Cat6 vs Cat5? Ideas

[mmphoneman]

I was wondering if using Cat 6 instead of Cat 5 would benefit me. I have FTTH, which is wired about 50ft from router(ASUS RT-N65R) to fiber board. Currently provisioned for 30M/10M. Any thoughts?

 

[bill001g]

Assuming you actually mean cat5e you will see no difference at all. Even the older cat5 could run 100m which is well beyond your internet connection.

Both cat5e and cat6 cable can both run 1g. Cat6 cable is pretty much a scam by cable vendors, the cable was invented to run gig over 2 pair. Since the equipment manufactures decided they wanted to support existing cat5e cable they decided to use all 4 pair. So now the cable manufacture has no market for their cable since it is almost impossible to find equipment that will run gig over 2 pair. They try to hype it up as being faster which technically it is but forget to mention that it does no good when the port in the equipment does not support it and only runs at the cat5e specifications.

 

[mmphoneman]

Best answer selected by mmphoneman.

 

[cables4sure]

Agree with the answer given by bill001g.. There is hardly much difference between cat5 and cat6. Just Cat 6 has a bit better transmission abilities as compared to Cat 5e - so there would be less network I/O errors

 

[terinate]

There is another thing to remember about Cat6 vs Cat5e- and that is the potential RF shielding difference. Cat6 specifications provides significantly lower interference or near end crosstalk (NEXT) in the transmission. in plain english, you get less RF interference in Cat6. This is however a loaded statment because if there is no external RF in your area (you live in the middle of nowhere as an isolationist), then better shielding is a mute point. If you have access to an RF analyser, that would be ideal, but they are costly so having them is a privlage, so use the good ol' common sense rule: If you are in an urban enviroment I would go with Cat6. There is alot of RF interference to be had in cities, and I wonder if half the data problems out there arn't from RF interference NOT off the system, but in the house on cat5 lines from cell phone towers, radio towers, and about 1000 other things that emit RF. Better shielding is more important than data standard because what good is your data if it's getting fouled by RF interference. I prefer to use shielded Cat6. I know it's over kill in many ways, but I also know that if I have a network problem, it's likely due to hardware failure and not RF interference on Cat5 lines because I prefer to use shielded Cat6 so interference is highly unlikely. You see, as more and more goes wireless, we will see more problems with RF interference. There will be more data problems from noise on the Cat5 lines. There is not infinite wireless bandwidth- It's pretty crowded already so knowing that, I take overkill precautions now to save myself a headach later. Bandwidth is not the real advantage with Cat6 (not yet anyway), but rather the better shielding from potential inductance on the wire. In short, spend a couple dollars more and just get good shielded Cat6. If you ever have a wierd data problem that can't be explained and it's just inductance of RF onto your Cat5 line, you will tear your hair out trying to find it, spend many hours trying to fix it, and most likely start to buy equipment thinking it's bad, when all it would take to fix it would be better shielding on yout ethernet wires!

 

[elky]

Cat 5e and cat 6 both support gigabit transfer speeds but cat 6 offers more bandwidth.

Were cat 5e is tested to 100mhz cat 6 is rated to 200mhz but tested to 250mhz so leaves more headroom for improvement.

http://youtu.be/KzhCCtYP6ww

 

[bill001g]

Cat 5e and cat 6 both support gigabit transfer speeds but cat 6 offers more bandwidth.

Were cat 5e is tested to 100mhz cat 6 is rated to 200mhz but tested to 250mhz so leaves more headroom for improvement.

http://youtu.be/KzhCCtYP6ww

You are posting useless technical garbage that means nothing in the real world. Sure if some magically 3g interface comes along maybe you can use cat6 cable. Guess what that will NEVER happen. The next speed is 10g and you need cat6a or cat7 to go 100m and the price of that cable is coming down fast.

Go back and read the post I made to this thread. Cat6 is all marketing hype to try to sell a dead end product that was designed for a standard that never was accepted.

 

[terinate]

True about the raw speeds, but you all are still forgetting about one of the most ignored problems in cat5 cabling- interfearance by inductance of unwanted RF. Seems to be the general consensus that if you are hard wired, you are good. Not true at all. I work with RF for a living, and inductance into wiring is a huge problem. Unfortunatly, you need very advanced and expensive equipment to measure if you would have a problem in the area you live, so it's best to be on the safe side. You won't see a speed difference between cat5e and cat6, UNLESS you have RF interfearance in your area. Cat6, just by it's nature is better at resisting any external interfearance. My advice- use shielded cat6 atleast because the cost is almost that of cat5e, but you will have a much lower probability of any RF interfearance. Case and point- I had some RF interfearance in my area, so I changed my house from cat5e to cat6 shielded. ran all new lines thru the attic, and even used the cat6 shielded metal ends. I saw about 25% increase in average internet speeds, and about 20milisecond drop in ping times. these are real world tests. The only thing I did was change from cat5e to cat6 shielded. I know that the speed increase was NOT because cat6 had more bandwidth, but because cat6 resists interfearance better due to it's higher TPI, and the fact that i bought shielded. Now, I could have probably just used shielded cat5e and gotten similar results because the shield, but I figured the price between the 2 was so small, I decided to take the cat6 shielded just for the added TPI resistance to RF interfearance. If you live in the middle of nowhere, with no RF broadcast from anything, then you will se no difference at all between cat5e and cat6 shielded, BUT what are the odds? If you are reading this, you probably live in a city, and want the best performance out of your system. Spend the extra pocket change and get shielded cat6, because unless you posess the tens of thousands of dollars of equipment needed to properly measure RF in your area, you will never know if you have a problem.

 

[bill001g]

True about the raw speeds, but you all are still forgetting about one of the most ignored problems in cat5 cabling- interfearance by inductance of unwanted RF. Seems to be the general consensus that if you are hard wired, you are good. Not true at all. I work with RF for a living, and inductance into wiring is a huge problem. Unfortunatly, you need very advanced and expensive equipment to measure if you would have a problem in the area you live, so it's best to be on the safe side. You won't see a speed difference between cat5e and cat6, UNLESS you have RF interfearance in your area. Cat6, just by it's nature is better at resisting any external interfearance. My advice- use shielded cat6 atleast because the cost is almost that of cat5e, but you will have a much lower probability of any RF interfearance. Case and point- I had some RF interfearance in my area, so I changed my house from cat5e to cat6 shielded. ran all new lines thru the attic, and even used the cat6 shielded metal ends. I saw about 25% increase in average internet speeds, and about 20milisecond drop in ping times. these are real world tests. The only thing I did was change from cat5e to cat6 shielded. I know that the speed increase was NOT because cat6 had more bandwidth, but because cat6 resists interfearance better due to it's higher TPI, and the fact that i bought shielded. Now, I could have probably just used shielded cat5e and gotten similar results because the shield, but I figured the price between the 2 was so small, I decided to take the cat6 shielded just for the added TPI resistance to RF interfearance. If you live in the middle of nowhere, with no RF broadcast from anything, then you will se no difference at all between cat5e and cat6 shielded, BUT what are the odds? If you are reading this, you probably live in a city, and want the best performance out of your system. Spend the extra pocket change and get shielded cat6, because unless you posess the tens of thousands of dollars of equipment needed to properly measure RF in your area, you will never know if you have a problem.

Going to claim a bunch of bull on this one. We have put in cat5e in industrial buildings for many years and have NEVER had an occurrence of interference on wired cabling other than when someone punched it down wrong. The switches very clearly show errors if you get any and I can look at thousands of switch ports in multiple locations that show ZERO errors in periods that can be well over a year.

I am going to go even further to say the part I have bolded is a BOLD FACE LIE. You have no understanding of what happens when you take a error on ethernet cable do you. The latency CAN NOT change. The packet is either accepted or it is dropped it is not delayed when you get errors. This makes almost everything else you post suspect.

 

[terinate]

True about the raw speeds, but you all are still forgetting about one of the most ignored problems in cat5 cabling- interfearance by inductance of unwanted RF. Seems to be the general consensus that if you are hard wired, you are good. Not true at all. I work with RF for a living, and inductance into wiring is a huge problem. Unfortunatly, you need very advanced and expensive equipment to measure if you would have a problem in the area you live, so it's best to be on the safe side. You won't see a speed difference between cat5e and cat6, UNLESS you have RF interfearance in your area. Cat6, just by it's nature is better at resisting any external interfearance. My advice- use shielded cat6 atleast because the cost is almost that of cat5e, but you will have a much lower probability of any RF interfearance. Case and point- I had some RF interfearance in my area, so I changed my house from cat5e to cat6 shielded. ran all new lines thru the attic, and even used the cat6 shielded metal ends. I saw about 25% increase in average internet speeds, and about 20milisecond drop in ping times. these are real world tests. The only thing I did was change from cat5e to cat6 shielded. I know that the speed increase was NOT because cat6 had more bandwidth, but because cat6 resists interfearance better due to it's higher TPI, and the fact that i bought shielded. Now, I could have probably just used shielded cat5e and gotten similar results because the shield, but I figured the price between the 2 was so small, I decided to take the cat6 shielded just for the added TPI resistance to RF interfearance. If you live in the middle of nowhere, with no RF broadcast from anything, then you will se no difference at all between cat5e and cat6 shielded, BUT what are the odds? If you are reading this, you probably live in a city, and want the best performance out of your system. Spend the extra pocket change and get shielded cat6, because unless you posess the tens of thousands of dollars of equipment needed to properly measure RF in your area, you will never know if you have a problem.

Going to claim a bunch of bull on this one. We have put in cat5e in industrial buildings for many years and have NEVER had an occurrence of interference on wired cabling other than when someone punched it down wrong. The switches very clearly show errors if you get any and I can look at thousands of switch ports in multiple locations that show ZERO errors in periods that can be well over a year.

I am going to go even further to say the part I have bolded is a BOLD FACE LIE. You have no understanding of what happens when you take a error on ethernet cable do you. The latency CAN NOT change. The packet is either accepted or it is dropped it is not delayed when you get errors. This makes almost everything else you post suspect.

Apparently, you did not read my whole answer, as I discussed in general detail about the possibility of RF interfearance. I work on aircraft avionics and deal with RF all day. I happen to have access to very expensive equipment to test RF that the average technician would not have. I plainly posted that the ONLY reason I attributed this increase in speed was due to RF interfearance in my particular area, and that it is not due to cat6, but rather the fact that the higher TPI a twisted pair has, the greater the resistance to RF interfearance it will have. Because Cat6 has a higher TPI, it will have greater resistance to external RF interfearance than Cat5 would. These are basic RF principles. The speeds are accurate, BUT as I stated before in the answer you so rudly debunked, it was NOT due to cat5e vs Cat6 in general, but rather the resistive properties of higher TPI and the shielding. I also plainly stated that had I used shielded Cat5e, I would likely have gotten similar results. You should read an entire post before making a comment because you only show what you truly don't know.

 

[bill001g]

I could care less the rest of the stuff you posted. You credibility is trash when you LIE. Explain how a cable magically introducing 20ms of latency and when you went your magic shield cat 6 cable it all went away.

Explain why this is true and then we can discuss any other stuff you post. This is the one part you uneducated person reading this post will understand and it is totally false

 

[terinate]

I could care less the rest of the stuff you posted. You credibility is trash when you LIE. Explain how a cable magically introducing 20ms of latency and when you went your magic shield cat 6 cable it all went away.

Explain why this is true and then we can discuss any other stuff you post. This is the one part you uneducated person reading this post will understand and it is totally false

OK- time to break out science. First, you must know the RF spectrum. here is a link to wikipedia with the current U.S. frequency allocations "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frequency_allocation". Next, Cat5e specs according to "http://www.cablek.com/technical-reference/cat-5---5e--6--6a---7--standards" dictate that 100 MHz is the range of Cat5e. By comparing the range of Cat5e and the U.S. frequency chart, you can see that 100 MHz is very heavily utilized. If you are unaware of how RF works, please refer to "http://www.digi.com/technology/rf-articles/rf-basics". There are also many potential problems in a house concerning stray RF interferance as proven by "http://randombio.com/interference.html". Now, Cat5e is able to negate the effects of RF interfearance by using Differential Mode transmission, but even that has limits as shown by "http://community.spiceworks.com/topic/136706-radio-through-the-cabling" and "http://www.villagegeek.com/Archives/GeeksCorner/RFInterference.htm". you can gain better shielding by adding more TPI to a twisted pair, but ultimatly in some cases a shielded wire may be ideal as stated on "http://sewelldirect.com/articles/utp-vs-stp-cable.aspx" and "http://www.excitingip.com/847/know-your-cat-5-6-7-unshielded-twisted-pair-utp-network-cables/". By combining the better shielding effects of the higher TPI of Cat6 and adding a shield to make it shielded Cat6, you have the best resistance to external RFI (Radio Frequency Interferance) aside from putting everything in a "Farraday Cage". As stated in one of my previous posts, not all people will see a difference between shielded and non shielded lines. It completly depends on what you have in your area that emmits any potential interferance. If you live by an airport or on an airbase, or by some broadcast towers, it is possible to get such strong RF transmission in an area that "Near end crosstalk" (which is the principle where twisted pair wiring such as cat5 cancels out external RFI) can not compensate, causing packet loss. This can slow down a data connection by forcing the device to inquire several times to complete the data being sent over the cat5 lines. "http://www.lanshack.com/cat5e-tutorial.aspx" is a great site to learn more of the basics about some of these terms if you are unfamiliar with them. Wire shielding is a very underrated situation because most people get hung up on the fact that cat5e and cat6 have the same data transfer rates. The posts I have previously made have mentioned that data transfer rates are NOT the problem as your internet service will not max the capabilities of either Cat5e or Cat6, so the fact that cat6 has a theoretical higher speed is irrelevant. What Cat6 really has over cat5e is this: The higher TPI helps to combat POTENTIAL RFI. If there is little RFI in your area, then Cat6 would offer no benefit at all. Shielding is another matter entirly. Using a shielded wire is necessary in some areas due to the high local RFI. By combining Cat6 with a shield, you have the best chance of resisting and negating any RFI because you have the greater TPI and shielding. I recomend using shielded Cat6 for this reason alone. Not all people will show an improvment in converting to shielded Cat6, but unless you have expensive equipment to check your area for RFI, then best to be safe and get the shielded stuff. Remember from my previous posts that not once have I mentioned anything about the supposed faster rates of Cat6 over Cat5e, but only made mention of it's greater RFI negating abilities. I attibute the increase in speed at my house to 1 thing really- the RFI resistance of the shielded cat6, and NOT the supposed greater capabilities. The speed differences can be explained as a lack of RFI effecting my ethernet network by upgrading to cabling that is significantly better at resisting RFI.

 

[bill001g]

Still a huge bunch of garbage that just discusses why you can have packet LOSS due to RF interference. This may technically be true but that is not the statement you made.

You very clearly said "in reduced my ping times by 20ms"

Explain HOW rf interference affects the propagation delay in the cable. How does it magically hold the data inside the copper cable for 20ms when you can cross the whole us in 20ms.

Maybe you just have no clue how ping works. So you just made some story up about how much better your response time is.

The main point I am making is you do not understand networking properly but you are recommending to people that they use SHIELDED cable or cat6 cable to get rid of RF interference. Why should anyone trust your assumption that RF interference is all over the place and it is some huge issue that users should spend money on. If you have to make up stories to make your case how can anyone trust this assumption.

If you had said you need to use shielded cable in a airplane maybe I would agree since I am not a expert in that area but in the networking area I am a expert....and that is not bragging i have multiple CCIE certifications to prove it.