I have been looking at publicly available 10Gbps PON
photodiode datasheets from major suppliers. For the receiver sensitivity, they
all claim -21 dBm for BER of 1x10E-12. The typical characteristics curve
suggests a BER of 1x10E-3 for input power level of -25 dBm.
With input BER of 1x10E-3, we can find FEC algorithms
which would provide output BER of 1x10E-12 or better. Excuse my ignorance of
the subject, but why can't we use -24 dBm as the receiver sensitivity for PIN-PD
receivers? That will give us an additional 4 dB.
Here are some examples:
