Sonet network upgrade
Alcatel Telecom in Paris and Sprint Carolina Telephone in Wake Forest, NC, have completed a network upgrade with a 5-node Synchronous Optical Network (Sonet) ring in Fayetteville, NC. With a length of more than 100 miles in and around the city, the ring more than doubles previous capacity. Alcatel supplied its 1648 SM Sonet multiplexers operating at 2.5-Gbit/sec OC-48 to create a network capacity of 160,000 simultaneous voice-equivalent channels, or an average of 32,000 channels from node to node. Sprint is using fiber-optic cables previously installed underground or aerially for this ring.