A 10 MEGABYTE/S FIBER OPTIC LINK

This paper presents a fibre optic link (FOL) that has been developed for the NA48 experiment at CERN [1]. About 15 FOLs will be used to transfer event data to the Data Merger (event builder) over a distance of 200 metres. The FOL has a very simple interface and is capable of transmitting data at a rate of over 10 Mbyte/s while performing error detection. The optical part of the FOL uses industry standard components. This, combined with its simplicity of use, makes the FOL suitable to be reused in a wide range of applications, which is shown by its use outside the NA48 experiment.