Bandwidth measurement of multimode fibers using system level bit error rate testing

We propose and demonstrate a novel bandwidth measurement method for multimode fibers through measuring the bit error rate and power penalty associated with the testing system. The relationship between system performance and bandwidth limitation is established through the use of well characterized electric filters. With the calibration information, bandwidths of actual fibers were measured. The results were compared with those from other methods. The benefit of the BER based bandwidth measurement method is discussed.