Opinion of SC to LC Adapter? 3

[sfrank8734]

I'm not a fiber expert, most of my stuff is nice multimode. At a location we acquired, the previous business owners got single mode fiber installed for a "between two buildings" run (maybe 300 feet?).

Now we're getting to the point where we want to upgrade networking equipment, and everything nowadays has LC connections, rather than the older Cisco gear we have the the SC connectors. The vendor (Dell in this case) is recommending we reterminate the existing single mode fiber with LC connectors. Of course, that's easy for them to ask, but is it really necessary? They cited "stability" yet I find dozens of vendors online selling such items.

I would love a second opinion--I assume there are many people who run into older fiber like this and don't want to reterm or replace, so this seems perfectly viable to me. Does anyway have opinions?

I attached a URL of a 60 second Youtube clip I found with a quick google search of such an adapter. It's not intended as an ad for the company, but explained exactly the problem I'm looking to solve.

Thanks!

- S

 

[trvlr1]

Reterminating is probably the best thing you can do. That being said, we have had exactly the same issue in our data center and have used adapters 100's of times without issue. We have also used fiber patch cables with LC at one end and SC at the other (as well as other types) again without issue.
We get most of ours from Graybar, but most cable suppliers have them. Graybar usually makes us patch cables to length as we need them, which makes installation easier and neater.

 

[sfrank8734]

Thanks, I agree that terminating again would be probably best but the adapter isn't much more than a patch cable too.

My situation is that I can't just reterm and have it work with the old equipment. I don't want to put all the new equipment in and discover a problem requiring me to go back to the old equipment then having to reterm, so I think the strategy is going to be to use adapters first, verify functionality on the new equipment for several weeks, then reterminate.

 

[trvlr1]

We squashed the idea of reterminating the existing fiber with the thought that, if it can happen once with the changes on fiber connections, it can happen again and there was no reason to reterminate fully functional connectors that were 100% good and chance causing issues in the future.

 

[mforrence]

Why not simply use a fiber patch cord with SC on one end and LC on the other? We do this every day. In my view, the idea of re-terminating the fiber is silly.
Mike

 

[sfrank8734]

mforrence - I agree totally. I was looking for second opinions because that was the logic I was using as well, yet the vendor recommended against.

Thanks!