1. Prepared by:Mohammed Ayesh
LAN Cabling
Prepared by:Mohammed Ayesh

2. Contents
Cable types
Coaxial TP
STP
UTP
fiber Optic
Other Media

3. Types of cables Coaxial Cable:
widely used for radio frequency applications
not susceptible to the effects of
RFI
EMI
Ethernet originally used coaxial cables
longer distances & higher transmission rates
10base m (185m), 10 Mbps
10base m, 10 Mbps
Ethernet/802.3 coax - 50, ARCNET coax 93

4. Types of cables cont… Coaxial – cont… Advantages: Disadvantages:
higher speeds than UTP
supports broad band (multi channel) LANs
Disadvantages:
easily damaged
difficult to work with
expensive than UTP
for different LANs specific coax types needed

5. Types of cables cont… Twisted Pair The type depends on:
no. of pairs
no. of twists per unit length
gauge of the wire
type of insulation
Shielded Twisted Pair (STP):
expensive
higher data rate
easy to work with

6. Types of cables cont… Un-shielded Twisted Pair (UTP): low cost
lower data rate
limited length
easy installation
flexible configuration (when star wired)
supports many LANs and voice communication in the same cable type
easy fault isolation

7. Types of cables cont… UTP Categories: category 3 category 4 category 5
Up to 16 Mbps
used for 10baseT Ethernet & 4 Mbps Token Ring
category 4
Up to 20 Mbps
used for 16 Mbps Token Ring
category 5
Up to 100 Mbps
100baseT Ethernet

8. Types of cables cont… Fibre Optics Advantages: Disadvantages:
allows electrical isolation between LAN segments
difficult to tap
very high data rates
longer cabling distances
Disadvantages:
expensive
difficult to install
easy to damage

9. Types of cables cont… Fibre Optics cont..
backbone cables typically contain 12 or 24 fibres
multi-mode and single mode types
diameters:
Multimode
62.5 m or 50 m core, 125 m cladding (human hair – 100 m)
single mode
8 – 10 m core, 125 m cladding
multi mode:
signal jitter at far end can occur
easy coupling of the light source to the cable

10. Types of cables cont… bandwidth: connectors:
expressed as MHz-km
e.g.: 200 MHz-km  200 MHz, 1 km, or 100 MHz, 2 km
connectors:
ST (straight tip) – for 10 BASE FL
SC (subscriber connector) – for 100 BASE FX and BASE FX
MT-RJ – for 1000 BASE FX – more compact
Cable splicing and fibre termination should be done by specialized people – requires skilled personnel and proper equipment

11. Types of cables cont… Other LAN Media Infrared laser beam Microwave
modulated infrared signals passed through open space
laser beam
modulated laser beams passed through open space
Microwave
high frequency radio waves passed by line of sight transceivers
Radio
earlier low speeds ( kbps) - now 2-10 Mbps
used for mobile LAN stations when cabling is not possible