TIA/EIA 568 Standard: Structured Cabling Specification

Here are the basic elements of a network with summarized recommendations from structured cabling specification 568.

Building Entrance Requirements
These are the specifications for the point at which the cabling enters a building.  These include the type of surge protecting device and the placement of the cabling used to connect in between wiring.

 Equipment Room
This is the existing telecommunications closet. It is the area where communication racks,cables, hardware devices (patch panels, switches, routers, etc.) are located.

It is recommended that the equipment room is located in the middle of the office space. This is to achieve approximately equal length of cables running from the equipment room to work areas and to ensure reliable transmission of data.

Backbone Cabling
It is the cabling between floors and equipment rooms (also extended between buildings). It provides the interconnection between equipment room and building entrance site (including cross connects, patch cords, and terminators).

It is recommended to double or triple the length of backbone cable. This provides for possible expansion and redundant connections.

Backbone cable maximum distance limitation:

• Voice grade 100ohm UTP — 800 meter
• STP data grade 150 ohm — 90 meter
• Multimode 62.5/125um fiber — 2000 meter
• Patch cable — 3 to 6 meter

Spending more money for the backbone cabling is recommended and selecting fiber optic over copper wire is the best choice.

Horizontal Cabling
It it the cable that runs from the workstation outlet to each terminal in the equipment room. It also includes the cable run from the wall outlet to each workstation, cable in equipment closets that connects network devices.

Horizontal cable maximum distance limitation:

• Between workstation outlet to workstation — 3 meter
• Between  equipment in the telecom closet — 6 meter
• Between telecom closet to workstation outlet — 90 meter

* Cable lengths from end to end should not exceed 100m.

It is recommended that horizontal cabling be rated for cat5 use. When installing horizontal cable, it is important to avoid any sources of EMI.

Work Area
The are where computers, telephones, patch cables, adapters, etc. are located.
It is recommended to provide a wall jack for each cat5, STP, and FO cable for future expansion.

 

Source: Structured Cabling System by Nortel Networks

Fiber Optic Pigtails

FO pigtail termination from left to right: SC, LC, ST, FC, MU, MTRJ, E200, DIN

Fiber Optic pigtail is a piece of fiber optic cable terminated at one end with a fiber optic connector.
FO pigtails are used to link the fiber optic cable with a fiber optic equipment, the connector at one end is used to link the equipment, while the other end is melted together with a fiber cable.

The most common types of FO pigtails have a fiber cable diameter of .9mm

Fiber optic pigtail Specifications (example):
Types: single mode, multimode
Terminations: FC, SC, ST, MU, LC, D4, DIN, E2000, MT-RJ, MPO, SMA, E2000, FDDI, and ESCON
Insertion Loss (dB): less than 0.2 (PC and UPC)
Exchangeability: less than 0.2 dB
Tensile Strength: less than 0.2 dB (0 to15 kgf)
Temp. Range: (- 40 to +80 degree centigrade)

Network Socket

What's inside a Network Socket?

Back to Basic!

We usually look for a Network Socket every time we need a “wired” Internet Connection (most are familiar with the name Internet Socket).

Network Sockets is the end point in a communication across a network, that’s what Wikipedia says.

I use to wire twisted pair cables, the EIA/TIA 568A or B Standard (the WoOWbBWgGWbrBr stuff!) but never I had experience wiring an Ethernet socket. How would the crimped cable work if there’s no network socket installed? Unless cables are directly connected to routers and switches! I saw this easy to follow instruction on ‘How to Wire an Ethernet Socket’. http://www.handymanhowto.com/2009/01/19/how-to-install-an-ethernet-jack-for-a-home-network/. The order of wires is basically  the same but the method of wiring them is different. It is really not an easy or should I mean a fast-to-do job, specially the cabling part. The technicians within my team usually do this network socket stuff. Well, If in case you want to wire a personal network socket, check the link and I hope it helps. 😉