Enlighten the non-telephony savvy

Discussion:

(too old to reply)

Jonathan Roberts

2007-02-16 03:02:57 UTC

Hello group!

I ran across a peculiar situation. Hopefully, I can describe it well
enough in a newsgroup post...

I was working on a site where some electricians had done the network and
telephone cabling. All of the CAT5 network cabling terminated into a
cabinet which used a patch panel. From the patch panel, there were
small patch cables connecting each live port on the panel to their
switch. All of that seemed normal. However, to one side of the patch
panel was a plastic box of some type. It took in two CAT5 cables on the
front and then had some cabling come out of the back of it. I am
guessing that they doubled up one of the cable runs to actually wire two
jacks and were using this box to split the line back into two lines
which could be connected to the switch. Would this make sense on CAT5
for an ethernet LAN? Is this the best way when there were open ports on
the patch panel?

Thanks for any info -- just curious about why this was done this way.

Jonathan

Rich Piehl

2007-02-16 04:07:56 UTC

Permalink

Post by Jonathan Roberts
Hello group!
I ran across a peculiar situation. Hopefully, I can describe it well
enough in a newsgroup post...
I was working on a site where some electricians had done the network and
telephone cabling. All of the CAT5 network cabling terminated into a
cabinet which used a patch panel. From the patch panel, there were
small patch cables connecting each live port on the panel to their
switch. All of that seemed normal. However, to one side of the patch
panel was a plastic box of some type. It took in two CAT5 cables on the
front and then had some cabling come out of the back of it. I am
guessing that they doubled up one of the cable runs to actually wire two
jacks and were using this box to split the line back into two lines
which could be connected to the switch. Would this make sense on CAT5
for an ethernet LAN? Is this the best way when there were open ports on
the patch panel?
Thanks for any info -- just curious about why this was done this way.
Jonathan

How big was the plastic box? Were there any kind of markings on it?

Take care,
Rich

God bless the USA

--
My parents thought I was a real wit, and they were half right.

--source unknown

Jonathan Roberts

2007-02-16 05:08:10 UTC

Permalink

Post by Rich Piehl

Post by Jonathan Roberts
Hello group!
I ran across a peculiar situation. Hopefully, I can describe it well
enough in a newsgroup post...
I was working on a site where some electricians had done the network
and telephone cabling. All of the CAT5 network cabling terminated
into a cabinet which used a patch panel. From the patch panel, there
were small patch cables connecting each live port on the panel to
their switch. All of that seemed normal. However, to one side of the
patch panel was a plastic box of some type. It took in two CAT5
cables on the front and then had some cabling come out of the back of
it. I am guessing that they doubled up one of the cable runs to
actually wire two jacks and were using this box to split the line back
into two lines which could be connected to the switch. Would this
make sense on CAT5 for an ethernet LAN? Is this the best way when
there were open ports on the patch panel?
Thanks for any info -- just curious about why this was done this way.
Jonathan

How big was the plastic box? Were there any kind of markings on it?
Take care,
Rich
God bless the USA

It was not very big. Roughly the size of a 'standard' rectangular
telephone jack (maybe 3x4 inches). It had two ports instead of one
though. I didn't notice any markings but there may have been some.

Thanks for the response,
Jonathan

Rich Piehl

2007-02-16 14:10:14 UTC

Permalink

Post by Jonathan Roberts

Post by Rich Piehl

Post by Jonathan Roberts
Hello group!
I ran across a peculiar situation. Hopefully, I can describe it well
enough in a newsgroup post...
I was working on a site where some electricians had done the network
and telephone cabling. All of the CAT5 network cabling terminated
into a cabinet which used a patch panel. From the patch panel, there
were small patch cables connecting each live port on the panel to
their switch. All of that seemed normal. However, to one side of
the patch panel was a plastic box of some type. It took in two CAT5
cables on the front and then had some cabling come out of the back of
it. I am guessing that they doubled up one of the cable runs to
actually wire two jacks and were using this box to split the line
back into two lines which could be connected to the switch. Would
this make sense on CAT5 for an ethernet LAN? Is this the best way
when there were open ports on the patch panel?
Thanks for any info -- just curious about why this was done this way.
Jonathan

How big was the plastic box? Were there any kind of markings on it?
Take care,
Rich
God bless the USA

Hard to say what it was. But have, on occasions where the patch panel
is full and the customer wasn't going to purchase a new one, terminated
new cat 5 runs to a cat 5 jack and put it in a surface mount box on the
backboard. Not the best way, but functional.

Take care,
Rich

God bless the USA

--
My parents thought I was a real wit, and they were half right.

--source unknown

Jonathan Roberts

2007-02-16 23:35:52 UTC

Permalink

Post by Rich Piehl
Hard to say what it was. But have, on occasions where the patch panel
is full and the customer wasn't going to purchase a new one, terminated
new cat 5 runs to a cat 5 jack and put it in a surface mount box on the
backboard. Not the best way, but functional.
Take care,
Rich
God bless the USA

Thanks, Rich!

telecom-gear.com

2007-02-16 17:25:47 UTC

Permalink

My guess would be - they needed to split the cable but did not want to use
two patch panel ports for that. It makes for a non-standard solution and
so it was not certified by the installer and was best to be kept separate
from the rest of the system that's probably certified and warranted.
You can do the split for two Ethernet connections (here is the pinout:
http://www.cabling-design.com/references/pinouts/split.shtml ) but it is
much more often done for telephone.

--

Cheers!
D~
http://www.telecom-gear.com

##-----------------------------------------------#
Retention measured in years a
http://www.telecom-gear.com
no-spam access to your favorite newsgroup -
comp.dcom.telecom.tech - 2755 messages and counting
##-----------------------------------------------##

Jonathan Roberts

2007-02-16 23:35:28 UTC

Permalink

Post by telecom-gear.com

My guess would be - they needed to split the cable but did not want to use
two patch panel ports for that. It makes for a non-standard solution and
so it was not certified by the installer and was best to be kept separate
from the rest of the system that's probably certified and warranted.
http://www.cabling-design.com/references/pinouts/split.shtml ) but it is
much more often done for telephone.
--
Cheers!
D~
http://www.telecom-gear.com
##-----------------------------------------------##
Retention measured in years at
http://www.telecom-gear.com/
no-spam access to your favorite newsgroup -
comp.dcom.telecom.tech - 2755 messages and counting!
##-----------------------------------------------##

Thank you for the explanation and the link!

Jonathan

Jeff Little

2007-02-20 03:59:42 UTC

Permalink

On Thu, 15 Feb 2007 21:02:57 -0600, Jonathan Roberts

Evening Jonathan;

What you are describing seems like one of these items:

http://www.cyberguys.com/templates/searchdetail.asp?productID=2695

They can come in handy on a short term basis while you are getting
new cable/patch panels installed. I have used them on a couple of
day basis when I didn't have a small port density switch available to
put at the client end of the circuit.

Jeff Little