Bit Error Rate Tester for 10 Gb/s Fibre Optic Link

The bit error rate tester suitable for operation in 10 Gb/s fibre optic links is described in the paper. The BER tester was built from commercially available components. Generation and reception of 10 Gb/s data stream is performed with help of high-speed serialiser and deserialiser by Maxim. The main functions of the BER tester are implemented in the field programmable gate array (FPGA) Spartan3 device by Xilinx. The part of the FPGA runs with the clock speed equal to 622 MHz. Some measurement results obtained in the fibre optic links operated with 10 Gb/ data rate are also presented.