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PHONE WIRING
Phone wiring uses the same 8 wires as Ethernet wiring. However, when
used for phone connectivity, the center two wires are used for line
1. Depending upon which wiring standard is used, the next two wires
adjacent to the center two form Line 2 or Line 3 and the pairs on either side
are used for the 3rd and 4th or 2nd and 4th phone connections. Each of
the lines is carried by one pair of wires, twisted together in a helix pattern.
If one has a four line phone and its cord is plugged into the 8 conductor
RJ45 outlet with four phone lines, that phone can access all four lines by
pressing the appropriate line button 1-4.
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Tip and Ring Or T & R are Telco Designations
For The Two Wires Used For A Single Phone Connection
Many builders of modern homes advertise that they pre-wired the home
with CAT 5 wiring and homeowners often attempt to use this pre-wiring to
run their computer networks, only to run into problems. The reason is that
the CAT 5 pre-wired builder's installation usually consists of running a
single CAT 5 (8 conductor) cable from the central wiring closet to several
outlets in a room or group of rooms in daisy chain fashion. There will be a
number of runs from the wiring closet to various areas of the home but
these are generally daisy chained to multiple outlets in a room or even
groups of rooms.
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the Local Area Network (LAN) cards of two computers are bussed together
(wired in parallel), neither will work.
When the homeowner with a pre-wired CAT 5 home attempts to set up their
home network using these cables, they discover that they can have one
Ethernet connection on a wiring run or up to four different phone lines. But,
in order to use the one cable for both phone and Ethernet service, one
must assure that the phone and Ethernet connections are not shorted
together. If only a single line phone and two wires are used for the phone
service, the other wires can serve the Ethernet application. Be sure to
construct the patch cable from the wall to the client computer so that it
skips the center two connections. The reason is that one cannot be sure of
the termination the Network Card, Hub or Switch will make for these two
wires. If they are shorted to ground, goodbye phone service.
People often think that the center two wires are required for full duplex 100
TX operation but this is untrue, Both 10BaseT and 100 TX require only four
conductions for full operation and both standards skip the center pair of
wires (the phone's line number 1).
One must also assure that the phone connections for shared Phone line 1
and Ethernet use of the CAT 5 cable uses only the center wire
pair. Connecting the other pairs to the phone can result in poor or no
Ethernet connectivity. It's best to construct a phone connection cable
using only the two center wires.
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the same transmit/receive pair pattern as a NIC card. This is used to
"Uplink" one HUB or SWITCH to another HUB or SWITCH. Sometimes a
switch is provided, marked "Uplink", that swaps the Transmit and Receive
lines for one of the RJ45 Jacks so that it can either serve as another client
LAN card connection or to uplink to another Hub or Switch. Another
common practice is to put in two RJ45 receptacles for one of the ports,
with one wired for conventional connection to a NIC card and the other
wired with the transmit/receive lines wired to uplink to another hub or
switch. This 9th port is usually labeled "uplink." If the hub or switch has
nine ports and one is marked "uplink", don't think that there are nine
ports. There are only 8 and if the uplink port is used, the normal port 8
cannot be used.
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CAT 3, 5 and 5E wire is available in reel-in-a-box packaging and on
spools. Reel-in-a-box is very handy for pulling the wire without putting
twists in it. For spooled cable, a cable reel stand or special reel handling
tools are required. With spooled wire, pulling wire is usually a two-person
job. Before reel-in-box packaging became available, broom handles were
sometimes used as an axel to hold wire reels. One person would hold the
broom handle that ran through the center of the wiring spool and the other
would pull and measure the cable. Otherwise, the wire usually ended up in
a tangled mess.
Stranded wire patch cables are generally specified for cable segments
running from a wall jack to a PC and for patch panels. They are more
flexible than solid core wire and are well suited for patch cables. The
rational for using stranded cable is that the constant flexing of patch
cables may wear-out solid core cable and break it. This shouldn't be a real
concern in the average small network. A downside to stranded cable is its
susceptibility to moisture degradation. in general, stranded cables should
not be used for runs of more than about 10 or 20 feet.
Solid core cable is quite suitable for connecting computers directly to other
computers or hubs. They serve this purpose for many home and small
business networks. They are also quite acceptable for use as patch
cables. For notebook computers that are constantly moving around,
consider stranded wire patch cables.
CAT 3, 4, 5 and 5E cables have four twisted pairs of wire for a total of eight
individually insulated wires. Each pair is color coded with one wire having
a solid color (blue, orange, green, or brown) twisted around a second wire
with a white background and a stripe of the same color. The solid colors
may have a white stripe in some cables. Cable colors are commonly
described using the background color followed by the color of the stripe;
e.g., white-orange is a cable with a white background and an orange stripe.
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[ Top | Contents | Previous | Next - Tools ]
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UTP Cable Sheath Stripper. This is one of the neatest tools we've seen
for cutting away the outer sheath of CAT 5 cable; without so much as
nicking the insulation on the inner wire pairs. Just push the wire into the
hole, spin it around once and off comes the cable sheath. This can also
be done using the Universal UTP stripping tool, but this little gadget will
do it quicker and easier.
Punch Tools. This tool is not used for making patch cables but is a must for
professional, between room, wiring using RJ45 Jacks and Patch Panels. These
devices have V-Grove cutting/holding jaws that are designed to cut into the
insulation on CAT 3, 5 or 5E wires and make contact between the wire and the
RJ45 Jack's connector pins, either on the Patch Panels or individual Jacks. The
punch down tool spreads the V-Groove jaws apart and pushes the wire into the
groove. Interchangeable punch blades provide a variety of functions such as
trimming excess wire next to the V-Grooves. Our punch tools are of the highest
quality and a large selection of interchangeable punch tool cutter/dies are
available.
A LITTLE THEORY
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line driver or transmitter is at one end of one of these lines and a line
receiver is at the other end. A (much) simplified schematic for one of these
lines and its transmitter and receiver is shown below:
Data pulses travel down the transmission line but what began as a square
wave of energy is attenuated as it travels along the transmission line. The
line itself has resistance as well as capacitance and inductance. These
cause the corners of the square wave to become rounded and
attenuated. When the length of the cable exceeds design limits for a
particular protocol and frequency, communication becomes erratic and
unreliable. See http://www.e-
insite.net/ednmag/index.asp?layout=article&articleid=CA149133&industryid
=2282 for a more complete discussion.
Using quality CAT 5 Cabling, good wiring practices and no EMI problems,
the maximum recommended transmission line length between nodes for
10BaseT and 100TX is 100 Meters (about 329 feet). For Gigabit wiring using
1000BaseT operating at 350MHz, the limitation is 82 feet.. The primary
characteristic used for communication is is the voltage potential between
the transmission pair and current flowing near the surface of the
wires. This energy also resides in the magnetic field which surrounds the
wires and the electric field between the wires. In other words, the data
pulse forms an electromagnetic wave which is guided by, and travels along
the wires.
A major concern is the transient magnetic fields that surround the wires
and the magnetic fields generated externally by the other transmission
lines in the cable, other network cables, electric motors, fluorescent lights,
telephone and electric lines, lightning, etc. This is known as EMI (Electro-
Magnetic Interference) noise. Strong external magnetic fields couple to
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and induce their own pulses in a transmission line and can literally bury
the Ethernet data pulses. This can and often does prevent reliable data
reception at the other end.
COLOR-CODE STANDARDS
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These are the pin-out diagrams for straight through and crossover UTP
Ethernet cables.
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The TX (transmitter) pins are connected to corresponding RX (receiver)
pins, with plus to plus and minus to minus. A coss-over cable must be
used to connect units with identical interfaces.
When straight-through cables are used to connect Ethernet devices, one of
the two units must, in effect, perform the cross-over function. This is the
reason that straight through cables work directly between hubs or switches
and NIC cards.... the Hub or Switch is designed so that their RJ45 Jacks are
pre-wired with the transmit and receive pairs already reversed.
There are two color-code standards in common use: EIA/TIA 568A and
EIA/TIA 568B. These standards derive from TELCO usage and the pairs
shown correspond to four phone lines, each with its own line pair. This
same wiring was adopted for LAN standard Ethernet RJ45 wiring as
well. RJ45 receptacle wiring for both standards are shown below:
Note: Only pairs 2 and 3 are used for Standard Ethernet wiring. Pairs 1 and 4 can
be used for other purposes such as telephones or even a second separate, complete
Ethernet connection.
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The flat wiring diagram, above, shows the 568A color code standard as the
wiring for the PC side of the cable and the same 568A standard for the Hub,
Switch or Router side of things (assuming that the Hubs, Switches or
Routers are wired internally to perform the cross-over function). The
illustration depicts the wiring arrangement before insertion into an RJ45
connector prior to crimping.
The flat wiring illustration, above, shows cross-over cable wiring using the
568A color code standard as the wiring for the PC side of things and the
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568B standard for wiring to the other PC. Note that in both cases, all eight
wires are shown but only four are actually needed.
Pins 4, 5, 7, and 8 and the blue and brown pairs are not used in either
standard. Contrary to common tech-lore and what you may have read
elsewhere, these pins and wires are not used or required to implement
100BASE-TX duplexing. In fact, they can be used for other purposes such
as a single line phones or even operating two separate Ethernet channels,
provided care is taken to assure that these wire pairs are isolated from the
other wires.
One cannot use flat-untwisted telephone cable for a network cable that
runs any appreciable distance. One must use a pair of twisted wires to
connect a set of transmitter pins to their corresponding receiver pins. One
cannot use a wire from one pair and another wire from a different pair... See
the theory page for the reasons why.
Blue Max designed a RJ45 wiring card so new technicians won't have
trouble remembering how to wire straight-through and cross-over
cables. These are business card size and are printed on both sides of
business card stock. One side shows the 568A standard at both ends (a
regular straight-through cable). There's a fold mark at about 1/3 of the way
across the card. To see the wiring for a cross-over cable, the user simply
folds the card to see the wiring of a cross-over cable with the 568A
standard on one end and the 568B standard on the other.
A sample of the card is shown below, along with a down-loadable .PDF File
of the front and rear of the card along with the front and back of the card in
Microsoft Word. These are designed for printing on Avery Stock 8371.
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Front of Card Back of Card
If you'd like a free card, fill in the order form by clicking below and we'll
mail you one. Or, if you'd like to download the Word file and print your own,
click the download button
KISS
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Note that there are only two unique cable ends in all of the
preceding diagrams. They correspond to the 568A and 568B RJ-
45 jacks. A sample of the A standard is shown to the right.
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connectivity is what counts and from a connectivity standpoint, both are
identical.
Most professionals prefer to use the 568A standard for straight-thru cables
and to start crossover cables with a 568A end. That way, all one needs to
remember is the diagram for the 568A end, that a straight-thru cable has
two of them, and that the green and orange pairs (pairs 2 and 3) are
swapped at the other end of a crossover cable.
An easy way to measure cable is to place marks at 5 and 10 feet from the
cable box or reel. Then, pull the cable off the reel or out of the box to the
desired lengths and cut. For cable lengths between the marks,
estimate the length as a percent of the distance between known
marks. One can get a rough estimate by stepping off the distance,
assuming that a normal human foot with shoes on is about one foot
long. If numerous cable of the same length are needed, make the mark
from the box or reel at the exact distance for the cables being made. For
cables longer than 10 feet, pull the cable out to the ten foot mark and then
go back to the box and repeat this procedure until until the desired cable
length (rounded down to the nearest 10') has been pulled out. The
remainder is then measured out by estimating or "walking" it out using the
"foot" measurement method.
Routing cable is best done before terminating the ends with RJ45
connectors. This way, one doesn't have to worry about snagging the RJ45
connector's locking tabs when running them through walls, floors, holes,
cracks and other small spaces. This is especially true when a cable must
be pulled backwards, since the locking tabs will invariable snag, either
breaking the tab and requiring re-termination or pulling the connector off
entirely. Wiring runs should always follow the wiring rules listed at the end
of this article. It's much easier to do the job right the first time than having
to go back and figure out why the connectivity is poor; after the wire has
been run. The total length of twisted pair wire segments between a PC and
a hub or between two PC's should not exceed 100 Meters (329 feet or about
the length of a football field) for 100BASE-TX or 10BASE-T cable runs. The
maximum length for 1000BaseTX twisted pair is presently 82 feet.
The Tables, below show the minimum and maximums for 10Base2,
10BaseT, 100TX and 1000BaseTX
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10Base2/10BaseT
Thin-net(Coax): 600
Maximum Cable Lengths
Feet
Twisted Pair: 329
Feet
Fiber 3,000: Feet
Maximum Number of
Thin-net: 30
Stations per Cable
Twisted Pair: 2
Fiber: 2
Maximum Number of
Stations per Logical 1024
Network
100TX
Twisted Pair: 329
Maximum Cable Lengths
Feet
Fiber :650 Feet
Maximum Number of
Twisted Pair: 2
Stations per Cable
Fiber: 2
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Maximum Number of
Stations per Logical 1024
Network
1000BaseTX
Twisted Pair: 82 Feet
but 329 feet with
Maximum Cable Lengths
CAT 5E operating at
350 MHz
Fiber: 1640 Feet
Maximum Number of
Twisted Pair: 2
Stations per Cable
Fiber: 2
Maximum Number of
Stations per Logical 1024
Network
Media Dependent
Maximum Overall Length
of Logical Network
Although this page describes making cables that may be hundreds of feet
long, we do not suggest this method for cable runs between rooms. The
professional way to run Ethernet twisted pair wiring is to use a patch panel
and RJ45 wall jacks between rooms and patch cables from the jacks to the
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PC's or hubs/switches/routers. The cables described herein are patch
cables used to connect to the wall jacks or patch panels that terminate
the between room wiring.
Patch panels and RJ45 wall jacks not only provide a finished, professional
look but they provide easy methods of rerouting connectivity, ease of
trouble-shooting problems and a far easier method of terminating long
cable runs. Be sure to use patch panels and wall jacks that have at least
the same, or higher, ratings than the cable being used. One cannot use
CAT 5 rated cable with a CAT 3 rated RJ45 jack or patch panel and expect
to have anything better than CAT 3 performance. See our section on punch
down tools and techniques and RJ45 wall jack and patch panel standards
for punch down RJ45 jacks and panel wiring.
After cutting and pulling the cable, strip one end of the cable with a
specialized stripper tool or a knife and diagonal cutters as detailed
elsewhere. Depending on the stripper used, the cable is placed in the
groove of the blade (left) side of the stripper and the end of the cable is
aligned with the right side of the stripper. The goal is to end up with the
sheath stripped, leaving about 1/2" of flattened evenly cut wires extending
past the cut-back sheath. The stripper should be turned about 1 1/4 turns
and the cable pulled out, leaving behind at least enough wire to end up with
1/2 inch of evenly-cut, flattened cable extending past the cut-back sheath. If
the tool is rotated more than 1 1/4 turns, the wires can be nicked and
require re-cutting. This means leaving 3/4 or 1 inch of exposed wire so that
it can be trimmed evenly after the wires are flattened and arranged in the
right order. When using a knife and diagonal cutters, be careful to slit only
the sheath and not the wire insulation around the twisted pairs. Carefully
slit the cable by an inch or so and neatly trim around the circumference of
the cable with diagonal cutters to remove the jacket.
Nicks are a No-No, so carefully inspect the wires for nicks. If any nicks
are found, cut the end off and start over. Be sure the cutting blade has
been properly adjusted using the screw at the front of the stripper. Cable
diameters and jacket thicknesses vary.
Prepare the pairs for insertion by spreading and arranging them, roughly in
the order of the desired cable end.
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Untwist the pairs and then arrange the wires in the desired
pattern for insertion and crimping to the RJ45 connector. The
ends can be flattened by using the thumb and
forefinger. They can also be flattened by placing them on a
flat surface and using a smooth tool or finger or thumb. Once
the desired pattern of flattened wires is in place, trim the ends
of the wires so they are even with each other and about 1/2"
long from the shortened sheath to the ends of the wires. It is
very important that the un-stripped (un-twisted), evenly-cut
wires be slightly less than 1/2" long. If longer than 1/2" the
ends will "bottom out" at the end of the RJ45 wire channels
and force the jacketed portion of the cable away from the cable clamping
plug. When this happens, the jacket cinching plug will miss the jacket and
the cable will not be securely connected to the RJ45 connector. If the
flattened wires are too short, they will miss the cutting blades that connect
them to the RJ45 connectors. Flatten the cable again after trimming. There
should be little or no space between the wires.
For final pre-crimp inspection, the RJ-45 plug should be held with the
locking clip facing down or away. Push the wire firmly into the
plug. Carefully inspect the assembly before crimping. Once crimped,
problems can be resolved only by cutting off the end and starting
over! Look through the bottom of the plug and make sure the wire on the
far left side has a white background. The wires should alternate light/dark
from left to right. The furthest right wire is always brown. All wires should
end evenly at the front of the plug. The jacket should end just about as
shown in the diagram -- exactly on the line.
The keys to good crimps are to start with good tools and taking care
that the ends of the wires are trimmed evenly. Then, make only one
crimping motion. The last requirement is usually met by the first since
good crimping tools incorporate a ratchet assembly that forces the user to
complete a full crimping motion before the crimp jaws can be returned to
their detent position.
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plastic tab of the RJ45 will simply push against the individual covering of
the the wire pairs and will not firmly hold the wires in place. Be sure to trim
the outer sheath of the CAT 3, 4, 5 or 5E wire just enough to allow the
individual wires to extend to the end of the RJ45, while leaving the outer
cable sheath to extend past the plastic tab used to hold the wiring
assembly in place. See the diagram below:
Trim the outer sheath of the cable as shown. The sheath should be cut
back far enough to allow the wires (with insulation) to be trimmed to even
lengths and extend exactly to the end of the wire channels of the RJ45. Not
too short, but just long enough to press against the end of the channels as
shown. If the sheath and wires don't go into the RJ45 as shown in the side
view, cut the wire back and start over. There is nothing any more
frustrating than a finicky, flaky intermittent wiring connection.
Once the trimming is satisfactory and the individual wires are arranged in
the proper order and flattened out for insertion into the RJ45, push the wire
into the RJ45 and make sure the assembly looks like the side view drawing
shown above (except for the fact that the plastic plunger and connecting
blades will not be pressed down yet). Once satisfied that the assemble is
ready for crimping, insert the RJ45 (with wire in place) into the jaws of the
crimping tool (it should only go in one way). Next, firmly press down on
the handles of the crimping tool, keeping the wire firmly pressed into the
RJ45. If the correct crimping tool is used, one must continue to crimp until
the process is complete. A one way ratchet device assures this.
If a quality tool is used, the ratchet assembly assures that the crimp was
complete. Attempting to make a second crimp is more likely to bend or
flatten pins or crack the plastic housing than it is to improve the crimp. If it
was done correctly with a good tool, once is enough.
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WHAT ACTUALLY TOOK PLACE
The crimping dies pushes two plungers down on the RJ-45 connector. One
forces a plastic plug/wedge onto the cable jacket, firmly clinching it and
preventing it from pulling out of the RJ45 connector. The other seats the
"pins," (each with two teeth at its end) through the insulation and into the
conductors of their respective wires.
If properly done using quality components and tools, the connector will
stay firmly in place even if pulled apart with up to 25 pounds of force. A
firm pull with an average person's bare hands should not separate the
cable and connector. Far better to find out that the wiring assembly won't
hold up before it's put into service than to spend hours tracing a poor
connection once it's in place.
Don't pull too hard when testing the crimp. If the cable is stretched, its
characteristics will change. Just look at the side of the plug and see if it
looks like the diagram and give it a fairly firm tug to make sure it is crimped
well.
After the connectors are attached, if both ends of the cable are within
reach, hold them next to each other with the RJ-45 locking tabs facing
away. Look through the bottom of the RJ45 connector. If the RJ45s are
wired correctly, they are identical in a straight-thru cable and different in a
crossover cable.
Inexpensive test tools are available that claim to test cables. However,
most of these only test the cable in a static, DC voltage environment, not at
10 or 100 MHz. If an operational network is available, test the cable as part
of the network and copy some large files over the cable and check the
results.
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If the cable doesn't work, inspect the ends again and make sure you have
the right cable and that it is plugged into the correct units for the type of
cable.
Hours can be wasted testing a system only to discover that the problem
was that one of the cables was a crossover cable when a straight through
cable was intended.
CABLING RULES
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2. Under no circumstances should cable bends be less than four times the
diameter of the cable. The Cat 5E standard is no bend radius less than 5
inches.
3. When bundling groups of cables together with cable ties (zip ties), keep
the ties snug but not excessively so. Do not over-cinch them. Keep them
snug but don't tighten them so much that any of the cables deform.
4. Keep cables away from devices that can introduce EMI noise. Among
others, these include: copy machines, computer monitors, power supplies,
UPS units, electric heaters, speakers, printers, TV sets, fluorescent lights,
AC power cables, RF antennas or transmission lines, copiers, welding
machines, radio transmitters, X-Ray Machines, un-shielded transformers,
refrigerator compressor motors, dishwashing machine motors, microwave
ovens, telephones, fans, electric garage door openers, elevator motors,
electric ovens, dryers, washing machines, and shop equipment.
5. Power cables and Ethernet twisted pair cables don't co-exist well. Do
not run Ethernet cables parallel to power cables. Yes, we know that this is
a repeat of number 4 but it is worth repeating... DO NOT RUN ETHERNET
CABLES PARALLEL TO POWER CABLES!
6. Do not stretch UTP cables when pulling cable. The maximum force on a
cable should be 25 LBS or less.
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7. Do not use metal staples or insulated metal U shaped cable clips to
secure UTP cables. Use telephone wire hangers, preferably ones with
plastic hangers for the wire.
REFERENCES
David Hess and John Gold; A Practical Guide to Cable Selection, National
Semiconductor Application Note 916, 0ctober 1993
Robert Grover Brown, et al; Lines, Waves, and Antennas, The Transmission of
Electrical Energy, The Ronald Press Company, New York, 1973
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