Best Cat5 cable for unknown route

the_syco

Hey all,
Moved into a new apartment. Shall be gaming from my room, and as we don't have access to the fusebox, I'm going to assume that there's one for the entire building. Thus, homeplug network wouldn't be that secure.

So, I'm going to go the Cat5 route. Shall be using a cable at least 16.6 meters (54'ish feet) long, and it'll have to be white (easier to hide it against a white roof at the short exposed section). The ceiling has these things on it;



so plan to put it up one corner, feed it along, and have it come out near the router, pin it to the roof for it's final bit, and then down behind some piping.

Now, not entirey sure what the setup in the part above said ceiling is like, but between me and the room that the router is in, there's a bathroom. If I l'm unable to feed it over the bathroom (ceiling blocks may be glused down there), I'll feed the cable around the bathroom.

Thus, I'll be getting a 100 foot long cable. Am in Toronto, so they seem to be around the $16 mark.

But before I buy said cable, should I be looking for any sort in particular? Is there any cable that I should look at to minimize interferance by nearby electical cables?

ED E

You'd be crazy to buy plain old Cat5 at this point, Cat5e is the same price but higher rated. You can go to CAT6 for a smallish premium. Terminate it well and you should be just fine. Its rated for 1000Mb at 328ft/100m so even in a noisy enough environment 16m is dandy.


Regarding homeplugs, performance would probably be poor if you've not got an isolated ring main but security should be OK as the pairing process(NB: Pairing NOT cloning) creates an AES128 key which is trends towards impossible to brute force (We're talking more energy than we have power stations in the world kinda figures). Whether firmware implementations are perfect is another matter but they are no doubt better than average wireless routers with WPS on by default.

the_syco

Going for Cat6. How unflexible would shielded be, and would shielded be needed if the network cable will probably run over electrical cabling (used for LED lights)?

http://www.staples.ca/en/Startech-Com-Cat6-Patch-Cable-with-Snagless-RJ45-Connectors-75-Ft-White/product_1510443_2-CA_1_20001
or
http://www.staples.ca/en/C2G-Cat6-Snagless-UTP-Unshielded-Network-Patch-Cable-30-4m-100-White/product_63458_2-CA_1_20001

ED E

Cat6 is unsheilded, its Cat6A thats shielded. No need for 6A at all.

Running past a few lights is not a problem, my Cat5(not E) is bundled with mains to an out building and still manages 1G no problem. At 10G you might have issues but 10G kit is still total overkill for residential.

BTW you should probably buy a spool and terminate it yourself. A lot easier to cleanly run it without jacks on either end. Tool hurts the budget if you don't own one though: http://www.staples.ca/en/HVTools-Crimping-Network-Tool-for-RJ45-11-x-4-x-1-Black/product_1908757_2-CA_1_20001

excollier

You can buy shielded Cat 6. You will need shielded if you are close to mains cable - low smoke stuff too.

the_syco

ED E wrote: »

BTW you should probably buy a spool and terminate it yourself. A lot easier to cleanly run it without jacks on either end. Tool hurts the budget if you don't own one though: http://www.staples.ca/en/HVTools-Crimping-Network-Tool-for-RJ45-11-x-4-x-1-Black/product_1908757_2-CA_1_20001

Considering 75 foot (not "not shielded", so possibly shielded?) is only $50'ish (prices here often don't include tax), I may put off the crimp tool until later, and leave any excess line in my room until then.

Cuddlesworth

excollier wrote: »

You can buy shielded Cat 6. You will need shielded if you are close to mains cable - low smoke stuff too.

You don't need shielded cable in a house environment or "best practises" when laying it. There is a huge difference between power cables in a office of 200 people versus power cables running a couple of home appliances. The cables going through my attic and walls are everywhere and I can get 960-980 out of all of them.

excollier

OK then OP just get Cat 5e UTP and work away.

blackbox

A bit harder to run, but saves the grief and cost of terminating:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/GizzmoHeaven-Enhanced-Ethernet-Business-Networking/dp/B00N4U8JCY/ref=sr_1_15?s=computers&ie=UTF8&qid=1466451722&sr=1-15&keywords=cat5e+ethernet+cable+20m

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