Bridge Copper to Fiber With PoE Media Converter

It’s common to see in modern society that many enterprise networks must support a wide range of installation environments located indoors and out. Considering this, a wide range of media converters and power supply options are important. And with the great benefits of fiber optic cables being accepted widely, PoE media converter seems to be a better choice for enterprise networks. Today this article intends to explain what PoE media converter can bring for managers and its applications.

PoE Media Converter Basis

PoE media converter is a type of fiber-to-copper media converter. It enables enterprises to power their network devices over the existing copper connections. With its PoE injector, PoE media converters can power devices like IP phones, video conferencing equipment, IP cameras and Wi-Fi devices over copper UTP cabling. Besides, they are available in a variety of multi-port configurations, including dual RJ-45 and dual fiber ports, and they can support fixed fiber connectors or SFP (Small Form Pluggable) transceivers.

PoE Media Converter

Once PoE media converters are connected into network systems, they are usually close to the PDs (Power devices) like IP cameras and wireless access points. And when they work, fiber is run to the power source via the SFP socket, and PoE is distributed over UTP cabling to the power devices via RJ45 port.

Network Design Options Provided by PoE Media Converter

PoE media converters bring great benefits for network deployments. For example, they eliminate the need for power supply devices, power cables and outlets that would be required for remote device. In addition, they also provide flexible network design options. Here are some examples.

PoE Media Converter with Single Fiber Ports

As shown in the following picture, single fiber ports are deployed in star topologies with a point-to-point style layout with the fiber switch in the center of the network.

PoE Media Converter with Single Fiber Ports

PoE Media Converter with Dual Fiber Ports

Option 1: daisy chain design. This design uses dual fiber ports to support connections in a liner daisy chain configuration. It suits long-haul applications along subways and rail lines.

PoE Media Converter with Dual Fiber Ports 1

Option 2: fiber ring design. In this fiber ring architecture, traffic can flow in both directions. In the picture below, a switch connects three PoE media converters to form a ring. If a fiber failure occurs in it, the switch can reroute the traffic in the opposite direction.

PoE Media Converter with Dual Fiber Ports 2

Option 3: redundant fiber design. This network structure uses two fiber connections. One is active and carries the data traffic. The other is a protection fiber port that back-up a fiber failure switch-over of less than 50 milliseconds.

PoE Media Converter with Dual Fiber Ports 3

Applications of PoE Media Converter

As we all know, in order to break out the distance and bandwidth limitations of copper cables, fiber optic cable is a good alternative. PoE media converters can convert copper to fiber and provide power at the same time, making it popular among enterprise networks. There are three main applications of PoE media converters.

  • Fiber to IP cameras. The PoE media converters have fiber uplink ports and downlink ports. And in most applications, two IP cameras at each location can be connected through the dual RJ-45 ports of a PoE media converter.
  • Fiber to wireless access points. PoE media converters enable wireless access points to be installed in office buildings, airport, hotels, public areas or other places needed.
  • Fiber to the desktop. The PoE media converters provide fiber to copper media conversion, and they send data and power to desktop items such as IP phones and video conferencing equipment.
Summary

PoE media converters provide a cost-effective way to extend distances over fiber optic cabling to PoE powered devices (PDs). In this article, four network designs with PoE media converters and three applications of them are illustrated simply. If you want to know more details about PoE media converters, please visit FS.COM.

Related article: Things You Need to Know About Power Over Ethernet (PoE)

Related article: How Much Do You Know About PoE?

Introduction to Fiber Media Converter

Network complexity and the increasing number of devices on the network are driving higher bandwidth requirements and faster network speeds, as well as forcing longer distance requirements within the local area network (LAN). How to deal with these issues? Media converters present solutions to these issues by providing seamless integration of copper and fiber and different fiber types in enterprise LAN networks. Moreover, media converters can support various protocols, data transfer rates and media types to create a more reliable and cost-effective network. There are many different types of media converters, such as fiber media converters, PoE (Power-over-Ethernet) media converters, etc. This article will mainly introduce fiber media converter.

Fiber Media Converter Overview

A fiber media converter is a simple networking device that makes it possible to connect two dissimilar media types such as twisted pair with fiber optic cabling. Fiber media converters play an important role in interconnecting fiber optic cabling-based systems with existing copper-based, structured cabling systems. They can be divided into fiber-to-fiber media converters and copper-to-fiber media converters. For fiber-to-fiber conversion, the multimode fiber to single-mode fiber and a dual fiber link to single fiber can be converted by using bi-directional data flow, while for copper-to-fiber conversion, the electrical signals used in copper unshielded twisted pair (UTP) network cabling are converted into light waves used in fiber optic cabling.

Fiber-to-Fiber Media Converter

Fiber-to-fiber media converters are capable of connecting different fiber optic networks and supporting conversion from one wavelength to another. They can provide connectivity between single-mode and multimode fiber, as well as between dual fiber and single fiber. Normally, fiber-to-fiber media converters are protocol independent and available for Ethernet and TDM (time division multiplexing) applications.

As is shown in the following picture, a fiber-to-fiber media converter is able to extend a multimode network across single-mode fiber with transmission distance up to 140 km. In this application, two Gigabit Ethernet switches equipped with multimode fiber ports are connected by using a pair of Gigabit fiber-to-fiber media converters, which convert the multimode fiber to single-mode and enable the long distance connection between the switches.

fiber-to-fiber media converter

Copper-to-Fiber Media Converter

Copper-to-fiber media converters integrate fiber into a copper infrastructure and make it possible to migrate a local network to fiber while extending the productive life of existing infrastructure. Moreover, they provide connectivity for Ethernet, Fast Ethernet, Gigabit and 10 Gigabit Ethernet devices. Also, they are able to perform 10/100, or 10/100/1000 rate switching and enable the integration of equipment with different data transfer rates and interface types into one seamless network.

As can be seen from the following diagram, 10/100 media converters are installed in a redundant power chassis for high-density fiber distribution from UTP switch equipment (A) at the network core. A UTP workgroup switch (B) is connected via fiber to the network core with a standalone 10/100 media converter. Another 10/100 converter enables fiber connectivity to PU UTP port in a fiber-to-desktop application (C). An Ethernet switch (D) is connected directly via fiber to the media converter module at the network core.

copper-to-fiber media converter

To sum up, fiber-to-fiber media converters are ideal solutions for the conversion between multimode and single-mode fibers and then increase the transmission distance. Copper-to-fiber media converters are simple and inexpensive solutions for matching copper ports to fiber infrastructure. Fiber media converters are flexible and cost-effective devices for implementing and optimizing fiber links in all types of networks. Fiberstore has various fiber media converters. It is an excellent choice for you.