Things to Know About MPO Fiber Testing

For the ever-increasing data center, bandwidth requirements of MPO trunk cable have become the common cabling solution. The MPO fiber cable links have attributes of parallel transmission. They are pre-terminated, compact, and can handle bandwidth up to 100 Gbps. The testing, certification, and migration of the MPO fiber cables can turn into a nightmare. This article will provide you with a clear overview regarding the testing of MPO cables in the data center.

Challenges of MPO Cables

It is essential to understand MPO cables and how they are tested to get a better understanding of the challenges of MPO cable validation. An MPO connection is similar in size to a fingernail. It contains 12 optical fibers which are less when compared to the diameter of a human hair, and there is a need for them to be tested separately. Once you’re in the process the actual fiber test is quick enough, typically under 10 seconds per fiber.

The main challenge here is that the pre-terminated fiber provides a guarantee when it exists in the manufacturer’s factory. During installation in the data center, it must then be transported, stored, and later bent and pulled. Before MTP trunk cable is deployed there needs to be the introduction of all kinds of performance. After installation, proper testing of pre-terminated cables is the only way that a live application can guarantee performance. Another challenge is testing and determining fiber polarity. Providing a continuous connection from the link’s transmitter to the link’s receiver is the simple purpose of any polarity scheme. Deployment mistakes are quite common as these methods always require a combination of patch cords with different types of polarity.

To evolve at an ever-increasing pace the demand for fast and reliable delivery of critical applications is driving data center technology. The insatiable requirement for bandwidth keeps in mind that the integrity of the data center is linked to the strength of the fiber cabling infrastructure. The growing use of MPO trunk cables says that the time has arrived to stop the verification of individual fibers. After all, it’s a single MPO trunk cable connection.