What is OM5 multimode fiber?

Compared with OM4, OM5 multimode fiber mainly broadens the high bandwidth channel, enabling it to support 850nm-950nm transmission. Because the bandwidth channel is widened, multimode wavelength division technology is applied. Because of this, OM5 can reduce the number of multimode fiber cabling and maintenance costs in the data center.

At present, OM5 multimode fiber is mainly used in SWDM4 short wave wavelength division multiplexing optical module and SR4.2 two wave division multiplexing optical module. SWDM4 is the wavelength division multiplexing of four short waves, namely 850nm, 880nm, 910nm and 940nm. The optical modules using this technology include 40G QSFP+SWDM4 and 100G QSFP28 SWDM4. The 100G QSFP28 SWDM4 can support the transmission of four wavelength channels in the range of 850nm to 950nm on a single fiber. Compared with the 100G SR4 scheme, it saves 75% of the fiber consumption, and has a more significant effect on cost saving and wiring simplification.

SR4.2 TWDM is mainly used for single fiber bidirectional technology, mainly represented by 400G-SR4.2 optical module and 100G BiDi. 400G SR4.2 uses two groups of different wavelengths to realize the function of Bidi, and each group of wavelengths is four. Therefore, 400G SR4.2 saves half of the cost of multimode optical fiber, reduces the wiring cost of data communication customers, and thus reduces expenses. The 100G BiDi optical module uses single fiber bidirectional and four level pulse amplitude modulation (PAM4) technology. The single channel rate is 50Gbps. It transmits signals from 850nm and 910nm windows in one fiber at the same time. Thus, a pair of fibers can transmit 100 Gbps in both directions, saving 50% of the optical fiber consumption.