Main Features Of The Cat 6 Cables
It is widely speculated that within a year, about 85 to 90% of all connections will be using the Cat 6 cables, and the older Cat 5 cables will be slowly pushed into oblivion. The Cat 5 cables had an improvised version in the Cat 5e cables, or the Cat 5 Enhanced cables, but these were just a precursor for the superior technology that was to come - that is the Cat 6 cables. In many respects, the Cat 6 cables are much superior to the Cat 5 and even the Cat 5e cables.
Let us get familiar with Cat 6 cables that are creating quite a buzz in the networking industry.
The Cat 6 cables follow the same pattern of previous cabling technologies, such as the Cat 5 and the Cat 5e cables. They contain four twisted pairs of wires bundled into a jacket. The wires are made of copper as it is the best conducting material. Though the basic pattern of having eight wires twisted into four pairs is the same, the Cat 6 cables have a separator wire between the pairs. The purpose of this separator wire is that it reduces crosstalk (in simple language, interference) between the twisted pairs and that is the reason why the Cat 6 cables can provide much better transmission that other prevailing cable technologies.
Not only that, the separator also allows for faster transmission speeds. While the Cat 5 cables allowed for data transfer at a speed of only 100 Mbps, the Cat 6 cables allow for ten times that amount, i.e. 1000 Mbps, which is equivalent to 1 Gbps. However, there is an augmented technology coming up in the Cat 6 cables that will allow transmission rates of up to 10 Gbps, which would be suitable for working hundreds of computers over a network without any reduction in efficiency. The best part is that the Cat 6 cables can transfer such blazing amounts of data without ever losing out on their speed. Even the bandwidth at which the Cat 6 cables operate is much higher than the Cat 5 and even the Cat 5e cables. While the Cat 5e had a maximum allowable bandwidth of 100 MHz, the Cat 6 cables can go over twice that amount - a bandwidth of up to 250 MHz is not uncommon. Though the Cat 6 cables have so many advantages over the earlier versions, it does not at all mean that these cables are inaccessible to older installations that have Cat 5 and Cat 5e cabling. Cat 6 cables are backward compatible, which means they can be used safely even with older version installations. In fact, Cat 6 cables are even compatible with the Cat 3 cable installations. The main benefits of Cat 6 cables are low interference in the form of crosstalk, better transmission, higher bandwidths and future compatibility. As technology is improving with each passing day, the older cabling options are becoming obsolete. That is why people with foresight will prefer Cat 6 cables, although they are bit more expensive than previous cables.
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