Going the distance

For centuries, humans have been obsessed with overcoming existing records. At 42 km, the marathon was once held to be the longest competitive endurance race, but now there are even longer ultramarathon races to run with distances ranging from 50 km to hundreds of kilometres. As a runner, there’s always a longer challenge waiting to test your endurance and performance.

This is true away from the running trail as well. At CommScope, we’re not afraid of new challenges, so we’re taking that spirit to a new technological limit. A few years ago, we launched the Powered Fiber Cable System to provide data and PoE over a hybrid fibre cable up to 3,000 m. But this wasn’t the only race to be run.

Since the SYSTIMAX portfolio was launched in 1985, the cabling infrastructure standardisation bodies used it as a blueprint to define the standards that are common knowledge today. One of the established standards is the 100 m channel limit, a rule that IT staff all over the world know very well.

This limit is based on the electrical limitations of twisted-pair copper cabling (primarily insertion loss) and it has stood the test of time, even as higher-frequency applications and new cable constructions have entered the market. In that time, network equipment vendors cost-optimised their transceivers based on the 100 m limit, further entrenching it as the accepted distance boundary.

However, the distance barrier has created a new challenge for network designers. Enterprise networks are expanding faster than the budgets needed to implement and manage them. Network managers must be able to support more network-connected devices and systems — throughout buildings, across campuses and especially at the edge.

Bandwidth-wise, our customers embraced the GigaSPEED XL, GigaSPEED XL5 and of course the respected Cat6A GigaSPEED X10D solutions.

So, like a runner ready to tackle a new challenge, CommScope is about to introduce a new copper solution that will go farther than ever and shake up existing assumptions about what’s possible. This April, as part of our new and enhanced SYSTIMAX 2.0 portfolio launch, the GigaREACH XL solution took the field and challenged the distance record.

The GigaREACH XL solution supports 100 Mbps Ethernet and 90 W PoE up to 200 m, 1 Gbps Ethernet and 90W PoE up to 150 m (50% longer than Cat 6), and 10 Mbps Ethernet and 90 W PoE up to 250 m — backed by our SYSTIMAX Assurance program.

Now users can easily connect and power devices beyond the once-indomitable 100 m limit with one cable — no additional telecom rooms, PoE extenders or optical equipment needed. Less equipment means fewer points of failure, lower installation costs and less greenhouse gas emissions, making for a more sustainable installation — and little or no disruption to existing services.

The GigaREACH XL solution supports all kinds of PoE applications and uses the same installation tools and best practices our certified PartnerPRO community can bring to any deployment.

For more information visit the SYSTIMAX portfolio page and see how much farther a network can go.

This story was previously published here.

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