Network Cables & Stuff

In the network you will commonly find three types of cables used these are the, coaxial cable, fiber optic and twisted pair.


Thick Coaxial CableThis type cable is usually yellow in color and used in what is called thicknets, and has two conductors. This coax can be used in 500-meter lengths. The cable itself is made up of a solid center wire with a braided metal shield and plastic sheathing protecting the rest of the wire.

Thin Coaxial CableAs with the thick coaxial cable is used in thicknets the thin version is used in thinnets. This type cable is also used called or referred to as RG-58. The cable is really just a cheaper version of the thick cable.

Fiber Optic CableAs we all know fiber optics are pretty darn cool and not cheap. This cable is smaller and can carry a vast amount of information fast and over long distances.

Twisted Pair CablesThese come in two flavors of unshielded and shielded.

Unshielded Twisted Pair (UTP)This is the most popular form of cables in the network and the cheapest form that you can go with. The UTP has four pairs of wires and all inside plastic sheathing. The biggest reason that we call it Twisted Pair is to protect the wires from interference from themselves. Each wire is only protected with a thin plastic sheath.

Shielded Twisted Pair (STP)Is more common in high-speed networks. The biggest difference you will see in the UTP and STP is that the STP use’s metallic shield wrapping to protect the wire from interference.-Something else to note about these cables is that they are defined in numbers also. The bigger the number the better the protection from interference. Most networks should go with no less than a CAT 3 and CAT 5 is most recommended.-Now you know about cables we need to know about connectors. This is pretty important and you will most likely need the RJ-45 connector. This is the cousin of the phone jack connector and looks real similar with the exception that the RJ-45 is bigger. Most commonly your connector are in two flavors and this is BNC (Bayonet Naur Connector) used in thicknets and the RJ-45 used in smaller networks using UTP/STP.