Critics of fiber argue that users don't need high bandwidth to the desktop, so that using fiber is wasted potential. Data rates of 25 Mbps and 51 Mbps are among those touted for desktop connectivity. Traditional Ethernet is being replaced by 100Mbps flavors. Video, video teleconferencing, multimedia, and other bandwidth-hungry applications are dying for bandwidth. ATM require more bandwidth .
Technology presents an important issue here.
Category 5 cable may have been pushed to its limits in achieving 100-Mhz performance. While advances in data encoding schemes may provide higher data rates within this frequency framework, the question remains whether Category 5 performance can be extended. At the same time, fiber has room to spare. For the 100-meter distances recommended for links to the desktop, Category 5 cable has a bandwidth of 100 MHz, while fiber has a bandwidth of over 1 GHz.