High-End Cabling Will Prepare You For Tomorrow

Over the past several years, the industry has established standards, including the ANSI/TIA/EIA-568-A Commercial Building Telecommunications Cabling Standard, to simplify material choices and installation practices. These standards create an "open" architecture that can be used by any application or access method, ensuring consistent system performance, especially when mixing components from different manufacturers.

Standards typically develop after products and technologies are created and introduced to the market. Then, once the industry adopts a standard, it sets forth minimum criteria that may meet only yesterday's communications needs. Substantial performance differences can exist even among systems that meet a specific standard. This is particularly true of copper Category 5 systems; many of these systems just meet the standard, but some far exceed it. Although these high-end systems are superior, they are all considered Cat 5 because a higher-performance standard has not yet been developed.

Manufacturers continue to improve cable designs with new methods to insulate, twist and jacket the cable. These modifications can achieve superior performance, but only with proper installation. Because traditional installation practices may yield lower performance levels, installers must follow stringent guidelines specifically for high-end installations.