Does the quality of an ethernet cable matter
- Thread starter Drake5
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Yes, it does make a difference... but it depends very much on the length of the cable.
For short runs of 1-5m... you will be hard pressed to find any difference in speed... at least up to 1gbps speed.
For a 20m cable, I found the cheap cable would cap out at around 800mbit. I got a decent quality thick-walled cable (although not shielded) and that easily meets the full 1gbit speed.
How they run next to power cables and the shielding in the cable / quality & thickness of the copper used will make a difference... so it really depends on:
- Length (10m+ it might be worth thinking about)
- Shielding if it runs around lots of power cables
The only other thing to really think about is the quality of the interconnects... the bits that actually connect to the PC/switch/router can be absolutely terrible on cheap cables and break very easily. More expensive ones usually come with better quality connectors, which is worth a bit more.
For short runs of 1-5m... you will be hard pressed to find any difference in speed... at least up to 1gbps speed.
For a 20m cable, I found the cheap cable would cap out at around 800mbit. I got a decent quality thick-walled cable (although not shielded) and that easily meets the full 1gbit speed.
How they run next to power cables and the shielding in the cable / quality & thickness of the copper used will make a difference... so it really depends on:
- Length (10m+ it might be worth thinking about)
- Shielding if it runs around lots of power cables
The only other thing to really think about is the quality of the interconnects... the bits that actually connect to the PC/switch/router can be absolutely terrible on cheap cables and break very easily. More expensive ones usually come with better quality connectors, which is worth a bit more.
It matters a lot because there's a lot of cable about which is absolute rubbish. I've seen reports of cable being sold without any (or too few) twists in the pairs, also most quality CAT6 cables will have a spline running down the middle to keep the 4 pairs separated from each other. If the cable is poor quality you'll get more crosstalk, dropped packets and probably not be able to reach the advertised speeds.
These are some good articles:
http://www.bluejeanscable.com/articles/is-your-cat6-a-dog.htm
http://www.audioholics.com/audio-video-cables/bjc-cat-network-cable-quality-interview
These are some good articles:
http://www.bluejeanscable.com/articles/is-your-cat6-a-dog.htm
http://www.audioholics.com/audio-video-cables/bjc-cat-network-cable-quality-interview
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I recently had a friend who cheaped out and ended up replacing the lot as he was getting bad throughput with dropouts, he threw in the towl when he got a couple of breaks after a while even though the cables were not really affect by movement :/
If you are going to have them for a while i'd suggest Cat6a to future proof it for 10gig when it finally becomes affordable.
If you are going to have them for a while i'd suggest Cat6a to future proof it for 10gig when it finally becomes affordable.