Cat 5e vs. Cat 6?

[chuckywang]

If I buy an ethernet cable, what's the differences (advantages/disadvantages) between Cat5e vs. Cat6?

 

[zeos]

cat6 is more exspensive and you have to be more careful when you terminate it. careful in that if you take out to much twist from the pairs you'll lose the benefits cat6 gives you. 5e does gigabit i would use it unless you really want to use cat6.

 

[spidey07]

as far as patch cables go - cat5e is just fine.

Now if there are jacks involved and that is a cat6 installation, then cat6 only.

cat5e installation then cat5e patch cables go with it.

 

[chuckywang]

yeah, i read that the cat6 is backwards compatible with the cat5e. so i bought a cat6. eh.

 

[MtnMan]

CAT 5e is certified up to Gigabit Ethernet. Did you need faster?

 

[spidey07]

Originally posted by: MtnMan
CAT 5e is certified up to Gigabit Ethernet. Did you need faster?

actually it isn't. its certified to 100 megabit. It just "happens" to be able to run at 250 Mhz.

Cat 6 was specifically designed for 1000 Base-T and is certified to 250 Mhz.

 

[imported_Paladin]

Cat5 is 100MHz.

Cat5e is 350MHz.

Buy a 1000 feet: http://www.cablestogo.com/product.asp?cat%5Fid=303&sku=27350

"The IEEE 1000Base-T specification supports the use of Cat 5, or enhanced Cat 5 cable, for successful gigabit transmission." -- http://www.nwfusion.com/news/tech/2000/1016tech.html

 

[cmetz]

Cat5 is the base spec, 100MHz of bandwidth in the EE sense. Cat5E adds a FEXT requirement and tightens a few other specs of cat5 in minor ways - the intent was that most proper cat5 plants conformed to cat5e. Cat5 is the requirement for 100BaseTX, cat5e is the requirement for 1000BaseT.

Cat6 is a much improved spec with 250MHz of bandwidth in the EE sense, and much tigher specs all around. In terms of signal quality it is a noticeably better cable / jacks and the same goes for the build quality of the cat6 cables and jacks I've worked with.

 

[spidey07]

Originally posted by: Paladin
Cat5 is 100MHz.

Cat5e is 350MHz.

Buy a 1000 feet: http://www.cablestogo.com/product.asp?cat%5Fid=303&sku=27350

"The IEEE 1000Base-T specification supports the use of Cat 5, or enhanced Cat 5 cable, for successful gigabit transmission." -- http://www.nwfusion.com/news/tech/2000/1016tech.html

I wouldn't trust ANY cat5e installation unless the entire link and channel passed and certified to 1000 Base-T.

that's just me though, seen too many things go wrong including ripping out over 1000 pulls of cat5e because it wouldn't pass 1000 Base-T tests.

If were talking a patch cable then no big deal. But if we're talking channel/link then we have patch cords, jacks, cables/terminations to worry about...different vendors working well together, etc.

-edit- I guess it really depends on how the plant is tested. I demand EIA/TIA certification as well as IEEE.

 

[ScottMac]

Cat5e ("e" = "enhanced") qualifies all four pair for high-speed data (as well as bi-directional tightening of some of the qualification parameters).

Some vendors have produced white papers stating the Cat5e can be a "bad thing" when used for legacy / older 10/100 active components. The general flavor of the problem is that the return path is now much clearer, and bad signals that would normally be attenuated on the return path now have an excellent channel available to make it back to the originating interface (at higher / more interfering levels).

Cat5e / Cat 6 are also more sensitive to variance in vendor's specs ... it's more of a "bad thing" to mix & match components from different vendors: You amplify the chances that you will experience a "collective tolerances" issue (one component near the bottom of the operational envelope, the next component near the top of the envelope ... the difference is too wide and out-of-spec even though both are "in-spec").

FWIW

Scott

 

[EULA]

I wish the fcc would lift that stupid 52k modem restrictions...

 

[cmetz]

spidey07, how does one certify for 1000BaseT? There are plenty of cable scanners that test the EIA/TIA cat5/5e/6 required specs and produce reports of what they found, but I've never seen one that "certifies" 1000BaseT. Of course, the practical test of netperf from some fast boxes over the line works pretty well, but isn't quite hand-held.

 

[spidey07]

Originally posted by: cmetz
spidey07, how does one certify for 1000BaseT? There are plenty of cable scanners that test the EIA/TIA cat5/5e/6 required specs and produce reports of what they found, but I've never seen one that "certifies" 1000BaseT. Of course, the practical test of netperf from some fast boxes over the line works pretty well, but isn't quite hand-held.

Last one I played with had different test categories like EIA/TIA and IEEE. One such test is 1000 Base-T.

Its similar for fiber as well because you can test for 1000 Base-SX (has the limits built in/loss budgets)

 

[imported_Paladin]

Cool. What brand and model?

 

[Goosemaster]

Originally posted by: ScottMac
Cat5e ("e" = "enhanced") qualifies all four pair for high-speed data (as well as bi-directional tightening of some of the qualification parameters).

Some vendors have produced white papers stating the Cat5e can be a "bad thing" when used for legacy / older 10/100 active components. The general flavor of the problem is that the return path is now much clearer, and bad signals that would normally be attenuated on the return path now have an excellent channel available to make it back to the originating interface (at higher / more interfering levels).

Cat5e / Cat 6 are also more sensitive to variance in vendor's specs ... it's more of a "bad thing" to mix & match components from different vendors: You amplify the chances that you will experience a "collective tolerances" issue (one component near the bottom of the operational envelope, the next component near the top of the envelope ... the difference is too wide and out-of-spec even though both are "in-spec").

FWIW

Scott

Interesting