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As the name suggests, the CO2 laser uses a gas mixture that is based on carbon dioxide. This mixture, which usually consists of CO2, nitrogen, and helium, is electrically excited to generate the laser beam. Solid-state lasers are available in the form of fiber or disk lasers in similar power levels to their CO2 counterparts. As with the CO2 laser, the laser-active medium gives the fiber laser its name, which in this case is a glass-like or crystalline solid in the form of a fiber or a disk. While with the CO2 laser, the laser beam is guided through a beam path using optics, the beam of the fiber laser is generated in an active fiber and guided to the machine’s cutting head via a transport fiber. One of the key differences, apart from the laser medium as such, is its wavelength: With a fiber laser the laser wavelength is around 1µm and with a CO2 laser 10µm.