NTNU

Optical access networks

As part of the course: “TTM1” by
Steinar Bjørnstad 10-2014
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Content Optical Access Networks
 Motivation
 Main characteristics
 FTTC, FTTB, FTTH
 WDM-PON
– WDMA
– Statistical Multiplexing
– WDM light-sources for access networks
– Systemarchitecture
– Protocol-stack
 “PON in adolescence, from TDMA to WDM-PON”

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Expected characteristics of future

access-networks
 Need for real-time services
 Evolve from text-based web to image and video-based web.

 Convergence among broadcast services and Internet-

sevices
– Everything in one fiber
 Symmetrical traffic-pattern?

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Bandwidth and access-networks
 Triple-play supports
– HDTV broadcast
– Standard definition TV channels (multitude)
– Voice (over Internet Protocol VoIP)
– Plain old telephony service (POTS)
– Video on demand
– Video conference

Red selection: is offerd in current Triple-Play networks

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Expected bandwidth growth

 Perhaps too optimistic?

 Remember data-

compression!

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Access-networks and cost

 Costs have to be shared among several customers
 Components cost is more important here than for metro and

core networks
 Laying fiber and digging ditches for the fiber may represent

~50 % of the total costs

– Will represent a lower limit to the costs of FTTx installation
– If copper wires are already laid in tubes in the ground, then digging
and laying of the fiber is substantially cheaper
 Equipment costs represent ~25 %
– As the technology improves and the volume increases the costs are
continously reduced

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Access technologies properties: xDSL

 Typically asymmetric, downlink 1/4-1/8 of uplink
 Twisted pair copper cable, fundamental physical limit is

close, Shannon theorem

 Bandwidth/distance tradeoff

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25 VDSL Shannon

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Capacity
Mbit/s
6 ADSL ADSL/RealADSL2
1
1.5 3 6 Distance (Km)
VDSL required for high capacity triple play
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ADSL plant

CPE

DSLAM
optical
fibre

typically 300m – 3 km

DSLAM: DSL Access Multiplexer CPE: Customer Premises Equipment

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Upgrading to VDSL

DSLAM

CPE

BAP DSLAM

optical fibre

VDSL-26 Mbit asym: < 1km

VDSL-52 Mbit asym: < 300m

BAP: Broadband Access Point

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FTTx

Fibre cable: Fiber to

the Home (FTTH)

OLT
Fibre cable: Fiber to
the Curb (FTTC)

Another access technology

in the building

Fibre cable: Fiber to the

Building (FTTB)
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Fiber to the Home (FttH) variants

•Many Fibers =>

no external power
is needed

•Consentrator =>
less fibers,
needs power

•Passive =>
Higher power loss
Do not need power
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Point-to-Point Optical Network

ONU

FttH architecture comparison

OLT
pros:
multi-fibre cable
the ultimate performance
cons
use of many fibres
several 10s of kms

Schematic of Physical Plant

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Active (AON) versus passive (PON)
Optical Network

ONU

OLT several kms

Remote multi-fibre cable

Node (RN)
Active = needs power!
Passive = passive splitting
(No need for power)
Schematic of Physical Plant

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PON: SCMA, TDMA, WDMA

 Sub Carrier Multiple Access (SCMA)

– Unique RF frekquency to each subscriber. Share wavelengths
 Time Division Multiple Access (TDMA)
– Collision avoidance with access protocols
– ATM-PON (B-PON), Gigabit PON (G-PON), Ethernet-PON (E-PON),
Gigabit Ethernet PON (GE-PON)
 Wavelength Division Multiple Access (WDMA)
– no collisions
– higher capacity
– more expensive

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Passive Optical Network (TDMA)

Time-sharing of
fiber resources

ONU

downstream
OLT
passive splitter
Limitation on power budget

Burst mode transmission up to 20km

Different power from each subscriber
Makes capacity upgrades difficult
OLT: Optical Line Terminal ONU: Optical Network Unit
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Passive Optical Network (TDMA)

FttH architecture comparison

pros: ONU
passive fibre plant upstream
OLT low OpEx
passive splitter
one connection at OLT
cons:
broadcast centric
less scalable
up to 20km
less upgradeable
complex customer differentiation
OLT: Optical Line Terminal ONU: Optical Network Unit

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TDMA PON’s – Two variants

 EPON – Ethernet PON

– Japan and Korea
– Low interface cost
– Integrated with Ethernet OAM
 GPON – Gigabit PON
– Widely deployed in US and Europe
– Higher bandwidth and bandwidth efficiency than EPON
– Native support of legacy services
– Longer reach

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Downstream Ethernet-PON
 ATM is expensive, Ethernet sells in high volume and is
therefore cheap
– QoS og VLAN
 Fiber resources in E-PON is shared and Point-to-Point
 Ethernet broadcast downstream (as in CSMA/CD)

– All frames are received by all subcribers

– Upstream the ONUs must share capacity and resources

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Upstream and multiple access

 Collisions must be avoided
– Too long distances implies a too long collision domain
 Time-sharing is therefore preferred, timeslots to each ONU
 All ONUs are synchronized to a common time-reference

– Buffer in ONU assembles packets and sends in time-slot

– Allocation of resources is an issue

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GPON/EPON characteristics

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WDM PON for the future

 GPON/EPON may not handle future requirements on bitrate

 10GPON – 10 Gb/s

– Power budget imposes severe limitations on distances and splitting

ratio
 WDM-PONs solves the limitations of TDMA-PON
– Dedicated wavelength to each subscriber
– May be combined with TDMA-PON in a hybrid, allowing 1:1000
splitting ratio.
– Many variants of WDM-PON

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WDM-PON (WDMA)

ONT

OLT
WDM, One
wavelength to each
subscriber

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Basic WDM-PON architectures
 B&S architecture
– Passive splitter
– Unique filter in ONU
– Individual wavelength
upstream
– Broadcast security issues
 AWG based
– Low insertion loss, 5 dB
– Universal Rx
– Wavelength specific Tx
– Periodic routing behavior
 AWG + Identical ONU’s
– Single shared wavelength
upstream (TDMA)
– Broadband LEDs and
spectral slicing give poor
power budget
– Bidirectional OLT using a
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Colourless identical ONU’s
 SOA broadband modulators + seed lasers: Laser adjust to
Seed wavelength
– Separate upstream and downstream fibre required
– Reflective SOA
 Re-use OLT Tx wavelength
– Seed signal achieved using FSK downstream
– FSK removed in RSOA and replaced by OOK upstream

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Most Cost effective: CWDM-PON
 16 CWDM wavelengths on SFW supports 8 ONU’s
– 1270 nm to 1610, ITU-T standard
 High power budget but potential problems with old fibers
(OH peak)
 Employs standard low-cost pluggable SFP modules

– Capex is low, Opex moderate (higher than colourless)

 DWDM much more expensive than CWDM, why?

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Power budget CWDM
 What is a power budget?
 What is it useful for?

 What causes the greatest loss?

 Why is the power budget higher for DWDM compared to CWDM

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CAPEX Cost on different PON-
solutions
 CWDM most cost-effective, but lowest splitting ratio
 Amplified TDMA highest splitting ratio

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Unified infrastructure: core to access
 PON not only to residentials
 Mobile back-haul

 ADSL back-haul

 Enterprise networks

 Combine with WDM Metro

rings
 Combine with ROADM

nodes
 Cost optimization

– Common management and

control plane required
– Common protocols required
(Not SDH and Ethernet
and…)

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Summary

 GPON and Point-to-point is presently being deployed

– In Europe
 GPON does not handle the future needs for bandwidth
 WDM-PON and point-to-point scales

 Hybrid GPON and WDM-PON allows a gradual migration

towards WDM-PON
 PON’s may be used for more than access to residentials

– Business customers
– Mobile base-station back-haul
– DSL back-haul

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