Cabling Chronicles
LinkIQ: Your Essential Network+Cable Tester
In a 2021 Network Field Report that surveyed more than 350 IT professionals, more than 70% said that network configurations happen daily, several times a week, or weekly. Nearly 50% of respondents also said they spend at least half of their time on reactive network tasks like troubleshooting, mapping, and configuration—leaving little time for strategic technology planning and digital transformation.
June 9, 2022
5 Vital Safety Rules for Working with Fiber Optic Cables
There are plenty of hazards to watch for when working on commercial and industrial networks. Fiber optic cable can seem safe; it doesn’t carry an electrical charge, and it’s not a heat source. More often it’s a lack of understanding of the real hazards of fiber optic cable that can be the most dangerous safety hazard of all.
May 31, 2022
Fiber Polarity Basics
Polarity defines direction of flow, such as the direction of a magnetic field or an electrical current. In fiber optics, polarity is directional; light signals travel through a fiber optic cable from one end to the other. A fiber optic link’s transmit signal (Tx) at end of the cable must match the corresponding receiver (Rx) at the other end.
May 19, 2022
Ethernet Cable Categories Explained: A Brief History
Millennials who entered the workforce between 2003 and 2016 are accustomed to the digital era: high-speed internet access, smartphones, online everything. And while they’ve definitely experienced advancements in technology during their lifetime, they may not be aware of just how far copper Ethernet cabling has come to make it all possible. We thought we’d start off 2022 with a little Ethernet history lesson for the younger generation and a walk down memory lane for those of us that have been in the industry a bit longer than we’d like to admit.
February 24, 2022
February 9, 2022
How to Test an SFP Transceiver and Network Cable
Recently we have been getting questions about how to determine if an SFP (Small Form-factor Pluggable) transceiver is working. We refer to SFP generically here to represent a multitude of the various optical modules that are available. Fluke Networks fiber testers can be used to measure the light that is being put out by an SFP.
January 21, 2022
Choosing the Best Fiber Optic Scope for Today’s Fiber Inspection
Contaminated connections remain the number one cause of fiber related problems and failures in data centers, campus, and other enterprise or telecom networking environments. But it’s not enough to just clean every fiber end face—there is no way to know if the end face is clean unless you inspect it.
January 4, 2022
Fiber vs. Copper to the Edge: Why Fiber is a Growing Choice for Smart, Sustainable Buildings
For years, we’ve heard about FTTX making its way into the horizontal LAN — fiber to the desktop, fiber to the office, fiber to the enclosure, fiber to the zone, etc. Often referred to as “fiber to the edge” or FTTE, most of these deployments have traditionally been for high-security government environments or specialty applications or devices. Now, as bandwidth requirements continue to increase and the commercial real estate industry is trending towards smarter and more sustainable buildings, the question of using fiber vs. copper is more relevant.
December 8, 2021
December 1, 2021
Are your fiber optic cables and testers ready for 400G Ethernet?
Driven by large hyperscale and cloud data center providers, advancements in signaling and transceiver technology have led to the development of next-generation transmission speeds. There are now multiple options available for 400G Ethernet applications over multimode and single-mode fiber with more on the horizon. And it doesn’t stop there—big players like Google, Facebook, and Microsoft are driving innovation to support 800 Gig and 1.6 Terabit applications, and the IEEE Beyond 400 Gig Ethernet Study Group is already defining objectives.
September 28, 2021
