Category 5e - Class D - UTP, FTP and S-FTP
In 2000 we saw the ratification and publication of a new standard Category 5e, the 'e' meaning enhanced. Developed jointly by both the ISO and EIA/TIA Category 5e was designed specifically for protocols such as Gigabit Ethernet and other full duplex applications, which will inevitably appear in future years. Although the actual bandwidth - 100Mhz -is identical to Category 5, there were a number of important new performance parameters contained within this specification. These include Equal Level Far End Cross Talk (EL-FEXT) Return Loss and various Power Sum measurements.
Category 5e has been widely adopted throughout the market and is backwards compatible with all previous classes of performance. This means the accidental use of a Category 5 patch cord will not cause your network to crash and you're guaranteed to maintain at least Category 5 performance.
Finally and perhaps most significantly there is a real, available application designed for Category 5e Gigabit Ethernet.
Category 6 - Class E - UTP, FTP and S-FTP
Category 6 standard was ratified in 2002. Category 6 offers bandwidths of 250MHz and provides a truly future proof cabling system that will run Gigabit Ethernet and beyond.
Due to the strict requirements set out in this Class E standard and to enable the performance to be more than doubled from the previous Class D standard, manufacturers have had to radically redesign each element of the structured cabling system to ensure full backward compatibility and interoperability.
Category 7 - Class F - S-FTP
This standard was ratified at the same time as Category 6. This standard is for future-proofing, with the financial institutions and large corporate companies using this offering.
On the right is a cat 7 install we recently implemented for IBM
Fibre Optics
Optical Fibres are fibres of glass, usually about 120 micrometres in diameter, which are used to carry signals in the form of pulses of light over distances up to 50 km without the need for repeaters. These signals may be coded voice communications or computer data.
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