OFDM-PON performance with limited quantization

A study of digital-analogue converter quantization effects and the minimum resolution required in an OFDMA-PON is carried out with 10 Gbps transceivers. The PON is based on DD over a maximum of 100 km fibre length. Results indicate that a 6-bit resolution for both, DAC and ADC are enough for ensuring a FEC limit BER of 10^-3 for a penalty of 1dB compared with infinite quantization for downstream with 16QAM modulation. For upstream signals with QPSK modulation, a 6-bit DAC with 6-bit ADC ensures almost no penalty, while a 4-bit DAC gives a penalty of 2 dB related with infinite quantization.