If you've ever gone to buy an ethernet cable for any reason, you may have noticed that
there are several types to choose from.
Some of them may say Cat5, Cat5e, Cat6, or Cat6a.
But what exactly do all these mean, and does it really make a difference which one you
get?
Well that's what we're going over today, so you can know what you're buying, and potentially
save some money.
And I'm also going to do a real world test to see how much of a difference it makes.
First of all, what the heck are these "Cat" ratings anyway?
Well for ethernet cables, that stands for Catagory, and the different numbers represent
different standards and specifications for the cable, so you can think of them like different
versions.
Now the good news is that all of these cables will typically "work", since the new versions
are all backwards compatible.
They all use the RJ45 connector, often just called an "ethernet port", but the difference
is in the rated performance of each.
So let's go over all the different types of ethernet cables you may come across, from
Cat5 all the way through Cat7 and beyond.
The first type is really common, which is "Cat5".
However, these days when someone says Cat5, they usually are referring to Cat5e, but we're
getting ahead of ourselves.
Now a true Cat5 cable is actually obsolete, and you probably can't even buy them any more.
A cat5 cable is only rated for up to 100mbps at 100 meters, with a 100 Mhz bandwidth.
So obviously only being rated for 100mbps, you almost never see these anymore, and if
you're still using one, you should definitely replace it.
Which brings us to Cat5e, or Catagory 5 "enhanced".
Cat5e is very common these days, and it is rated for 1 gigabit speeds at 100 meters,
again with a bandwidth of 100 MHz.
This is due to improved specs regarding twisting of the wire pairs inside, shielding, and other
improvements which reduce "crosstalk" or interference, which would reduce speed.
Also, a regular Cat5 cable only required 2 twisted pairs of wires, while Cat5e uses four,
so obviously it can transfer much more data.
Though it is important to note that just rating certifications are for bare minimum, so it's
very possible that a cable will be capable of much more than what it's rated for.
So for example, a "Cat5" cable might actually be capable of gigabit speeds if it is high
quality.
And the same will go for all of these types.
After Cat5e came Catagory 6, which bumped the spec from 1 gigabit to 10 Gigabit, at
55 meter length, with a bandwidth of 250 Mhz.
And by the way, the bandwidth refers to the range of frequencies the cable is able to
reliably use, which explains how that would improve the speed.
It's got more "space" to fit the data in a way.
Cat6 further reduces crosstalk, using tighter wound wire pairs, and may also use things
like a plastic core to better separate the internal wires.
Cat6 I would say is a good choice if you're not sure what type of cable to buy, since
it probably won't be much more expensive, depending on where you buy it, and will be
future proof for a while.
This is especially so if the wire can't easily be replaced, like if you're wiring a house,
where I would get at LEAST Cat6.
But, if you're just buying a general purpose cable for your laptop or something, Cat5e
would definitely be fine, since I doubt any of your devices are capable of 10 gig anyway.
So by now you might be thinking, ok surely Cat6 is the best, I mean why would you need
anything more than that?
Well, you may be right, but we're not stopping there!
Because there's also Cat6a!
This one is also capable of 10 gigabit, but at a longer maximum distance of 100 meters
instead of 55, and it has a larger 500MHz bandwidth.
So if you are actually running a 10 gig network, Cat6a will be more reliable at getting your
full speed, since again it has further improved specs for reducing crosstalk.
And now finally, the big daddy of ethernet cables, is Catagory 7.
As far as I could tell, this is the fastest type you can buy at the moment.
Cat7 is also rated for 10 gigabit speeds, but with an even larger bandwidth of 600MHz,
and the strictest specifications for reducing crosstalk, such as requiring shielding between
individual wire pairs, as well as the whole cable as itself.
This seems to be all about improving reliability, since it doesn't actually improve the speed
requirement, even though it probably is capable of higher speeds if you had a switch that
was capable of faster than 10 gig.
So I think Cat7 would be best suited for extreme future proofing permanent wire installations,
for people who are not just satisfied with the "best", but rather want the "completely
unecessary".
Ok, so we've learned that there are tons of different ethernet cables you can use, but
does it really matter?
Well I wanted to find out, so I decided to do a quick test!
I've got three different cables, a Cat5e, a Cat6, and a Cat7, all the same 5 ft length.
And I wanted to find out if they would make a difference when used with a gigabit internet
connection, since that's really the fastest internet you're gonna get right now.
And yea I know I could do a local gigabit test, but I want to do it this way.
For this I'm simply going to connect my laptop directly to the router using each cable.
And to make sure there are no limiting factors, I have the router to fiber optic intake with
a cat7 cable.
So what was the difference?
Well, none at all.
As I pretty much expected, with such a short distance, all cables were more than capable
of handling the full gigabit connection.
I had also tested upload speed but it was very inconsistent between tests so I didn't
consider that.
Then out of curiosity, I did a speed test on my desktop, which is is plugged into a
port in the wall, using my apartment's Cat6 wiring.
And with what I would guess is an extra 50 feet of cat6 cable, the speed only dropped
less than 10 megabits, so a loss of less than 1% of speed.
So the takeaway here is that unless you need to worry about future proofing your connection,
it really doesn't matter what type of cable you buy.
Perhaps if you have tons and tons of cables packed right next to each other, the improved
shielding on the better catagories will help you, but in almost all other cases, it shouldn't
matter.
But you may all be wondering, what's the point of all these other cables if most people can't
use them!
Well, part of it's marketing, since it's easy to say you need the "better" cable with the
higher number, which of course costs more.
But of course there is networking hardware out there capable of 10 gig ethernet, usually
commercial equipment.
However, we are starting to see some 10 gigabit consumer grade switches coming out.
For example, there's the Asus XG-U2008 switch, which has two 10 gigabit ports, along with
8 regular gigabit ports.
So you could hook up your computer, and maybe a network storage device to the 10 gig port,
then everything else to the gigabit ones.
That way, even if none of the other device on the network are capable of 10 gigabit,
it would allow multiple gigabit data transfers to multiple
devices simultaneously, or a 10 gigabit transfer to whatever is on the other fast port.
In that sort of situation, where you do have 10 gigabit capabilites, at least Cat6 would
be required, at least for the 10 gig ports.
And if it's over any kind of distance, Cat6a would be ideal, for the better reliability.
But something tells me not too many people are going to be using 10 gigabit for a while.
So I guess my takeaway from all this is that even old ethernet standards have held up surprisingly
well.
Believe it or not, the same RJ45 connector used in these ethernet cables was first standardized
in 1987!
At that time, the initial spec was only 3KHz bandwidth, and now it's getting into the GigaHertz.
So I think it's safe to say that that connector probably won't be going anywhere any time
soon, since it seems like there's still a lot of room for expansion.
So I think that's it, hopefully you guys thought this video was pretty cool and interesting,
I'd love to hear what you think down in the comments section.
Are you still using old Cat5 cables, or do you need that 10 gig speed?
I myself kinda went crazy recently and bought a bunch of Cat 6 and 7 cables, since I could
never find any when I needed them.
And I used the Cat7 cables to connect all the most important stuff like the router and
switches hooked up to it for maximum performance, even if it doesn't make much of a difference.
I wanted to remove all doubt.
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So, thanks again for watching guys, looking forward to hearing from you, and as usual
I'll see you next time, have a good one.