Choosing cable to wire a house

[ggadrian]

We bought a new house for weekends and holydays and altought it's not going to have internet at the moment (we don't need it right now) I tought that now that they have to do all the electrical wiring it's the perfect moment to lay some network cable just in case.

The problem is that I can't decide wich cable to run. Right now I know that cat5e is enough for 1Gbps and that cat6 just allow for longer wires and less interference, right? But will the cat6 be 10Gbps capable if that becomes a standard in the future or I'll need something else?

 

[Skott]

I'm no expert but from what I have read CAT6 will be or is 10GBps capable. CAT6 is certainly an improvement over CAT5e so I would say go ahead with CAT6 if you can afford to do so. It is set to be the next standard. By doing so you are in some way future proofing yourself. If you believe such a thing is possible. Best to have the latest and greatest if you can. Just my own opinion anyway.

 

[John Connor]

I would lay Cat 6 too or fiber.

 

[Red Squirrel]

Check monoprice, probably cheapest place to get cable, and yeah I'd go with cat6. It's not really much more expensive than cat5e.

 

[ch33zw1z]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category_6_cable

check out the maximum length section on the link, going from 1Gbps to 10Gbps changes the maximum cable length.

Go with cat6, it's not a huge price jump.

If you wiring in the walls, you want to use solid core (aka "riser") cat6....and terminate the runs into keystones

It will be a while before 10Gbps is going to be a standard in the house, if it becomes the standard at all.

 

[ggadrian]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category_6_cable

check out the maximum length section on the link, going from 1Gbps to 10Gbps changes the maximum cable length.

Go with cat6, it's not a huge price jump.

If you wiring in the walls, you want to use solid core (aka "riser") cat6....and terminate the runs into keystones

It will be a while before 10Gbps is going to be a standard in the house, if it becomes the standard at all.

Yes, I know that 1Gbps is going to be standard for some time, but technology changes very fast, and this cable is going to be in the walls this year, 10 years from now, 20 years from now, etc... So I'd like to future proof it.

So cat6 it is. Just any solid core cat6 or should I look for something in special?

 

[imagoon]

Install stub up conduits, install cat5e. Then when you actually need 10gig you simply replace the cable by pulling it through the existing conduits.

 

[kevnich2]

I would go with imagoon's suggestion and at least in a couple key areas of the house, run conduit from your jack up to either the attic or basement then run atleast cat5e or cat6 cable. cat5e will do 1gb/s without any issues but you do need cat6 for 10gb but honestly, it's going to be AWHILE before you NEED 10gb for home use, if ever. But to future proof, just put like 2" conduit going down your wall in key areas so it makes pulling wire later on easier when things need to be changed.

Also if your doing electrical now, best time to do conduit. In most areas, I would install atleast 1, possibly two runs of cat5e/cat6 on opposite ends of each wall in each room. If all the wiring comes back to a central location in a structured setup, you can then wire each one to a big patch panel and have each individual jack be capable of doing either voice or data and it's easily changed. Might cost a few grand to do this but atleast on outer walls, once the sheet rock is up, you can't do this later.