Home cat5e install questions

[skypilot]

I'm in the middle of doing some UTP cat5e installation at my house so I can get off wireless (goodbye, effective 8mbps throughput) and onto 100Base-TX for now and 1000Base-T in the future. I have some questions about running the cables:

1) I've heard not to run next to power cable for any significant distance. I'm running parallel to group of power cables, about 24 inches away, for about 16 feet at one point. Given the way my attic works, this is unavoidable.

• Will this work at all?

• Will it prevent me from getting decent throughput?

• Will it prevent me from upgrading to 1000Base-T when the time comes?

2) I was running one of the attic lines, and the cat5e kinked. I straightened it out and finished the run.

• Same questions as #1

I can figure all this out when I test, but I figure if the AT crew can tell me before I attach the patch panel and outlets, it would save me some time.

 

[cmetz]

skypilot,

1) this will work fine if you have to do it. Try to stay as parallel as possible. You should avoid power as much as you can, but in the real world it's hard to avoid. 24" is a good distance. I think you're fine.

2) now this might be bad. If you can re-run it, that would be ideal. Otherwise I'd suggest just remembering which run this was and crossing your fingers.

 

[dartworth]

skypilot

just curious, how many cat5e drops are you putting in each room?

do you have a server or gigabit switch?

 

[skypilot]

Originally posted by: dartworth
skypilot

just curious, how many cat5e drops are you putting in each room?

do you have a server or gigabit switch?

I have a couple of servers in the garage (file/general server, media server), as well as my cable modem, router, and a 16-port 10/100 switch.

I've run cat5e to 5 rooms, one run each room. These terminate in the garage on a 24-port cat5e patch panel.

I have a 5-port 10/100 switch in the office, where there are 3 computers and a network color laser printer.

I have a media computer in the living room, bedroom 1, bedroom 2, and the kitchen.

 

[yuppiejr]

1) You're fine, 24" is plenty of space. Just make sure you cross on the perpendicular if you end up having to intersect any power lines.

2) The kink is iffy, was it a "hard" kink (the outer jacket turned white from the strain) or just a small loop? A small loop isn't going to hurt anything if it got straightened out before you continued pulling - but a hard kink should be a re-pull without question. Even if it was kinked and straightened it's probably not going to hurt 10/100 speeds but could be a factor at GigE. Probably worth re-running if you are in doubt, cable is cheap and removing the "ifs" while you're still doing the wire pulling is worthwhile. If you have problems later you'll just have to re-pull and terminate - or worse you may end up with intermittent issues later on.

 

[DainBrammage]

Dude,

If you are pulling the cable . pull two to each box. You will thank me later