cat5, 5e vs. cat6

[bwatson283]

There isnt any difference with cat5's and cat6 except that the cat6 runs at 500mhz. Am i right? I will still be able to get on the internet via cable modem right and router right?

 

[bluestrobe]

Googling or searching these forums would have answered that question for you. Yes (cat5e vs cat6) and Yes.

 

[maddawg]

I just got 1 quick question...........

I am wiring up 2 computers using cat6 cables.....

Do I also have to put cat6 from cable modem to router OR can I use the cat5e for that??????

I seem to think cat6 should be used for all the cables, but I just want to verify because I already have a cat5e cable.....I hope this is not a dumb question!!!!!!!

 

[ScottMac]

It won't matter in your case. MIxing Cat6 & 5e in the manner you describe will work fine.


Good Luck

Scott

 

[Captante]

The biggest difference between cat5e & cat6 cable is price ... aside from that, cat6 is better shielded so in theory it will experience less signal degradation over long runs, but for your purposes it won't matter which you use.

Bottom line is that either one will work fine for you.

 

[ScottMac]

Well, no.

There are quite a few differences between Cat6 and the other Catagory-rated structured cabling components (Cat{5e, 5, 4, 3}).

While there *are* some shielded Cat6 cables out there, many/most are not.

In fact, if the OP had a chunk of *shielded* Cat6, it would be a Very Bad Thing to mix shielded and unshielded cabling in a single run (without the benefit of a shielded cable-type panel that is properly grounded and terminated).

Ungrounded (or poorly grounded / terminated) shielded cabling performs somewhere in the neighborhood of rusty barbed wire sitting under a high tension power line. The (improperly terminated) shielding acts like an antenna and usually does a great job of sucking in noise to put on the conductors..

The termination specification for Cat6 is also much more stringent, compared to lower rated cabling with a "Category" certification. The conductors tend to be larger guage, the overall diameter tends to be larger because of the (usual) use of an X-member/insulator/pair separater.

There are a lot of differences between Cat6 and the other stuff but, as mentioned, simply using Cat6 jumpers in a system that also uses Cat{5e, 5} jumpers should work OK.

The overall system will assume the characteristics of the lowest-rated component.

FWIW

Scott