Structured Cabling Evolving for High-Speed Information Transport Systems

By Pat Boardman

The technology of Local Area Network (LAN) transfer speeds has shown to increase by one order of magnitude every ten years; in the mid-80s the very slow 10 Megabits per second advanced to 100 Megabits per second in the mid-90s, then up to 1 Gigabit per second around 2000. Standards are being written in 2011 for over 100 Gigabits per second. The new classes of cabling and other components to be used in carrying data are designed and manufactured when the application exists or is emerging. Applications of this kind are often called "killer applications" which legitimize the design of necessary hardware components. Most Local Area Networks are connected by Ethernet cabling; the most common example would be in a business where all departments need the capability to work with customer files; being linked together in a network allows those work stations to use the same programs and data updates at the same time. The advent of networks within offices was a quantum leap in terms of efficiency, allowing rapid growth, higher sales, and faster processing of orders. Before 1991 communications and computer cabling was not standardized; it was provided by different vendors with different specifications, resulting in widespread confusion. The need for generic cabling systems was satisfied by the creation of a standards body given a lengthy name - the Telecommunication Industry Association/Electronic Industry Alliance, (acronym TIA/EIA) that issue specifications and standards for structured cabling systems. The common economical medium for cabling for commercial buildings had formerly been unshielded twisted-pair (UTP) cable systems with a top band width frequency of 16 MHz, primitive by 2011 standards. Ethernet came along as a just-in-time innovation. Most Local Area Networks are connected by Ethernet cabling; the most common example would be in a business where all departments need the capability to work with customer files; being support the higher demands of video, voice, and storage. Category 5 UTP cabling, known as CAT 5 is the standard for the exponentially higher speeds required. In 2002 the 10 Gigabit Ethernet standard was published. In data centers there is an ever-growing need for technologies to increase speed of transmission so higher classes of cable are being designed to connect servers of today and to prepare for the next generation of protocols for data transmission; in July of 2010 the killer application was Ethernet 40 to 100 Gigabits per second and a set of standards was published for cabling to support it, entitled the IEEE 802.3ba standard. The 10BASE-T Ethernet would use Class EA Shielded power cable with polyvinyl insulated Cu Conductor. The rate of groundbreaking changes in the design and manufacture of computer wiring is so phenomenal that soon there will be cell phone-sized supercomputers operating with nanoscale level wiring one thousandth the width of a human hair. Microsoft founder Bill Gates predicted that we would have infinite bandwidth in only a few years. The challenges faced by cabling limitations would have to be addressed to handle the transfer speeds so the medium selected will have to be chosen for not only effectiveness, but for practical affordability. Many set-ups require expensive materials and highly-specialized technicians so they may be beyond of the financial reach of many companies. Pat Boardman is an SEO Consultant for Computation, a Toronto cabling systems and data destruction company.

Posted in: Computer