Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
single manufacturer. This is simple to do if you are installing a new cable plant. If
you are the contractor, insist that the contract recognize that proper operation is
guaranteed only with user patch cords that match the Category 6/AC6 specifications
of the outlet/patch manufacturer.
Manufacturer's Warranty Programs.
You may want to consider one of the manufac-
turer's installation warranty programs. These programs warrant performance of the
components and installation for a period of 15 or 20 years, as long as an installer who
is manufacturer-certified is used. As we covered in earlier chapters, these warranty pro-
grams require you to use specific brands (and material types) of connectors and cable
to qualify. Generally, they guarantee that performance of the Basic Link (Permanent
Link) will continue to meet minimum requirements for that category for the period of
the warranty. The use of a certified installer will presumably result in the use of proper
installation practices. If a link is later shown to fail those same performance measure-
ments, the manufacturer will pay to have the failed component replaced at its expense.
In a few cases, these programs are offered by manufacturers' partnership, for
example, when neither makes both cable and connectors. Be aware that this may
produce interesting (and unanticipated) results if a competing component vendor
acquires one of the partners.
Although including a program warranty clause in your contract may produce
a warm fuzzy feeling, you know quite well that network requirements change much
faster than once in 15 years. By that time, you will very likely need totally new
cabling and hardware. On the other hand, the warranty essentially extends the stan-
dard manufacturer's defect period from a norm of 1 year to 15 or 20 years. The cost
to the manufacturer is negligible, as it is highly unlikely that a component that can
last a year will spontaneously fail in 5 or 10 years, and that is virtually the only way
performance can change. The benefits to the manufacturer, however, are enormous,
as it “guarantees” you will buy its components to the exclusion of all others.
Testing Gigabit Cabling
Most of the information you will need to know on testing installed cable is con-
tained in Chapter 15. However, it might be of benefit to concentrate here on a few
issues that are particularly applicable to cable installations used for gigabit net-
works. It is also useful to know some of the gigabit networking issues that may
cause a link failure that is not the fault of the cabling.
Gigabit Limitations.
The first item in the “not-the-cable” category is Gigabit
Ethernet's repeater limitation. Unlike older technologies, particularly 10 Mbps
