The Basics of Structured Cabling

What Is Structured Cabling 

The system that provides a comprehensive telecommunications and technology infrastructure by the use of cabling and hardware is known as structured cabling. The main purpose of structured cabling is to provide homes, businesses, and any other types of physical or mobile structures with telephone and computer network services. These services can be provided both at stationary and mobile locations.

When it comes to structured cabling systems each and everyone has its own variation. These variations make each structure cable system very unique. The different types of variations that exist are depended upon the structure of the building, the cable connections that are found on the building, the type of equipment needed for installation, the manufacturer warranties, and the specific customer request or requirements.

The Importance Of Standard Cabling Installation 

There have been standard cable installation procedures implemented in the cable installation industry. These standards were created so that acceptable and quality cable installation work can be performed. This will ensure that the system is performing at a high level consistently.

The two entities that set and govern the standards of the cable installation industry are the American National Standards Institute also known as the ANSI and TIA/EIA. To ensure that all cable is being properly installed these two entities have come together and published a series of publications that cover cable installation, cable design, and how to maintain cable installations. These standards have provided many positive benefits such as stable design, one set of guidelines on transmission line requirements, and a form of universal documentation within the industry.

One thing about a structured cabling system is that in order for the system to be efficient it should never be device-dependent. The purpose of the structured cabling system is to provide detailed digital communication and technology infrastructure. The infrastructure does a variety of different things but the three main functions are to transmit data through a computer network, provide telephone services, and to connect CCTV.

The local area network or LAN is used to describe a structured cabling installation that services a very small area such as a building. The industry term used to describe a network that covers a wide area is known as metropolitan area Networks or MAN and wide-area Networks or WAN.

What Is Included Structured Cable Installations

When structured cable installation is being performed there are always certain areas of the building were installations are always included and they are the entrance facility, work is outlets, telecommunications closets, equipment rooms, and vertical and horizontal backbone pathways.

The entrance facility is the most important part of the installation process because it houses all the cabling outside of a building and inside of a building. The entrance facility is considered the electrical protection device and one of the main reasons why is because it gives easy access to all the cables if any maintenance needs to be done. The entrance facility can be found anywhere in the building or anywhere on the building’s property.

There are several things that can dictate where the entrance facility can be found and they are the type of facility, the building’s architecture, the building’s aesthetics, and the route of the outside plant cabling. When it comes to structured cabling there are many different things that should be taken into consideration when this job is being performed. If there were no guidelines and standards to follow this installation process would vary dramatically with each installation. However, the guidelines that have been created to make the installation process simple whether it be a local area network installation or a wide area network installation.

Paul Petersen