Today’s modern Data Centre proposition continues to promote the hot topics around consolidation, reduced operating expense, flexibility, scalability and of course being as ‘Green’ as possible along the way.  That part is simple, but when you start digging in to what you actually need to achieve all of the above, everything starts moving full speed in to complexity overdrive.

Each manufacturer is continually fighting for positioning. Every distributor is promoting an abundance of alternatives, and we ‘mere mortals’ are being left behind on the side line, having to try and piece together a strategic ‘guesstimate’ network plan to cater for both today and tomorrow.  What I can confess, is this often confuses our own team of highly accredited industry geeks! So don’t panic, you’re not alone, and in very good company!

Let’s pick one topic out of this huge arena, Pre Terminated Fibre.  Over the past few months, I have digested what seems like three courses a day -  trade magazines, web sites, blogs, whitepapers, industry gossip, social media groups and even a few of our own ‘real life’ case studies thrown in for good measure.  I am now well and truly bloated with technical information overload! 

From all of this, what is clearer to me than ever, is that when we are talking about pre-terminated fibre let’s just make it simple from the offset, forget for a few moments the various acronyms and general industry marketing ‘talking it up’.  Instead, let’s unravel this to understand the main reasons why mission critical enterprise networks are considering the need for multiple fibres in a high density, modular and pre-terminated format. Even that’s a mouthful!

 

Panel to Panel Links are nothing new are they?

We have seen Panel to Panel links, both copper and fibre being installed for many years. These tend to be mainly in Data Centres, linking up racks, and therefore providing easy moves and changes within local patching fields. The trouble is these are terminated and then fixed permanently in to place.

In the past, a fibre installation would have involved a good amount of forward thinking, ensuring that the planned lengths were precise as there would be little movement to rectify any mistakes. After careful consideration, the required parts would be ordered in on a lead time, then either terminated in a workshop or cut to size whilst on site during the lengthy installation process. 

This would result in a costly installation, often being installed out of hours by experienced fibre engineers with their expensive tools……and overtime claims!

The somewhat ‘unpredictable’ future bandwidth requirements of the modern network is now making it more difficult than ever before to plan ahead with your crystal ball. Especially, with that Finance Director breathing down your neck and asking you to ‘put your job on it’ so they won’t need to open up the cheque book again anytime soon.  It’s clear that high speed enterprise networks are already demanding and installing multiple fibres on a single cable, meaning selecting that right express, easy and expandable fibre infrastructure choice from the offset is of vital importance.

 

What are the hot topics at the moment?

When it comes down to fibre it has to be the Pre-Terminated MTP connections, providing new advancing technologies that provide multiple fibres in a very small and modular footprint.  These are assembled for elite performance using, US Connec. MTP type connectors, supplying you with a single trunk cable of either 12 or 24 cores. All in all, not much thicker than a standard fibre patch lead, so greatly reduced in size from previous pre terminated fibre cable installations. 

The MTP fibre connector, also referred to as MPO (Multiple-Fibre Push On/Pull Off) has a very precise housing with a floating ferrule for perfect alignment when plugging in to compatible modular cassettes.  Both the 12 & 24 core cable options are most commonly stocked for immediate next day requirements.

However, already being requested are larger cores of 36, 48, 72, 96 or even 144 - but do keep in mind that these will be thicker in construction and could be made of multiple cores on a number of separate cables. Also, with a higher MTP core count, comes a higher price premium and also the risk of having too much reliance on a single fibre cord.  Patchsave MTP trunk cords are UK assembled, produced to your exact requirements and delivered in just a couple of days.

 

Where could MTP be used?

The Fibre Cassettes suit various environments, applications and budgets.  Primarily, Data Centres, DR- Co Locations, FCoE SAN’s, links between floors/risers and larger communication rooms. Basically, for anyone that needs to quickly create a 10 Gigabit performance fibre network backbone. All of these demand, and would ultimately benefit, from the uncompromised performance, density and scalability that MTP solutions can provide.

Although there will continue to be a market for more traditional fibre pre-terms, MTP provides a quick and seamless installation – so an ideal choice for today’s busy network manager, without the need for an external contractor entering your secure space.

Additional to the MTP to MTP Cassette links, we are also seeing an increased demand for ‘last metre’ fan out cables. For example, 12x LC connections to a single MTP Adapter, being used for direct 40 Gigabit equipment links. With the ever increasing need for more bandwidth and virtualisation of application 40Gbp’s speeds are already being installed in Data Centres, most notable with Cisco Nexus switch SFP’s.

If not already in place, Network Managers are certainly planning for these backbone network speeds in the next 2-5 years.  What’s more, moves and changes must now be managed in such a critical approach to avoid unscheduled down time, therefore flexibility is required in the vast majority of future designs.

 

How does it all stack up?

Supplied as part of the MTP solution is a 1U rack mountable fibre tray, so the installation is extremely easy – you are looking at around 15 minutes to rack mount panels and plug in the cassettes!  Each 1U tray will hold 4 cassettes and at the back of each cassette you can then access the MTP trunk cable male socket(s). The more cassettes you purchase the more 1U trays are supplied, hence an extremely modular and scalable approach against the previous restrictions in pre-terminated assemblies. 

You will then find at the front of Multimode or Singlemode cassettes are the legacy LC fibre connections, in either a 6 or 12 Duplex (12 or 24 Core), to link back to the active network hardware or existing patch panels.  Minimal time is required for the installation, with no need for onsite fibre termination and better still no out of hours working, allowing you to experience the highest performance from your network…..immediately.

 

Sounds expensive?

Designed with both flexibility and ease of installation in mind, our MTP solutions are priced extremely competitively (with no compromise around quality) when compared to similar solutions from other leading manufacturers. If we consider a base solution consisting of a 1U Panel Tray for 2x locations, connected with 4x 12 core 20 Metre MTP/MPO trunks and then presented with 2x 12 LC Duplex’s at each end, you are looking at sub £2,000….and not much more to run in some additional ‘redundant’ fibres at the same time for future use. We will even supply you with an MTP/MPO Fibre cleaning tool to keep everything in pristine condition long term.

Our technical teams are always on hand to provide on-site measuring and a complimentary design service. We can then immediately complete the required terminations (as we hold all standard lengths/types in stock) in our quality controlled ISO manufacturing environment. Finally, the products would be pre-labelled with your required numbering sequence – so giving you a fully customised solution to simply mount in to place the very next day. Nice and easy!

If you would like any further information around our Express, Easy and Expandable MTP MPO Fibre solution then please do get in touch with me or visit our fibre Pre-Term Website for the latest products and promotions. Thanks for reading and I hope this article has been a useful introduction to MPO.

Russell Meehan

Operations Director, Patchsave Solutions Limited