First off, I've nearly come to the end of my 305m drum of Cat5e and have more to run for IP cameras etc. Any particular cables to be avoided?
Likewise with a rack/cabinet and patch panel to help tidy up the mass of spaghetti in the loft.
Cheers Pete
En el artículo , Andy Burns escribió:
1) you can make then to precise lengths (helps in patch panels so you don't have to 'hide' excess cable when using pre-made) 2) it's incredibly satisfying making your own. (OK, it's just me, then.)
That's what wiring combs are for ;-)
(and being realistic, if you buy patch leads in 20, 30, 50, 100cm lengths, you don't need to end up with much spare to lose.
Its also incredibly slow! (and unless you keep a stock of stranded CAT5e, they are less flexible than proper patch leads).
I normally reserve making leads for when you need unusual lengths, or have to pass the wire though a hole where the RJ45 would not fit etc.
En el artículo , John Rumm escribió:
And the storage space you lose by having to store all those cables of different lengths, with the wrath of SWMBO? :)
Sod's law states that just when you need one of X length, you'll have run out of stock.
I do agree with keeping stock of different lengths - I did this at work (plus also different colours for different functions - red for backbone, yellow for phones, green for user desktops, blue for serial, grey for 'f***ed if I know', etc.) where there is space available to store them and someone else is paying for them.
But in a domestic installation?
I've just had to run a couple of Cat5e cables in my house. Solid floors and a proscription on trunking or clipping to skirting boards, etc. made it tricky. In the end I went out through the exterior wall, ran it around the building under the lip of the bell casting at the bottom of the external render with hot melt glue to hold it in place, then back in through the wall at the desired location. Worked well: quick, minimal mess and the cable is totally invisible.
I believe you *can* buy crimpable plugs for solid cable I don't think they are as common / easy to acquire as those designed for stranded cable. It's possible you can also get 'universal' plug but I've never seen them ITRW.
A mate has had the electrician cable up his shop with solid Cat5e (no problem with that) but didn't go for the patch panel or boxes at the remotes as I recommended and so I'd told him I'll have nothing to do with it (if he calls me for (network issue) help in the future). ;-)
Cheers, T i m
It was funny, I'd just started at a new training centre in the city and we (trainers, office and admin staff, all hands to the decks etc) were still setting up the all the networking and desks / kit in the rooms as they were being finished by the builders etc.
I was minding my own business and one of the guys running the cables under the floor from the comms room to the training rooms approached me with the 'Ere Tim, you know about networking and stuff, can you help us please ..?'
The scenario that had was that they could get links up that happened to be using short cables (they were just making up 'long' patch cables using stranded cable as the distances weren't that great) but the longer cables didn't work.
I asked them if they had observed the pairs across pins 1 & 2, 3 & 6 (not 4) etc and they looked blank so I drew it all out on a whiteboard (I'd just put up). ;-)
They cut all the ends off the cables they had made up that far, started again and it all worked fine (surprise surprise). ;-)
One of the delegates had to do that with 200 patch cables they had made in the UK and shipped to Germany. He had to fly out and spent quite some time putting new ends on (and vowed to never do one again). ;-)
Similar with a mate who had been struggling with a 'touchy' Thin Ethernet installation using 4 x multiport thin Ethernet repeaters. When popping in for a coffee I spotted 'very short' (less than the .6m minimum) interconnecting cables between the repeaters and got him to replace them with longer ones. All of a sudden, the network was stable? He asked me why the supplier of the repeaters or the consultant they had got in hadn't spotted that ...?
Cheers, T i m
RS sell them - I've used them. Sorry, I don't have a part number to hand.
That's what punch down sockets are for, one either side with some proper cable between. 8-)
Yes, you *can* get them but they aren't the sort of thing you can easily pickup at the std outlets, or even Maplin etc.
Plus I'm not sure how many people, especially those who crimp such '8P8C' (what we typically call RJ45) connectors in a non-professional role know such plugs exist?
Cheers, T i m
En el artículo , Tim Watts escribió:
Me too. They look identical to the ones for stranded, but you can tell the difference by inspecting with a magnifying glass. The ones for stranded have pins that pierce the cable insulation and contact the core, the ones for stranded are more of a IDC type that bites into the insulation and the core on two sides, similar to the Krone IDC conencters used on e.g. RJ45 sockets and BT phone sockets.
You're supposed to use the right ones for the cable but I've not had any trouble mixing them. Also have a feeling there are universal ones.
En el artículo , Mike Tomlinson escribió:
Apropos of not much, I notice that if I test a very short patch lead with my cable tester, it confirms the pin to pin wiring is ok, but flags a split pair error... (to be fair the instructions do say there is a minimum length that it can test reliably)
For a lead that's going to be left well alone, you can get away with "normal" plugs on solid core wire IME. Not a good idea for wires that will be moved about a bit though.
An electrician I know of "moved" CAT5 outlets by punching new cable on the the back of an outlet, and running that to a new one. Then repeated the same excercise on the second outlet to produce a third, rather like you would with phone outlets.
I didn't even know there were different plugs for different wires. Always just crimped regular plugs to solid cores.
Looks like I might need to "upgrade" my shop LAN next then as it too is just a mass of hybrid patch leads from wall boxes straight into the switch.
Admittedly cables are never moved so I've yet to have any wiring faults. :)
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