of 2 Mb/s each, and that your wireless technology can pack 10 bits per Hertz (that's really tight packing!). 5 million x 2 million / 10 = 1x10^12 So to give those folks their internet access, you need 1 THz (terahertz) of electromagnetic spectrum. But the whole usable spectrum is only about 300 GHz, and the FCC probably wants some of it for little things like radio stations, air traffic control, military communication, etc. ;) Wireless connections won't work because there are too many people.
I don't agree with your example. You are assuming that all 5 million New Yorkers are simultaneously connected to the same base-station. Your example seems to "prove" even cell-phones are impossible. In reality, a network of base-stations, each connected to each other and the backbone by fiber, would be used to implement the last mile. If one base-station was used per 1000 customers, then only (1e3 * 2e6) / 10 = 2e8 MHz if required. So, using your assumption of 10 bits per Hertz, only 200 MHz of bandwidth is needed to implement the network city-wide. Agreed, it would be damn hard to find an economical A/D converter if we needed a high SNR, but it certainly IS possible.
Re:I have a (real) question. (Score:1)
For starters, people spend a lot of time on the internet. The average length of a phone call has changed in the last few years from something like 10 minutes to something like an hour, and websurfers are the reason.
But websurfing aside, once services like video-on-demand or plain old TV are offered over these networks, people will stay connected all the time. And if you doubt the potential market for those services, think how often people rent movies, and how much more often they'd rent if they didn't have to leave their Barcaloungers!
Re:I have a (real) question. (Score:2)
All 5 million people could be online at once, but they are not served by a single base-station. There would be one base-station for every 1000 or so people. So, we would need 5e6/1000 = 5000 base-stations for all 5 million people to be online at once and still only use 200 MHz of bandwidth.
Cell-phone networks work the same way. Each "cell" is served by a base-station that can handle maybe 100 simultaneous calls in its area. When a call is made from cell-phone to cell-phone, each cell phone is actually communicating with its nearest base-station and the two base-stations are communicating with each other over a fiber-optic link. Because base-stations dynamically assign bandwidth to individual cell-phones requesting a connection, when two cell phones are talking to each other they could be on totally different frequencies.
In summary, when a wireless network is partitioned using cells, the bandwidth requirement is dependent on the number of users per base-station, not on the total number of users. Therefore, increasing the number of users from, say, 10000 to 5 million, only requires additional base-stations, NOT additional spectrum.
Re:I have a (real) question. (Score:1)
I think it would behoove you to do some research on the system I am discussing - it has been used succesfully in trials to transmit in the gigabit range.
Good SciAm-style graphics? (Score:1)
Since when are SciAm's graphics good? I've always found them obtuse and esoteric. Other, less "elite" science publications have a graphics style that communicates concepts better.
Is anyone with me on this?
Re:I have a (real) question. (Score:2)
Re:one day... (Score:1)
The new stuff makes fusing super easy. you just need the money to get to that level.