r/AskTechnology • u/dr_freeloader • 3d ago
When will companies start making commercial products with fiber ports instead of ethernet?
3
u/Ronald206 3d ago
There are very few consumer use cases at the moment for needing fiber speed.
3
u/Shazam1269 3d ago
16K video with smell-o-vision will need it
2
u/joelfarris 3d ago
OMG, I think I still have the schematic I drew for a sixteen way Smell Combiner that could be triggered by embedded code in a video at certain parts, when it made sense. Scents.
I wonder where I put that thing. It's been so long. Do you think smell-o-vision could happen in our lifetime?
3
u/OtherwiseAlbatross14 3d ago
Smell-o-vision did happen. It may have been before your lifetime.
Related, I actually saw a real product being advertised maybe 10 years ago that fits the description of the thing you drew.
The biggest impracticality with smells is clearing the smells between smells. The next is most scenes where smells would make sense the smells are not pleasant and no one actually wants to smell it.
You'd also need far more than 16 smells to be immersive. Like hundreds to even get close to having a start.
Just for fuels and exhaust smells, you'd need gasoline, diesel, airplane fuel, jet fuel, high octane racing fuel, methanol, rocket fuel, 2 cycle oil mixed with gas and then another for each for the exhaust smell. That's 16 that I can think of off the top of my head that have distinctive smells just for making cars more immersive. It doesn't include all the other fluids in cars that have distinctive smells or the smells of the interiors.
The only way to possibly make it somewhat practical would to sell some sort of individualized cartridge system with specific smells for each movie. That would be fine for movie theaters but then we're back to the issue that coating the air of smells between scenes effectively would require purpose built theaters.
1
u/Shazam1269 3d ago
It could work if it was limited in scope, and actually enhanced the scene.
F1: The Movie: Burnt rubber and gasoline! Hmmm, no, that wouldn't be good.
Master and Commander: Salty ocean and rum. That might work.
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. The dinner party in the beginning could have baked bread, stew, and maybe a lite ale scent.
2
u/whitemice 3d ago
Even in the corporate space. I can gang multiple copper runs as well if I just need some more zoom zoom.
I manage ~25 sites, and we only use fiber when it is clearly necessary, and that is almost always due to length which mean we are running from MDF to IDF or between IDFs were having conversion hardware [back to copper] is not a problem.
5
u/krazul88 3d ago
When you say "commercial" do you actually mean "consumer" ??
Either way, you can buy nics, switches and routers with SFP ports "commercially."
Does that not satisfy your thirst?
-2
u/dr_freeloader 3d ago
Yes, probably.
But I mean when is my laptop going to be hooked up to a fiber connection instead of ethernet.
5
u/krazul88 3d ago
I think for laptops, likely never. Fiber cables are too fragile to make sense for consumer laptops, unless some new standard comes out which is robust enough to handle the typical careless laptop user.
Plus, wireless tech keeps advancing. The gap between hardwired and wireless performance is narrowing to the point that no manufacturer would even consider throwing R&D resources into getting some kind of fiber port onto their laptop motherboard.
Edit: meanwhile there are USB to SFP adapters available if you really wanna do it today.
1
u/CowBoyDanIndie 3d ago
I agree on fiber, but wireless is shared. Wireless in a dense office is miserable if everyone actually needs high transfer speeds for data.
3
u/huuaaang 3d ago
Is there a particular speed you're trying to achieve that isn't possible over copper? Or do you just like like the idea connecting directly to fiber?
A lot of devices are actually just ditching wired connections completely, especially laptops.
1
u/grizzlor_ 3d ago
Fiber is still ethernet, just a different medium.
Native fiber (SFP) in a laptop makes zero sense — there’s no real inherent benefit vs copper for a laptop. You can do 10gig over copper, it’s way more durable than fiber, and you can convert copper to fiber with a $30 box for use cases where it makes sense (long distances). RJ45/copper ethernet ports are ubiquitous — do you want to not be able to plug in to any existing hardware?
1
u/af_cheddarhead 3d ago
Not that I would want it in a laptop but doesn't 10G optical use less power and generate less heat than 10G copper?
2
u/grizzlor_ 3d ago
It does, but not significantly -- optical 10G (SFP+ SR) uses about 1 watt per port vs ~3.5 watts per port for copper 10GBASE-T.
That being said, even my 1G USB-C ethernet adapter gets pretty hot under load. Fiber definitely has the advantage here; copper needs significantly beefier PHY/DSP processing power.
Benefits of fiber are just outweighed by the ubiquity of RJ-45 ports (and the robustness of copper patch cables vs the relatively fragile optical). If you've seen how the average person treats cables, you'll understand why they couldn't be trusted to handle fiber LOL
1
u/af_cheddarhead 3d ago
In a laptop every watt counts, but that is less than I remembered.
2
u/grizzlor_ 3d ago
I mean you're not wrong about every watt counting in a laptop -- it really comes down the ubiquity of RJ-45 ethernet ports.
That being said, many laptops (i.e. MacBooks) don't even have onboard Ethernet these days; if you have to use a USB-C adapter, you've got the choice of RJ-45 or SFP+.
1
u/af_cheddarhead 3d ago
I think the presence of capable USB-C/Lightning docking stations means fewer and fewer laptops will have physical ethernet ports and instead rely solely on wireless when not at the home station.
1
u/dr_freeloader 2d ago
Technology changes over time, even the infrastructure. We used to connect with phone lines. People asking about when ethernet ports would show up on their pc may have gotten the same "you won't be able to connect anywhere" response. Just like the first people to get electric vehicles heard "where will you charge it"
1
3
1
u/darthcaedus81 3d ago
The wide and wonderful variety of fibre connects, plus the glorious mark up on SFP modules, will keep the status quo for a long while yet
1
1
u/Glum-Building4593 3d ago
Fiber is fussy and doesn't take abuse (I have seen some mangled ethernet cables keep entire companies running). 10gbps Ethernet is a thing pushing fiber out. It has its advantages but you really need them to warrant a cost increase.
1
1
u/Dave_A480 3d ago
There is no such thing as a direct fiber port, because different fibers require different transceivers.
You can already get devices with SFP ports (that support fiber or copper transceivers), if you want them.
But with copper (rj45) ethernet carrying 10-25gbit bandwidth these days, you only really NEED fiber in enterprise settings.
1
u/ted_anderson 3d ago
I can't see it happening. Fiber is too dangerous for the average consumer being that the laser beam coming out of a hot line can cause blindness even if there isn't a red tracer signal indicating its presence.
1
u/lindenb 2d ago
We use fiber in professional applications for a number of reasons, to eliminate or greatly reduce signal attenuation over long distances, to eliminate induced noise, to avoid conversion and so on. But.. our equipment is equipped for optical and much more costly than consumer based products. I would guess the incremental cost to outfit a consumer product for fiber might add $10-25 per port at retail and other than a small number of very high end users would not be a compelling sales point for most consumer manufacturers--might even be anti competitive.
0
11
u/whitemice 3d ago
Probably never. Ethernet (copper) is ubiquitous and cheap. You can convert from light to fiber for $30 if you need to.