Understand the difference between fiber optic transceivers and switches

What is a fiber optic transceiver?

Optical fiber transceiver is an Ethernet transmission media conversion unit that exchanges short-distance twisted-pair electrical signals and long-distance optical signals. It is also called fiber converter in many places.

Fiber optic transceivers usually have the following basic characteristics:

1. Provide ultra-low latency data transmission.

2. Completely transparent to the network protocol.

3. A dedicated ASIC chip is used to realize data line-speed forwarding. Programmable ASIC concentrates multiple functions on one chip, and has the advantages of simple design, high reliability, and low power consumption, which can enable equipment to obtain higher performance and lower cost.

4. Rack-type equipment can provide hot-swappable functions for easy maintenance and uninterrupted upgrades.

5. The network management equipment can provide network diagnosis, upgrade, status report, abnormal situation report and control functions, and can provide complete operation log and alarm log.

6. Most equipment adopts 1+1 power supply design, supports ultra-wide power supply voltage, and realizes power supply protection and automatic switching.

7. Supports an ultra-wide operating temperature range.

8. Support complete transmission distance (0～120km).

The fiber optic Ethernet switch is a high-performance managed Layer 2 fiber optic Ethernet access switch.

On the surface, the optical fiber transceiver only completes the signal conversion between different media (optical fiber, Ethernet cable), and realizes the connection of two switches or calculators within 120km. In fact, it also has the following functions:

(1) Realize the interconnection between switches.

(2) Realize the interconnection between the switch and the computer.

(3) Realize the interconnection between computers.

(4) Transmission relay: When the actual transmission distance exceeds the nominal transmission distance of the transceiver, especially when the actual transmission distance exceeds 120Km, if the site conditions permit, use two transceivers for back-to-back relay or use optical -Optical converter for relaying is a very cost-effective solution.

(5) Single-multimode conversion: When a single-multimode fiber connection is needed between networks, a single-multimode converter can be used to connect, which solves the problem of single-multimode fiber conversion.

(6) Wavelength division multiplexing transmission: When the long-distance optical cable resources are insufficient, in order to increase the utilization rate of the optical cable and reduce the cost, the transceiver and the wavelength division multiplexer can be used together to transmit the two channels of information on the same pair of optical fibers.

Classification of fiber optic transceivers

What is the difference between fiber optic transceivers and switches?

Optical fiber transceiver is a very cost-effective and flexible device. The common use is to convert the electrical signal in the twisted pair into an optical signal. It is generally used when the Ethernet copper cable cannot be covered and the optical fiber must be used to extend the transmission distance. In the actual network environment, it also played a huge role in helping to connect the last mile of the optical fiber to the metropolitan area network and the outer network. A switch is a network device used to forward electrical (optical) signals. It plays a central role in the mutual communication between wired network devices (such as computers, printers, computers, etc.). It is usually connected to a router so that you can pass optical Cat accesses the network.

1. Transmission rate --- At present, optical fiber transceivers can be divided into 100M optical fiber transceivers, gigabit optical fiber transceivers and 10G optical fiber transceivers. Among them, the most common are 100M and Gigabit fiber optic transceivers, which are economical and efficient solutions in home and small and medium-sized enterprise networks. Network switches include 1G, 10G, 25G, 100G and 400G switches. Taking large data center networks as an example, 1G/10G/25G switches are mainly used at the access layer or as ToR switches, while 40G/100G/400G switches are mostly used as core or Backbone switch.

2. Installation difficulty---Optical transceiver is a relatively simple network hardware device with fewer interfaces than switches, so its wiring and connection are relatively simple. They can be used alone or installed on a rack. Since the fiber optic transceiver is a plug-and-play device, its installation steps are also very simple. The network switch can be used alone in a home network or small office, or it can be installed on a rack in a large data center network. Generally, you need to insert the module into the corresponding port, and then use the corresponding network cable or optical fiber jumper to connect to the computer or other network equipment. In a high-density cabling environment, patch panels, optical fiber boxes, and cable management tools need to be used to manage cables and simplify wiring. For managed network switches, some advanced functions are required, such as SNMP, VLAN, IGMP and other functions.

3. Functional configuration---Electric-to-optical (optical-to-electricity) and optical-to-optical fiber optic transceivers are two common types. The former can convert electrical signals into optical signals to realize the connection of devices based on copper cabling to extend the transmission distance The latter can realize single-multimode conversion, single- and dual-fiber conversion, and wavelength conversion (mainly converting conventional wavelengths of 1310nm and 1550nm into WDM wavelengths). Compared with the optical transceiver, the function of the switch is much more complicated, which is determined by its network operating system. According to the network layer, they can be divided into layer 2, layer 3, and layer 4 switches. Normally, a layer 2 switch is the basic switch used to transmit data and perform error checking on every frame sent and received. Layer 3 and Layer 4 switches have routing functions that can actively send data packets to the destination in the best way. In addition, they also have some advanced functions, such as MLAG, STP, VXLAN, etc.

4. Optical fiber switch is a high-speed network transmission relay equipment, which uses optical fiber cable as the transmission medium compared with ordinary switches. The advantages of optical fiber transmission are fast speed and strong anti-interference ability.

5. Optical fiber transceiver is an Ethernet transmission media conversion unit that exchanges short-distance twisted pair electrical signals and long-distance optical signals. It is also called Fiber Converter in many places.

6. The optical fiber switch is the connection of the fiber channel with high transmission rate and the server network, 8-port optical fiber switch or the internal components of the SAN network. In this way, the entire storage network has a very wide bandwidth and provides a guarantee for high-performance data storage. .

7. The optical fiber transceiver provides ultra-low latency data transmission and is completely transparent to the network protocol. A dedicated ASIC chip is used to realize data line-speed forwarding. Programmable ASIC concentrates multiple functions on one chip, and has the advantages of simple design, high reliability, and low power consumption, which can enable equipment to obtain higher performance and lower cost.

Optical transceiver vs. switch: when to choose which one?

Both optical transceivers and switches can be used to connect copper cables and optical fiber jumpers. So, when to choose fiber optic transceivers or network switches in Ethernet?

1. Fiber optic transceivers are usually used when Ethernet cables cannot be covered and fiber jumpers must be used to extend the transmission distance within a limited budget. They can be used for the construction of local area networks and inter-city area networks, such as enterprise networks and campus backbone networks.

2. The network switch has multiple ports for different devices (such as computers and printers) to communicate in the LAN. In other words, the network switch is a more flexible device, which can be easily added to the network to expand the network capacity.

3. Fiber optic transceivers and network switches can also work in the same network. For example, when the network switch has only electrical ports, but needs to transmit more than 100 meters, it is necessary to use optical fiber transceivers to transmit electrical signals to optical signals to extend the transmission distance. The following figure shows the application of fiber optic transceivers and network switches in the campus backbone network.

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