Optran® AN INFRARED LED TRANSCEIVER FOR DATA COMMUNICATIONS

Abstract

The following discussion reviews operating experience with a non-coherent infrared (IR) optical data link at several installations in the United States. Optran is a commercial digital data link, manufactured by Computer Transmission Corporation, for computer-to-computer or computer-to-terminal data transfer applications. It uses a nonlasing gallium arsenide diode as the transmitter and a silicon diode as the receiver. Simple optics collimate the transmitter output and focus the captured receive energy on the receiver diode. A digital interface unit at each terminal end presents a standard interface to business equipment and encodes/decodes data from the optical head.