Abstract: A hand held optical fault locator used to determine the distance to a discontinuity in a fiber optic cable, such as a break, nick, cut, scrape, indentation, or the like, a splice, a connector, or the end of the cable. The locator includes an analog front end, a complex programmable logic device (CPLD), a laser diode and drive, a microcontroller, at least one input, and at least one output. The preferred locator allows a user to select a specific index of refraction, to measure the distance to a fault directly in feet or meters, to measure fiber lengths at counting frequencies in the 100KHz range, to determine fiber reflection events in the digital-time domain, and to make accurate measurements without the use of a sensitivity adjustment feature.

Abstract: An enhanced amplifier for interconnecting a two-wire, bidirectional cable side transmission path and a two-wire bidirectional equipment side transmission path in a communication system includes a first splitter and a second splitter. The first splitter is formed of a cable-to-equipment voltage sense amplifier, a shunt current driver, and a series current compensator for generating a first simulated terminating impedance. The second splitter is formed of an equipment-to-cable voltage sense amplifier, the shunt current driver and the series current compensator for generating a second simulated terminating impedance. Other features disclosed include manual balancing circuitry for manually adjusting the cable side balance networks. Further, a loopback circuit is provided form facilitating remote testing and alignment of the amplifier from the cable side.