Is Google Fiber a model for Municipal Networks?

Mon Feb 4 17:03:52 UTC 2013

Scott Helms wrote:

> Here is the architecture document:
> http://static.googleusercontent.com/external_content/untrusted_dlcp/research.google.com/en/us/pubs/archive/36936.pdf

The document, seemingly, does not address drop cable cost
difference.

It does not address L1 unbundling with WDM-PON, which
requires fiber patch panel identical to that required
for SS, either.

As for power consumption at CO, all the transmitters do not
have to have power consuming LDs but can just have modulators
to modulate light from a shared light source, which has already
happened with QSFP+:

	http://www.luxtera.com/faqs/

	How do you generate light in silicon?

	Actually, we don't. Silicon is a bad material to try and
	build lasers in. Some silicon lasers have been demonstrated,
	but these are completely impractical. As it turns out there's
	no need to build a silicon laser: lasers are already very
	inexpensive (remember, there's already one in every PC
	- inside the CD/DVD player). The challenge has been finding
	an inexpensive way to attach the lasers to silicon. Solving
	this problem, and the related one of inexpensively attaching
	optical fibers to silicon, is a key piece of Luxtera's
	intellectual property. We think of a laser as being just
	like a DC power supply – only it provides a steady stream of
	photons rather than electrons.

						Masataka Ohta