RJ-45 and Cat-5

[going5hole]

Are these cables the same thing? If not, what are the differences between the two. Thanks.

 

[Viper0329]

RJ-45 is the connector placed on the end of Cat-5 cable to make a standard ethernet cable.

 

[MedicBob]

Viper got it.

CAT-5 is the cable and the name "cat-5" is the standard it will meet. There are also CAT-3, CAT-5E, and CAT-6 cables. Basically 5, and 5e are for 10/100 networks, cat-3 for phone, and cat-6 for 10/100/1000 networks. They can carry different amounts of data.

RJ-45 is the connector, 8 pin, that can only connect to a RJ-45 port. This is the most common connctor for network cables

 

[John]

In addition Cat5e is also ideal for gigabit (1000) ethernet.

 

[SpeedFreak03]

Yeah viper is right. RJ-45 connectors are crimped onto Cat-5 cables. You could also put RJ-3 (i think, anyway its the phone line connector) onto Cat-5 cables. Like I had a nice spool of Cat5 left over from a job, and I needed a 25 foot telephone cable (to run under carpet for a fax machine), so I just crimped the RJ-3 (or w/e) connector to it.

-Josh

 

[going5hole]

Thanks much to everyone.

 

[ScottMac]

Actually, Cat3 is the spec for 10BASE-T.

Cat4 was most often used for 16 Meg Token Ring
Cat 5 is the least acceptable spec for 100BASE-T
Cat5e is recommended / spec for Gig-E over copper (depending on the generation of the equipment)
Cat6 is not "required" yet for any of the networking technologies, but provide more headroom and better specs in general.

All work fine for terminals, serial (RS232, RS485, etc.), baseband video, broadband video, line audio, alarms, T1 (limited distance), DDS, and pretty much any other use, with the appropriate adapter.

Coax is still better cable, in general, but UTP is less expensive and usually easier to deal with.
Type 1 IBM cabling is still better cabling, but is definately more expensive, more of a pain to terminate properly (by virtue of its shield), and much harder to find these days.

Phones can run on any of the above, or unrated cabling (not Category-Rated) like DIW.

FWIW

Scott