While working for a broadcasting/networking integration gig, we designed, assembled and field-terminated thousands of copper and fibre runs from 1/2 ft to football field lengths.
The amount of time required to terminate a copper cable in the field is seconds, and felt a bit like art. Something about the way it reliably reacted was magical and felt "strong."
Terminating or splicing a fibre cable felt like wrestling a snake covered in melted crayons, and the failure rate was significantly higher across the board. And it wasn't just workmanship, but quality of product, terminating environment, available equipment, misuse by future operators etc.
That said, at a certain point, we as a firm learned that most purchasers would rather the low latency/small footprint of optical/fibre versus copper, maintenece/failure be damned. Though, maybe part of our willingness to push fibre came from knowing that most purchasers would in 1-2 years call us back in to replace the rack terminations with copper :)
The amount of time required to terminate a copper cable in the field is seconds, and felt a bit like art. Something about the way it reliably reacted was magical and felt "strong."
Terminating or splicing a fibre cable felt like wrestling a snake covered in melted crayons, and the failure rate was significantly higher across the board. And it wasn't just workmanship, but quality of product, terminating environment, available equipment, misuse by future operators etc.
That said, at a certain point, we as a firm learned that most purchasers would rather the low latency/small footprint of optical/fibre versus copper, maintenece/failure be damned. Though, maybe part of our willingness to push fibre came from knowing that most purchasers would in 1-2 years call us back in to replace the rack terminations with copper :)