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The transmission impairments of a Raman amplified link using dual-polarization 16-quadrature amplitude modulation (DP-16QAM) are experimentally characterized. The impact of amplitude and phase noise on the signal due to relative intensity noise (RIN) transfer from the pump are compared for two pumping configurations: first-order backward pumping and bi-directional pumping. Experimental results indicate that with increased Raman backward pump power, though the optical signal-to-noise ratio (OSNR) is increased, so is the pump-induced amplitude and phase noise. The transmission performance is firstly improved by the enhanced OSNR at a low pump power until an optimum point is reached, and then the impairments due to pump-induced noise start to dominate. However, the introduction of a low pump power in the forward direction can further improve the system’s performance.