New TransPacific Cable Projects:

Mon Sep 24 20:11:10 UTC 2007

Make sense what you said, I'm just pretty sure that eventually they'll come
up with a way to put 100 to 500 waves on it.

Frank

-----Original Message-----
From: Rod Beck [mailto:Rod.Beck at hiberniaatlantic.com] 
Sent: Monday, September 24, 2007 1:57 PM
To: frnkblk at iname.com; michael.dillon at bt.com; nanog at merit.edu
Subject: RE: New TransPacific Cable Projects:

Here is a TeleGeography news article worth a quick read:
http://www.telegeography.com/cu/article.php?article_id=19783&email=html

It appears that that article assumes that capacity will not be increased by
WDM products...have those that been applied on those links already reached
the cables' maximum capabilities based on current technology?

Frank 

I think you are going to find that the numbe of waves that can put on an
undersea fiber is a function of the distance between the landing stations.
Obviously most TransPacific cables traverse greater distances and hence
probably cannot carry as many waves as TransAtlantic cables. 

There is also a need for cables that are diverse from the existing cables.
So lighting more capacity will not solve the physical diversity problems
that were highlighted by the December earthquakes. 

Most modern undersea cables have four fiber pairs per cable. And each of
those fiber pairs can handle from 24 to 80 10 gig waves. 

Hibernia can do 80 10 gig waves, but only becuase we replaced the undersea
DWDM kit deployed at our landing stations. 

Regards, 

- Roderick. 