Cat 5 wiring (2025 Update)

mark posted for all of us...

NO! This ^^^^ is PART of the problem, the crimper.

Go to the Leviton, Siemon,other cabling,etc sites and they will explain how it SHOULD be done. Think punch down. Ceimped connectors are for patch cables. So in other words DO YOUR RESEARCH! There are also group that are dedicated for this.

I probably wouldn't coil it up (although I doubt it'll make a difference) -- no need to tempt the fates with extra inductance. But an extra 20 feet is not an issue by itself unless you're running near the length limits.

Mark:

The first 50 I did took me 15 minutes each and I, probably, had 50% success rate. Now I do 1 in less than a minute and my success rate is, as far as I know, 100%.

Get them flat, cut very straight, and don't let go until you slide them in all the way.

Also, I always wear magnfyinh glasses when doing it.

Good luck.

Hi, Are you using quality crimping tool or El Cheapo one?

Right. It will take the signal 2 x 10^^-8 seconds to travel the unnecessary distance.

It takes practice. There is also a tester to see if all the wires are 'made'. People should be using cat 6 now.

Cat 6 seems to have no real benefit over Cat 5, now or in the foreseeable future.

Make sure you have the right connectors for the cable. Connectors designed for solid wire have contacts that go around the the conductor after piercing through the insulation, and those for stranded wire pierce the wire down the center.

Also ensure that the wires are properly paired. In simplest terms, one twisted pair should go to the center pins (4 and 5). Each wire of the second pair goes outside to the first pair on pins 3 and 6. The third pair goes to pins 1 and 2, and the fourth pair goes to 7 and 8. A common mistake is to pair pins 3 and 4, then 5 and 6. This will pass a simple electrical test, but may cause poor data transmission.

For neophytes I always recommend the EZ-RJ45 Crimping System:

More importantly, make sure any CAT 5 or 6 you use in a home is plenum rated, even if the building code doesn't require it. Your family's safety requires it. Don't be tempted by the sometimes significant cost differential.

Transit time isn't the issue when you coil up extra cable.

It isn't standard practice to wire as you described. You run solid CAT5 to the jack and punch it down. Then you use a patch cable to connect to whatever device is being used on that jack.

This bears repeating: the solid-conductor cable that runs in walls is meant to be punched down to the back of female jacks, either at a patch panel or at a wall jack. Crimp-on male plugs are normally for stranded-conductor patch cords. Solid conductor cable is more likely to break if it's frequently flexed, and hard-to-crimp translates to unreliable connections.

If you really want to do it, I believe there are plugs and crimp tools made for solid conductors. If yours aren't labeled as such, they're not.

Chip C Toronto

Stripping not necessary. They must be flat and in the correct order depending on weather you are making a crossover or regular cable. Scan Google for pictures.

Better yet, buy them all made. Home Depot has good prices on ready made cat 5 cables.

No.

I always wondered why they use 4 pair cable. My understanding is a pair is used each direction. Can you use 2 pair cable? Does 2 pair cat 5 cable exist?

CAT 5 only describes the performance characteristics of the cable. It has nothing to do with how many pairs are in the cable. And using all pairs of 4 pair cable is not unusual in computer work with GigE being the most common current example.