Category 5 or Category 6 ?

"Category six" refers to six types of unshielded twisted pair

The parameters of the six types of unshielded twisted pair have been greatly improved, and the bandwidth has been extended to 250MHz or higher. Category 6 Double

The twisted pair has a certain difference in appearance and structure from the Category 5 or Super Category 5 twisted pair, not only an insulating cross frame is added, but the four pairs of twisted pairs are placed in the four grooves of the cross frame respectively. inside, and the diameter of the cable is also thicker.

The cross skeleton in the center of the cable rotates with the change of length, and the four pairs of twisted pairs are stuck in the grooves of the skeleton to maintain the relative position of the four pairs of twisted pairs and improve the balance characteristics and crosstalk attenuation of the cable. In addition, it is ensured that the balanced structure of the cable is not damaged during installation. The bare copper wire diameter of Category 6 unshielded twisted pair is 0.57mm (wire gauge is 23AWG), the diameter of the insulated wire is 1.02mm, and the diameter of the UTP cable is 6.53mm.

According to the different electrical performance, twisted pair can be divided into three types, five types, super five types, six types and seven types of twisted pairs. The prices of different types of twisted pair cables are quite different or even disparate, and the scope of application is also very different.

Except that the traditional voice system still uses Category 3 twisted pair, the network wiring basically uses Category 5e or Category 6 unshielded twisted pair. Although the Category 5 unshielded twisted pair can still support 1000Base-T, it has gradually faded out of the cabling market because the price is almost the same as that of the Super Category 5 unshielded twisted pair.

Although the price of Category 6 unshielded twisted pair is relatively high, it is slowly becoming the new favorite of integrated cabling because it has very good compatibility with the Category 5e cabling system and can support 1000Base-T very well. Category 7 shielded twisted pair is a brand-new wiring system. Although it has excellent performance, it is expensive. The construction is complicated and there are few products to choose from, so it is rarely used in wiring engineering.

Category 6 unshielded twisted pair can support Gigabit Ethernet very well and achieve a transmission distance of 100m. Therefore, the Category 6 cabling system is widely used for the cabling of the sub-server room, as well as the horizontal cabling that retains the ability to upgrade to Gigabit Ethernet.