Optical fiber to the workstation

The author presents the point of view that installation of fiber optics is now a strategically sound solution to both current local area network (LAN) requirements and the only realistic migration path to the high-speed LANs of the future. Vertical and horizontal wiring schemes are considered. It is concluded that star-topology fiber-optic Ethernet LANs have become the preferred implementation for backbone applications on the basis of superior performance at equivalent or even lower cost than other implementations. It is further noted that extension of fiber optics to the workstation can be justified on the basis that future LAN applications will require the bandwidth, reliability, and error-free data transmission characteristics of fiber optics