What kind of cable for 2.5GB networking?

[MarcLister]

I have recently bought a house and am getting the loft converted so I can work in there. There is currently no network cabling to the loft so I'm getting that taken care as part of the loft work.

In order to future proof my potential network what kind of cable should I be looking at for cabling that will support 2.5GB speeds? My new PC will have a motherboard with a 2.5GB NIC and I will probably build a NAS in the near future with a 2.5GB NIC too so I want to make sure the network cabling I get will support 2.5GB speeds.

Is Cat5e OK or should I go for Cat6a? The house is a small 1 bedroom place and I don't think the distance from the living room, where the broadband router will be situated, to the loft is more than 7-8 meters so I was thinking of getting a 100m roll of Cat6a U/FTP cable made by Connectix and get 3-4 ports up in the loft for future expansion such as placing a NAS there etc plus a Wifi point.

 

[Firegod]

I think Cat6a would be fine. Interwebz says Cat6a supports 10GB speeds over 100m runs. If Cat7 is available maybes go for that as it supports a higher frequency? I use that around the house just as it wasn't really much more money and still found it flexible enough (just). Don't try Cat8. I bought a few short runs and you need arms like Arnie to bend it. And no I don't need Cat8 but I thought I'd see what it was like haha.

 

[bremen1874]

Isn't part of the point of 2.5GbE that it'll work over existing Cat5e cabling where 10GbE won't (or is a bit of an unknown)? It'll certainly work over Cat6 as that supports 10GbE at reasonable distances (certainly far beyond the distances the OP is talking about).

Using shielded cable is just making your life hard for no good reason. Decent quality Cat6 UTP will be more than adequate.

Most Cat7 appears to be bought by people that fell for the irrelevant hype on Amazon listings. It has no place in a normal domestic (or most commercial) networks.

 

[MarcLister]

I can't find any normal Cat6 or Cat6a in a 100m reel that isn't shielded only in 305m reels which is way more than I need. The Cat6a 100m reel I've found is one where each pair of strands is wrapped in foil. If I want unshielded I have to pay 3-4 times more to get the 305m reels than the 100m. I probably won't use all of the 100m and definitely wouldn't use more than 35-40% of a 305m reel so I'll have to get the Cat6a 100m with foil shielding on each pair.

Thanks for your advice.

 

[robj20]

You haven't looked far have you even Screwfix sell, 100m unshielded.
As do a main OCUK competitor in Bolton.

 

[bremen1874]

Cable Monkey, Comms Express and Kenable will all sell you a 100m length of Cat6 UTP for a reasonable cost.

Also, Screwfix if you have one local.

 

[Caged]

I'd always run Cat6 now, the extra expense and termination of Cat6A puts it outside of "well you might as well run that" territory. And as above, Screwfix will do you 100m of Cat6 for £32.

 

[Sparx]

Here you go...

https://www.kenable.co.uk/en/networ...preca-reel-box-100m-003807-5055383438075.html

 

[Cyber-Mav]

Cat6 be fine and cheap enough. Avoid cca if using poe stuff

 

[JohnStewart]

I've recently wired my house with Ethernet. You can get 100m of U/FTP solid core Cat6a from the likes of Cable Monkey etc. Use solid core for running to the loft etc, instead of stranded which can be a nightmare to terminate reliably.

The cost difference between Cat 5e and Cat 6a is almost negligible for a typical house and I found some Cat 6 stuff was the same price or less that 5e!

I bought deep (45mm) some surface mount socket boxes, screwed them onto a flat surface in the loft, and terminated the cables there using tool-less keystone jacks, twin port faceplates and purchased cat6a patch leads (under £2 each) to connect to an old 8 port 1G switch. The metal cat6a keystone jacks are only £2 something each and will save you hours of time crimping, testing (and re-terminating) connections. In each of the rooms, I used a drywall box, tool-less keystone jacks and single or twin port faceplates.

The next stage of the project will be to swap out the old unmanaged 1G switch with a managed one with some 2.5G and 10G ports, and install a 10G capable NAS.

 

[Mr.Shabz]

Cat6.
This will give you more than what you need currently speed wise, while covering any future upgrades to end devices/switches.
I'd run more points now while you can also, at least on the path of the cable run from loft to lounge, even if just for redundancy.
Cat6 is good for 10Gb up to ~50/55M.

 

[Avalon]

Given 5e (if properly terminated) is spec’d to do 10Gb upto 45 meters, pretty much anything you can buy (that isn’t CCA or terminated with your teeth), will do 2.5Gbit over the kind of distances usually found in a domestic install.

 

[bremen1874]

Given 5e (if properly terminated) is spec’d to do 10Gb upto 45 meters

Is it? Not trolling, just interested.

I'm sure it's possible to run 10GbE over Cat5e at some distance but haven't had the opportunity to try it for myself, or ever seen any documentation or practical test results I'd trust. As Cat6 is only rated to 55m, 45m for Cat5e seems a bit optimistic (happy to be educated).

 

[Armageus]

Is it? Not trolling, just interested.

I'm sure it's possible to run 10GbE over Cat5e at some distance but haven't had the opportunity to try it for myself, or ever seen any documentation or practical test results I'd trust. As Cat6 is only rated to 55m, 45m for Cat5e seems a bit optimistic (happy to be educated).

Can't say with regards to 10gb but cat5e is supposed to be good for 5gb at 100m in most cases

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2.5GBASE-T_and_5GBASE-T

 

[Avalon]

Is it? Not trolling, just interested.

I'm sure it's possible to run 10GbE over Cat5e at some distance but haven't had the opportunity to try it for myself, or ever seen any documentation or practical test results I'd trust. As Cat6 is only rated to 55m, 45m for Cat5e seems a bit optimistic (happy to be educated).

A lot of it depends on the quality of the cable and termination and in some cases what’s printed on it, the difference between decent 5e and 6 was minimal in terms of suggested maximum length for 10Gb, you had to go to 6a before you got a significant increase, but in a domestic install you are unlikely to need to see that sort of run.

 

[bremen1874]

I have managed to find other references to 10GbE over Cat5e at up to 45m, but not where they're getting that figure from.

Decent Cat5e does tend to have specs that far exceed what's required for it to be compliant. I have no problem believing that Cat5e will support 10GbE, but would like to know the source for the 45m figure.

Given the option, I'd still install Cat5e in preference to Cat6 as it's cheaper to buy and quicker/easier to install. If Cat5e really does support 10GbE at virtually the same distances as Cat6 then why bother with Cat6 at all (especially with the mainly small domestic installs discussed on this forum)? How does almost always recommending Cat6 in preference to Cat5e actually benefit the end-user?

 

[RandomMonkeH]

I'd be very surprised if Cat5e can't handle it.

 

[robj20]

It's a job you want to do once, so for that reason and peace of mind id only use cat6.
While cat5e may be rated which I don't think it is for 45m don't forget that would be in an ideal installation ie no dodgy bend radius not next to mains cable, that tends to be unavoidable in a domestic install. Cat6 will let you get away with a bit more.

I have no doubt cat5e will do 10gb but at what distance and how reliably I don't know.

 

[Avalon]

I’ve run 5e between a pair of x520’s (or 540’s?) without issue to about half the suggested maximum distance previously, I don’t remember the exact throughput, but if it was managing less than 5Gbit, I would have dug into it as the point was to be faster than dumping it to an AHCI SATA SSD and using sneaker net.

 

[MarcLister]

Whoa! Where did all these replies come from?!

I got the cable from Cable Monkey, delivered today actually. 100m Cat6a for £52.