What Is the Function and Working Principle of a Fiber Switch?

Fiber switches provide the capability to cascade many switches into a large-scale Fabric. By connecting one or more ports of two switches, all ports connected to the switches can see a unique image of the network, and any node on this Fabric can communicate with any other node.

In essence, by cascading switches, it is possible to build a large, virtual switch with distributed advantages, and it can span very large distances. A Fabric built from multiple switches appears as a single Fabric composed of individual switches; all ports on the switches can view and access all other ports on the Fabric just as they would access a local switch. Unified name server and management services allow the entire Fabric information to be viewed and modified through a single interface.

An important factor in creating a distributed Fabric is obtaining bandwidth for inter-switch connections. The effective rate between any two ports is affected by the effective bandwidth of the inter-switch connections, and multiple inter-switch connections may be required to maintain the necessary bandwidth. Workgroup Fibre Channel switches are numerous and more versatile.

Users can use workgroup switches for a variety of purposes, but the most common application is in small SANs. Such switches can be connected together via inter-switch links to provide a greater number of ports. Inter-switch links can be created on any port of a Fibre Channel switch. However, if you plan to use products from multiple vendors, be sure to verify device interoperability.

The UT series multi-port media converter (also known as a fiber switch) converts between Ethernet electrical interfaces and optical interfaces. A fiber switch can be configured with one or more Ethernet electrical ports and one or more optical interfaces. It extends the Ethernet transmission distance from 100 meters over copper cable to 2 kilometers (multimode fiber) or 120 kilometers (single-mode fiber). It can simply achieve interconnection between multiple motherboard servers, repeaters, hubs, terminals, and multiple terminals. It adopts a mature switching core, is equipped with multiple fiber interfaces, supports hot swapping, and features flexibility, high efficiency, and reliability. It is suitable for telecommunications, broadcasting, broadband networks, megapixel HD video surveillance, and other network environments requiring high performance and high reliability.

Fiber switch function and working principle: A fiber switch is a high-speed network transmission relay device. Compared with ordinary switches, it uses fiber optic cable as the transmission medium. The advantages of fiber transmission are high speed and strong anti-interference capability.

Its characteristic is the use of high-speed Fibre Channel to connect servers or components within a SAN (Storage Area Network), giving the entire storage network very wide bandwidth and ensuring high-performance data storage. In such a SAN storage network, the key role is played by the fiber switch (FC Switch, also known as "Fibre Channel switch") that we often hear about.

Product features:

1. Uses high-quality optoelectronic integrated modules to provide good optical and electrical characteristics, ensuring reliable data transmission and long working life.

2. Supports full-duplex or half-duplex modes with auto-negotiation capability.

3. Auto-adapts between 10Mbps and 100Mbps.

4. Ethernet ports support automatic crossover detection.

5. Built-in store-and-forward mechanism with 1MB buffer, supporting multiple protocols.

6. Supports maximum transmission packet length of 1536 bytes.

7. Meets carrier-class operating standards, with MTBF exceeding 50,000 hours.

8. Operating power: DC12-48V/1A, AC12-38V/1A.

9. Uses SC fiber interface (ST, FC interfaces optional).

10. Surge protection: 3000V (power supply).

11. Automatic alarm output via FAIL relay.

12. Redundant dual DC input with overload protection.