10 GIGABIT PER SECOND CAPABLE PASSIVE OPTICAL NETWORK SYSTEM WITH FLEXIBLE NOMINAL UPSTREAM BITRATE

摘要

Techniques, apparatus and systems are described for accommodating the optical network units (ONUs) having different nominal upstream bitrates on the same passive optical network (PON) system by making the specified burst preamble and the bandwidth map allocation record format invariant with respect to the nominal upstream bitrate of a target ONU. The disclosed techniques, apparatus and systems allow seamless evolution of the lower-bitrate services to higher-bitrate services offered to an end-user without need to upgrade the central office equipment. In addition they can avoid the adverse consequences of inadvertently connecting a high-upstream-bitrate ONU to a lower-upstream-bitrate network.