Where to get good Patch cables

[drinkingbird]

I am happy with the Altex Electronics CAT6 patch cable so I am going to buy a few more short ones.

Local PC shop, are they making their own cables or buying them wholesale? If their own, do they have flukes for full testing? If wholesale, they're basically just Monoprice cables. Next batch may or may not be as good as the ones you got before.

There are basically 3 manufacturers of cables
-The one that supplies 90% of the cables out there like Monoprice, Amazon Basics, Belkin, Best Buy, many others, as well as all the no-name brands out there. The purchaser can specify certain specs and pay more for higher quality, but none are individually tested and there will be bad ones from time to time. Yes there is actually more than one supplier but they're all basically the same thing, in the same region, employing the same ultra low wage workers and using the same cheap cable and ends.
-The ones that make premium, individually swept cables for enterprise
-Yourself, if you make your own.

 

[sfx2000]

LOL - pick up a Monoprice/Amazon Basics 30 meters or less cable that meets CAT5 - you're good to go...

Ars prepares to put “audiophile” Ethernet cables to the test in Las Vegas

We’ve partnered with James Randi’s foundation to prove or debunk magic cables.

arstechnica.com

Seriously folks, better things to do here...

 

[coxhaus]

I had a fluke at my last job and I tested all my home cables as well as work troubleshooting. I do miss it as I am running blind now since I am retired.
How do identify if the cable is Monoprice? Just because you think it is does not make it so. Altec may have better specs for their cables, who knows. At least they are labeled CAT6.

 

[drinkingbird]

I had a fluke at my last job and I tested all my home cables as well as work troubleshooting. I do miss it as I am running blind now since I am retired.
How do identify if the cable is Monoprice? Just because you think it is does not make it so. Altec may have better specs for their cables, who knows. At least they are labeled CAT6.

Monoprice does not make anything. They contract someone to put their name on the cables, same as 1000 other companies who pay that exact same manufacturer to do the same thing.

There are a limited number of manufacturers of bulk cable, and a limited number of companies that assemble patch cords. Everything else is just white labeling.

You don't need a fluke, just two PCs that are capable of doing iperf at 1 gig, I have two older laptops that can do it and I very often test cable runs with them). While it won't do a frequency test or report errors/drops (actually newer versions I believe can do some error reporting, not positive) you can use a NIC that supports error counters or put a switch in the path to detect errors. But if you're able to push 950M over a 1 gig connection, the cable is good and very unlikely there are any errors or drops. If I really want to stress test a cable I'll run 10 sequential 60 second tests in each direction, but that's pretty overkill. A few in each direction (30 or 60 seconds is better than the default 10), or if your computers can handle it, simultaneous in both directions, is plenty.

 

[drinkingbird]

LOL - pick up a Monoprice/Amazon Basics 30 meters or less cable that meets CAT5 - you're good to go...

Ars prepares to put “audiophile” Ethernet cables to the test in Las Vegas

We’ve partnered with James Randi’s foundation to prove or debunk magic cables.

arstechnica.com

Seriously folks, better things to do here...

I'd go 5e just to be safe. Sure at 30M 5 can easily do 1 GIG, but in reality 5 is probably hard to find and more expensive anyway. Generic 5e is probably about equivalent to 5, 6 equivalent to 5e, etc.

In fairness, ethernet is heavily used in pro audio now. While "audiophile" is in most cases a BS term, shielding and durability is incredibly important in that environment, so there is some validity to having specially patch cords for that industry. Now when they start saying that 100% pure oxygen free copper provides superior sound quality, that may have been true for analog, but a total load of crap for digital. As long as it passes the 1s and 0s without loss, it could be made of aluminum coated plastic and sound the same.

Just like gold plated TOSLINK cables, always made me laugh that people got sucked into that one. Its plastic and glass you morons.

Have been into audio (home, car, and pro) for 30 years, some of the stuff sold to rich people is hilarious. Pure silver speaker wire was a great one, no human ear with the exception of maybe a few on the planet (who are probably lying) could tell the difference between that and good OFC, and if you bent it more than a few times it started to break internally and actually sound worse. But at around $50 per foot, great profit margin. I was friends with several people that worked at the high end audio stores and saw all the behind the scenes stuff.

The best sounding speaker wire (in many people's opinion) is made of many braided pairs of decent pure copper solid cat 5 or 5e cable. If you're willing to invest the time and a little bit of money on bulk cable, you can make some amazing speaker wires for dirt cheap. Some people also swear by using solid "mains cable" - aka Romex electrical wire that normally runs in your walls. Marketing and reality are often very different.

 

[coxhaus]

I have made hundreds of cables over the years. It is too easy to get a bad crimp without having a Fluke to test it. I had a Paladin crimper at work. I don't want to buy all the stuff for the little bit I need at home nowadays.

I still have some AT&T CAT5 patch cables I made 30 years ago.

I think the new CAT6 cables are better made than the new CAT5e cables now. I have had some bad luck with some CAT5e cables I installed a few years ago so I quit buying CAT5e cables and I buy CAT6. I still have some good old CAT5e cables from years ago.

If you are going to use solid wire for in walls then you need different terminators than for twisted patch cables. Most of the time you use female punch down panels or individual female wall connectors any way not male for solid cable.

 

[L&LD]

LOL - pick up a Monoprice/Amazon Basics 30 meters or less cable that meets CAT5 - you're good to go...

Ars prepares to put “audiophile” Ethernet cables to the test in Las Vegas

We’ve partnered with James Randi’s foundation to prove or debunk magic cables.

arstechnica.com

Seriously folks, better things to do here...

Where's the actual testing? This article just states what is to happen.

Also, reading that first link (within the link above), the logic of why the cable is not what it claims is flawed.

You don't use theory to 'prove' how/why something doesn't work, you observe it in action, to prove the theory.

I've seen (and heard) more than a few things that known science/'experts' can't explain. Doesn't mean that what I experienced should be discounted, dismissed, or ridiculed.

I'd like to see the full testing, but given the tone of the article, advertising it on the 'net, and it being held in Las Vegas, I can guess what the conclusions are already.

 

[drinkingbird]

I have made hundreds of cables over the years. It is too easy to get a bad crimp without having a Fluke to test it. I had a Paladin crimper at work. I don't want to buy all the stuff for the little bit I need at home nowadays.

I still have some AT&T CAT5 patch cables I made 30 years ago.

I think the new CAT6 cables are better made than the new CAT5e cables now. I have had some bad luck with some CAT5e cables I installed a few years ago so I quit buying CAT5e cables and I buy CAT6. I still have some good old CAT5e cables from years ago.

If you are going to use solid wire for in walls then you need different terminators than for twisted patch cables. Most of the time you use female punch down panels or individual female wall connectors any way not male for solid cable.

RJ45 crimps will work on either stranded or solid. 110 block only works with solid, if you want stranded you have to crimp an RJ45 and use a keystone RJ45 coupler. There are supposedly punchdowns that work with stranded but I've never trusted them, the connection is nowhere near as tight. Nobody should be running stranded in wall anyway.

CAT6 and up should use different RJ45 connectors with the pins staggered to help mitigate crosstalk, but I've seen plenty of CAT6 patches with the straight CAT5e ends on them and they work fine. At shorter distances, it isn't going to matter.

I have spools of high quality cat6A for in wall use but crimping ends requires a special crimper and ends and it is solid cable, so not good for patches anyway. I have some no-name brand ones off Amazon from years ago that all tested perfectly and work great. Plus several bags of Cat5e patches left over from an office install. They both test perfect at 1 gig so I use whichever color/length I need for the particular connection. Honestly some of the Amazon Basics cables I've seen are made really well, and some are about the same quality as Monoprice. Honestly in home use, I've yet to find a bad patch cable (but I always buy ones with correct gauge/specs). For work, it happens from time to time, even with high quality enterprise grade patches, often due to someone yanking it or bending it too hard etc.

Like I said, you do not need anything other than two PCs with iperf to test your cables or in wall wiring. If it can push ~95% bandwidth you're good. If there are errors, drops, interference, etc the throughput will be significantly lower.

 

[drinkingbird]

Where's the actual testing? This article just states what is to happen.

Also, reading that first link (within the link above), the logic of why the cable is not what it claims is flawed.

You don't use theory to 'prove' how/why something doesn't work, you observe it in action, to prove the theory.

I've seen (and heard) more than a few things that known science/'experts' can't explain. Doesn't mean that what I experienced should be discounted, dismissed, or ridiculed.

I'd like to see the full testing, but given the tone of the article, advertising it on the 'net, and it being held in Las Vegas, I can guess what the conclusions are already.

I forget when exactly it was but at some point ARS went from valid testing to promoting whatever has an amazon referral link. I take all their stuff with a grain of salt these days. Same with Wirecutter ever since NY Times bought them. Basically if a review or article has links to Amazon in it, it is suspect in my mind.

Pro audio ethernet are thick, substantial, rugged, and fully shielded. They are meant to be trampled, bent, abused, etc. For home use, the only ethernet is basically HDMI. Home audio is gradually moving to fully uncompressed HD Audio over HDMI, and even the generic HDMI that the ISP gives you carry 4K with HD Audio just fine.

 

[sfx2000]

CAT6 and up should use different RJ45 connectors with the pins staggered to help mitigate crosstalk

Please think about that statement - RJ45 is a reference standard, so how can they be any different.

Come on, seriously...

 

[sfx2000]

I have made hundreds of cables over the years. It is too easy to get a bad crimp without having a Fluke to test it. I had a Paladin crimper at work. I don't want to buy all the stuff for the little bit I need at home nowadays.

Yep - if one has a decent crimper, buys good bulk material, and has the skills/knowledge/time...

Beldin CAT5e or CAT6 bulk spool is likely enough to last a lifetime

Years ago I rewired the house, for both POTS and ethernet, and that was with Beldin - it's been fine - quality parts end to end...

During that same cable pull project, I did a remove and replace on the old CATV with new RG58, which greatly improve picture quality in the HDTV age - of course, DirecTV uses RG6, so when that got installed, ended of having to do a couple of runs there - RG6 is 75 ohm impedence, RG58 is 50 ohm...

 

[ColinTaylor]

Please think about that statement - RJ45 is a reference standard, so how can they be any different.

Come on, seriously...

I think it's clear that he was referring to the staggered load bars and IDC connectors used in some Cat6/Cat6A 8P8C (RJ45) connectors to accommodate thicker wires and reduce crosstalk.

 

[coxhaus]

RJ45 crimps will work on either stranded or solid. 110 block only works with solid, if you want stranded you have to crimp an RJ45 and use a keystone RJ45 coupler. There are supposedly punchdowns that work with stranded but I've never trusted them, the connection is nowhere near as tight. Nobody should be running stranded in wall anyway.

I can tell you haven't done much of this. 110 blocks are for phones and will not pass CAT5e certification. They will work on 10 meg CAT3. I only mean they will pass certification for 10 meg the 110 blocks are all tied together for phones not ethernet. There is too much wire unraveled for a 110 punch down block to pass certification for 100 meg and don't even think about 1 gig or 10 gig.

 

[drinkingbird]

Please think about that statement - RJ45 is a reference standard, so how can they be any different.

Come on, seriously...

If you're not familiar, you can just google it. Fits in the same plug, and in most cases the same crimper will work, but the wires inside are staggered to reduce crosstalk.

 

[drinkingbird]

I can tell you haven't done much of this. 110 blocks are for phones and will not pass CAT5e certification. They will work on 10 meg CAT3. I only mean they will pass certification for 10 meg the 110 blocks are all tied together for phones not ethernet. There is too much wire unraveled for a 110 punch down block to pass certification for 100 meg and don't even think about 1 gig or 10 gig.

Seriously? I've been doing this for 25 years.

110 is for ethernet and is good for up to CAT6. 66 is for phone and probably won't even handle 10 megs reliably.

Done correctly it can also be used for Cat6E/10G however most opt to use pass through style patch panels/keystone jacks as it is very sensitive to being done perfectly.

Do your own research before calling people out.

 

[coxhaus]

110 punch down blocks are used for IDF and MDF phone blocks. Yea I guess I was thinking of 66 blocks.

110 Punch Down Block: What's It, How to Use It?

110 punch down block is common in telecom closet. Here covers what is 110 punch down block & wiring diagram, and discuss how to punch down 110 block.

www.fiber-optic-transceiver-module.com

 

[ColinTaylor]

110 punch down blocks are used for IDF and MDF phone blocks not Ethernet.

A 10 second internet search would have revealed that 110 blocks are also used for Ethernet. For example,

110 block - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

https://www.fs.com/uk/products/73402.html

 

[drinkingbird]

110 punch down blocks are used for IDF and MDF phone blocks. Yea I guess I was thinking of 66 blocks.

110 Punch Down Block: What's It, How to Use It?

110 punch down block is common in telecom closet. Here covers what is 110 punch down block & wiring diagram, and discuss how to punch down 110 block.

www.fiber-optic-transceiver-module.com

As long as it is solid wire, obviously it will work for phone, heck you can lightly twist two wires together and it will work for phone. Stranded you have to use 66 (or risk a failure down the road with 110). 66 block also isn't all tied together, you either have to buy one specifically with a bus for that or do it yourself. The standard 66 block is wired similar to 110 block with each pair of punchdowns linked. But yeah, I'm the one that hasn't done much of this.

 

[follower]

World best quality Cable Market Leaders. They produce a lot of ODM and OEM cables. They also have their own brands. I use some of them. They are so great.
But I just feel great.

 

[EPR]

If you're not familiar, you can just google it. Fits in the same plug, and in most cases the same crimper will work, but the wires inside are staggered to reduce crosstalk.

My BB Essentials blue color CAT 6 cables look nothing like that. There are only 2 staggered. Green one and White one next to Orange.