Electronics and Signals

• The function of the physical layer is to transmit data

by defining the electrical specifications between the
source and destination
• Data is represented:
– by the presence of either electrical pulses on
copper conducting wires
– light pulses in optical fibers
• basic theory of electricity
 Insulators, Conductors and
Semiconductors
• Electrical insulators, or insulators, are materials that
allow electrons to flow through them with great
difficulty, or not at all (plastic, glass, air, dry wood,
paper, rubber, and helium gas)
• Electrical conductors, or conductors, are materials
that allow electrons to flow through them with great
ease (metals, such as copper (cu), silver (Ag), and
gold (au))
• Semiconductors are materials where the amount of
electricity they conduct can be precisely controlled.
(Carbon (C), germanium (Ge), and the alloy, gallium
arsenide (GaAs), silicon (Si))
 Electrical Measurement
• Voltage, sometimes referred to as
electromotive force (EMF), is an electrical
force, or pressure, that occurs when
electrons and protons are separated
– Voltage can also be created by friction (static
electricity), by magnetism (electric generator), or
by light (solar cell
– The unit of measurement for voltage is volt (V),
and is defined as the amount of work, per unit
charge, needed to separate the charges
 Electrical Measurement
• Electrical current, or current, is the flow
of charges that is created when
electrons move
– The unit of measurement for current is
Ampere (Amp)
– defined as the number of charges per
second that pass by a point along a path
 Electrical Measurement
• Materials through which current flows,
offer varying amounts of opposition, or
resistance, to the movement of the
electrons
• The unit of measurement for resistance
is the ohm (Ω)
 Electrical Measurement
• Alternating Current (AC)
– Alternating current (AC) and voltages vary with
time, by changing their polarity, or direction
– AC flows in one direction, then reverses its
direction, and repeats the process
• Direct Current (DC)
– Direct current (DC) always flows in the same
direction
– DC voltages always have the same polarity
 Electrical Measurement
• Impedance
– Impedance is the total opposition to
current flow
– resistance is generally used when
referring to DC voltages
– Impedance is the general term, and is the
measure of how the flow of electrons is
resisted, or impeded
– Its unit of measurement is the ohm (Ω)
 Electrical Measurement
• Currents only flow in closed loops
called circuits
• circuits must be composed of
conducting materials, and must have
sources of voltage
• Voltage causes current to flow
• Resistance and impedance oppose it
 Electrical Measurement
• Ground
– The third prong in an electrical outlet is
the ground and it gives the electrons an
extra conducting path to flow to the earth,
rather than through your body
– Ground can also mean the reference
point, or the 0 volts level, when making
electrical measurements
Grounding Network Equipment
• The purpose of connecting the safety
ground to exposed metal parts of the
computing equipment is to prevent
such metal parts from becoming
energized with a hazardous voltage
resulting from a wiring fault inside the
device
 Representing Bits
• Basic building block of information is 1 binary digit, known as
the bit or pulse
– may be as simple as 0 volts for binary 0, and +5 volts for
binary 1
• signal reference ground - reference point used by
computing devices to measure and compare incoming
digital signals
– optical signals, binary 0 would be encoded as a low-light,
or no-light, intensity (darkness) binary 1 would be encoded
as a higher-light intensity (brightness)
– wireless signals, binary 0 might be a short burst of waves;
binary 1 might be a longer burst of waves
 Six things that can happen to 1 bit

• propagation
• attenuation
• reflection
• noise
• timing problem
• collisions
 Propagation
• Propagation means travel
– Propagation means that a lump of energy,
representing 1 bit, travels from one place to another
– time it takes the bit to travel from one end of the
medium and back again is referred to as the round
trip time, (RTT)
– propagation time is too long, you should re-evaluate
how the rest of the network will deal with this delay
– propagation delay is too short, you may have to slow
down the bits, or save them temporarily (known as
buffering)
 Attenuation
• Attenuation is the loss of signal
strength
– means that a 1 bit voltage signal loses
amplitude as energy passes from the
signal to the cable
– choosing materials carefully and geometry
can reduce electrical attenuation
– Can also happen to optical fiber and
radio/microwaves
 Network reflection
• Reflection occurs in electrical signals
– voltage pulses, or bits, hit a discontinuity
some energy can be reflected
– occurs in electrical, optical and atmospheric
media
 Noise
• Noise is unwanted additions to voltage,
optical, or electromagnetic signals
• it is important to keep the signal-to-
noise (S/N) ratio as high as possible
– S/N ratio is an engineering calculation and
measurement which involves dividing the
signal strength by the noise strength
 Noise
• Types of Noise
– When electrical noise on the cable
originates from signals on other wires in
the cable, this is known as crosstalk
(NEXT – Near end crosstalk)
– can be addressed by:
• termination technology
• use of quality twisted pair cables
 Noise
• Thermal Noise
– due to the random motion of electrons
• AC Power and reference ground
noises
– Long length of the neutral and ground
wires can act as an antenna for electrical
noise
 Noise
• EMI/RFI
– electromagnetic interference (EMI)
– radio frequency interference (RFI)
• Each wire in a cable can act like an antenna absorbs
electrical signals from other wires in the cable and from
electrical sources outside the cable
• Two ways to limit EMI/RFI
– Shielding - metal braid or foil surrounds each wire
pair or group of wire pairs
– Cancellation - two wires in an electrical circuit are
placed close together
Dispersion, jitter, and latency
• Dispersion is when the signal broadens in
time
– Dispersion can be fixed by proper cable design,
limiting cable lengths, and finding the proper
impedance
• Jitter – when the clock on the source host is
not synchronized with the destination
– series of complicated clock synchronizations,
including hardware and software, or protocol
synchronizations
 Latency
• Latency - also known as delay
– careful use of internetworking devices,
different encoding strategies, and various
layer protocols
 Collision
• A collision occurs when two bits from
two different communicating computers
are on a shared-medium at the same
time
– detect them and simply have a set of rules
for dealing with them when they occur
– only allowing one computer on a shared
media environment to transmit at a time
 Messages In Terms of Bits
• Eight bits equal 1 byte
• Multiple bytes equal 1 frame
• Frames contain packets
• Packets carry the message you wish to
communicate
– Networking professionals often talk about
attenuated, reflected, noisy, dispersed,
and collided frames and packets
 Encoding and Modulation
• Encoding means converting binary
data into a form that can travel on a
physical communications link
• Modulation means using the binary
data to manipulate a wave
 Encoding and Modulation
• encoding messages as voltages on
various forms of copper wire
• encoding messages as pulses of
guided light on optical fibers
• encoding messages as modulated,
radiated electromagnetic waves
 Encoding and Modulation
• Methods of Encoding
– TTL (transistor-transistor logic) encoding
is the simplest. It is characterized by a
high signal and a low signal
– Manchester encoding results in 1 being
encoded as a low-to-high transition and 0
being encoded as a high-to-low transition
 Encoding and Modulation
• modulation, which specifically means
taking a wave and changing, or
modulating it so that it carries
information