[inferiorhuman]

You still have to get transceivers for both ends of each and every connection which drives up the cost per port pretty dramatically.

Edit:

  Scantly driving up the cost per port.

Say what? You've just added $1,500 (28 ports * 2 per port * $27) to the cost of a 28 port switch… at the low end.

Now I've no experience with fiber, but anecdotally I've come across a few complaints that the Ubiquiti stuff is picky about the transceivers you use. So if you go with a single manufacturer, Ubiquiti wants about $900 for their 28 port switch, but SFP+ transceivers start at $38. Their direct attach cables are cheaper but a 5m cable will still run you about $40. Compare that to *BaseT where I can grab a 3m Cat6 cable for under $10.

For an ISP the cost difference probably matters much less as they will be making money off of each connection (and likely saving on cooling costs). For a home user (e.g. an EPB customer) that's still pricey. An ER-X w/ a single SFP port runs about $80, using that SFP port will cost you.

[theideaofcoffee]

Let's be generous and assume that we need far more reach than what is realistic in this scenario, take it at 10km between the subscriber demarc and the CO where these connections would presumably be terminated. A 10km LR optic is only $27 [0]. Amortize that over, say, three years and that's $0.75 per port, multiplied by two, so call it $1.50 per port/month over three years. Scantly driving up the cost per port. The physical fiber linking the two ends is more expensive (though you could depreciate and amortize over a longer period of time).

The 25G optics are barely that much more, LR/10km for $59 a pop. [1]

[0] https://www.fs.com/products/74670.html?attribute=4254&id=290...

[1] https://www.fs.com/products/75297.html?attribute=740&id=3417...

[71a54xd]

It's not that bad given the performance gain. Fiber patch cables are dirt cheap, FS.com optics are a great deal and also very affordable. Catch is to make sure you carefully buy hardware that accepts the proper optics, insane that it's somehow legal to lock down optics for specific vendors (I'm looking at you intel).

[aetherspawn]

You're right. Definitely wouldn't consider the direct attach cables though for anything longer than 1m. Any serious deployment you'd want to be full optics.