ACOnet Backbone

ACOnet's country-wide carrier network is based on a wavelength transparent fibre optic backbone that allows for multiple transmission paths per route. The ACOnet backbone uses 100 Gbps DWDM technology (DWDM = Dense Wavelength Division Multiplexing).

Since 2017, it is possible to directly interconnect ACOnet's PoPs via short links (see Topology). Thus, for example a connection between the cities of Innsbruck and Salzburg no longer needs to take a route via Vienna.

Such cross connections reduce latency and enhance performance among the PoPs; a requirement for traffic-intensive and for real-time applications. Therefore, all the main backbone nodes are outfitted with OADMs (Optical Add-Drop Multiplexers), which facilitate flexible connections.

Joint projects among multiple ACOnet participants can also avail themselves of VPN connections, either as a service on existing ACOnet infrastructure or using dedicated wavelengths. One such case is GovIX, a country-wide peering VLAN for governmental organisations that is operating since 2010. Both IPv4 and IPv6 are available to all ACOnet participants with equal quality of service.