What Are Passive Optical Networks?
Passive optical networks use optical access networking techniques to lower the cost of fiber in metropolitan areas. They essentially allow smaller, flexible quantities of bandwidth (capacity) to be delivered to customers. Customers can start with lower-speed services and order more capacity as they grow without changing onsite electronics. Inexpensive passive splitters distribute a single fiber’s capacity among multiple fiber strands that go to customer sites. These splitters are located between the customer and the telephone company equipment. Intelligent optical terminals installed at each customer connect to the fiber and to the customer equipment. One of way of overcoming this bottleneck is the use of passive optical networking technologies. Passive optical networks bring high-speed fiber out to points in neighborhoods. From these points, the capacity on the fiber is shared among up to 32 sites. A passive coupler at the neighborhood node spreads the fiber’s capacity to multiple sit
