CAT5 cables installed roughly 10 years ago.

[BlueWeasel]

I've read that some CAT5 cabling meets CAT5E standards and therefore supports gigabit networking. Is there a chance that would work with CAT5 cabling roughly 10 years old?

We've got a small business network with 10-12 drops wired with CAT5 (in 1998) that terminate into a patch panel tied to a 10/100 switch. 6 of those drops are workstations that I want to upgrade to 1000mbps networking. The patch cables to the switch are clearly marked as CAT5 and I've not examined any of the drop cables.

My plan is to incorporate a new 8 10/100/1000 switch into the network that connects the gigabit workstations. All of the other 10/100 printers and plotters will remain on the existing switch.

However, there are no plans to rewire using CAT5E or CAT6, as we will likely only be in this office for a couple more years.

Given the age of the CAT5 cables, is there a chance that G/B networking will work? The cost for a new switch and G/B PCI cards is only about $200 but don't want to bother if it's a waste of time.

 

[racolvin]

Much depends on the quality of the original install and the quality of the cabling that was purchased at the time. Easiest thing to do would be to have someone come in with a cable tester and run tests on them - that'll tell you right quick if it'll work.

 

[bruceb]

Only way to tell for sure is to bring in a network cable tester. That will not only tell you of any problems with in the cables, but it can also do a test to see what speed it can operate at error free. If the cables were properly run, no kinks or staples and on good solid terminations, it may work, especially if the cable runs are under 300 feet.

 

[spidey07]

3rded. Get it scanned/tested for 1000 Base-T. You're most likely OK as long as it was installed properly and tested.

 

[BlueWeasel]

Excellent advice, thanks!

 

[bobdole369]

Certified installations of plain jane CAT5 would be swept to 100mhz and checked for crosstalk back in 98. No reason for it to not work. You can hire a guy to recertify one of them for fairly cheap and if she works on one, she'll probably work on em all.

 

[Mogadon]

A little of topic but in the same vein:

What's the going rate for a professional to come in and recertify/test a network?

 

[spidey07]

Probably around 30-40 bucks per run. If it's a new install the certification/testing is part of the install.

 

[racolvin]

If its a new install, I'm with Spidey - certification/testing and documentation of the new install is part of the package.

Getting a team to come in and do a recertification/test would depend on the prevailing labor rates in your area and how hard up for work the cable installers are in this current economy

 

[reicherb]

Originally posted by: racolvin
Easiest thing to do would be to have someone come in with a cable tester and run tests on them - that'll tell you right quick if it'll work.

Typically I would agree but why spend as much on testing as the equipment would cost? Just get the equipment and if it works great. If not, your not out any more money than if you had the cable tested and found out that you can only get 100mbps speeds.

 

[spidey07]

Originally posted by: reicherb

Originally posted by: racolvin
Easiest thing to do would be to have someone come in with a cable tester and run tests on them - that'll tell you right quick if it'll work.

Typically I would agree but why spend as much on testing as the equipment would cost? Just get the equipment and if it works great. If not, your not out any more money than if you had the cable tested and found out that you can only get 100mbps speeds.

Because that's not how it would pan out. You'd have errored frames but it would "run" at 1000 Base-T. And that gives throughput that can actually be below 100 Base-T speeds. Not up to specifications cable gives link, and it will work, but it will work very poorly and give really weird problems that wind up costing much much more than a few hundred bucks to just scan it and make sure the physical layer is good.

The physical layer is the single most important part of a network, you don't mess with it or guess with it.

 

[BlueWeasel]

After finding out that 5 of the 6 workstations already have on-board GB NICs, I went ahead and ordered the hardware.

Got a 8-port switch and Intel 10/100/1000 NIC from Newegg for $125. Even if the cable limits us to 100mbps, we'll use the hardware when we change offices.

 

[spidey07]

You won't know if the cable will limit it to 100 Base-T because it doesn't test the cable to see what it can do, just sends out a link pulse. You'll get link and it will autonegotiate to 1000 Base-T, whether it runs error free with no retransmissions (and the many, many seconds you have to wait between them) you'll just have to monitor the counters on the switch and NIC.

 

[macssuck]

I would agree about the cabling certification. About a year ago i was sent out to replace a network that consisted of 10Mbit hubs(yes I said hubs) with Cisco 3560 10/100 switches. I put the switches in and one part of the network ran worse than before! Luckily they were managed switches so you could see the problem easily. It turned out the site knowingly ran the cable longer than spec because they were only running 10Mbit hubs at the time and did not want to spend the money on fiber for the up link to do it right. Without a managed switch such as in your case you could be scratching your head for hours wondering why one of the PC's just doesn't work quite rite.