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back to article Danes cram 43 Tbps down ONE fibre using ONE laser

Denmark has hauled in some cable in the ongoing tug-o'-war over who has the fastest fibre, claiming a 43 Tbps record using a single laser. The Ultra High-Speed Optical Communications (UHSOC) group at the Denmark Technical University says its demonstration puts it far ahead of the 32 Tbps record formerly held by the Karlsruhe …

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  1. Glen Turner 666

    Impressive

    Hi Richard

    Nice work picking up on the importance of single laser versus multiple lasers and wave-division multiplexing.

    In the future you could also look into the uncorrected error rate, the distance (or optical loss) and if it used a ITU-specified cable (ie, something which may be in the ground versus something lab-built). That would help with the apples v oranges nature of these sort of comparisons (and I'm not at all suggesting that the variation is deliberate, merely reflective of the small number of labs working in this field, all of which make different reasonable choices in an environment where there's no pressure for interoperation).

    -glen

    7 0 Reply
    1. Jellied Eel Silver badge
      Reply Icon

      Re: Impressive

      Abstract here, paper is paywalled-

      "We demonstrate 43-Tbit/s transmission over 67.4-km seven-core fiber using a single source. Each of the 6 outer cores carries 6 Nyquist-WDM channels using 320-Gbaud Nyquist-OTDM-PDM-QPSK 330-GHz spaced, and the center core carries 10-GHz clock pulses."

      It's not a fibre type that's in the ground, ITU-standardised or widely available. Good news is it's a reasonable distance, but may be bad news if your network has spans >60kms. Real-world applications would come down to cost. As the author says, currently you can lay 144f or 288f and that's pretty cheap. By using 7 fibres, you could do the same thing, and if that works out cheaper or gives you greater capacity, you'd likely go that route. Where it may get more interesting is with submarine cables. Those typically have much lower fibre counts due to mechanical challenges with attaching the 'torpedoes' containing amp/regen electronics to the cable.

      4 1 Reply
  2. Gene Cash Silver badge

    288 fibre strands

    Zounds. And how long is that out of commission after the backhoe?

    0 0 Reply
    1. Steve Davies 3 Silver badge
      Reply Icon
      Coat

      Re: 288 fibre strands

      Backhoe?

      don't you mean JCB?

      Unless you are a former Colonial....

      Mines the Donkey Jacket with lots of Hi-Viz stripes

      4 0 Reply
      1. Knoydart
        Reply Icon
        Mushroom

        Re: 288 fibre strands

        I think you'll find the technical term is spade fade.

        Nuclear blast as no jcb icon...

        1 0 Reply
  3. Pascal Monett Silver badge

    Seven-core fibre ?

    Doesn't that mean that the fibre is actually seven fibres bundled together ?

    Sounds like it does, and this website all but confirms it.

    So they're doing the transmission over a bundle of seven fibres, not just one. Which does not detract from the impressive success, but it does mean that it is not a test that has a hope of being replicated in the real world unless the fibres that are currently in the ground are also seven-core ones.

    Somehow I doubt that they are.

    0 0 Reply
    1. Rabbit80
      Reply Icon

      Re: Seven-core fibre ?

      No - this is a single fibre, but with 7 cores running through it.

      Better explained in this article.

      http://www.extremetech.com/computing/187258-43tbps-over-a-single-fiber-worlds-fastest-network-would-let-you-download-a-movie-in-0-2-milliseconds

      1 0 Reply
  4. ÐÇÐ

    43 Tbps down ONE fibre using ONE laser

    over ONE metre..?

    Plus it's not quite one fibre, as it's made from seven cores.

    0 2 Reply
    1. channel extended
      Reply Icon
      WTF?

      Re: 43 Tbps down ONE fibre using ONE laser

      RTFA!

      It's a 67.5km fiber!

      Sorry all, it seems I have a short temper and fast fingers.

      0 1 Reply
      1. ÐÇÐ
        Reply Icon

        Re: 43 Tbps down ONE fibre using ONE laser

        ...oh IC.

        0 0 Reply
  5. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Impressive

    But Tbps is a capacity, not a speed.

    0 0 Reply
  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Now that's video on demand.

    Before you finish typing your search, you would have the ENTIRE copy of it available on cache, ready for play. In 8K definition, with all subtitles in all languages and 7.1 sound. And just lossless compression, if any.

    (...)

    No more gaming huge installs. Some games now push 50GB without remorse. The games of yore didn't allow complete install from CD because the developers already assumed "they wouldn't possibly fit in a HDD." I actually read that on a single-CD game manual, that tipped the scales at mere 300MB. Really old DOS game, that is.

    (...)

    I say, bring it on. Upgrading our ISP backbones so they can actually deliver their promised capacity instead of huge lies is a godsend, for starters. Throw the statistical usage to the wind, and just ADD THE FREAKING PROMISED NUMBERS FOR EVERY CUSTOMER. "We have 10 million users with 10Mbps contracts, so...." so, yep.

    0 0 Reply

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