Cabling Installation & Maintenance articles from April 2005

Cabling Installation & Maintenance archives from April 2005

Several optical waves driving the structured cabling market.(EDITORIAL)
April 1, 2005... In early March, I spent a few days at the Conference on Optical Fiber Communication/National Fiber Optic Engineering Consortium, commonly referred to by its acronyms OFC/NFOEC. The 2005 conference and exhibition marked the first time these...

Are you being coaxed into using the wrong medium for broadband?(Ask DONNA)
April 1, 2005... Wouldn't it be great if hospital rooms were cabled for high-speed Internet access and interactive television? We could use a handheld remote or wireless keyboard to access the network through the hospital room's TV. If your room is "hot," you...

Making sense of 10-gigabit systems: what you need to know to make an informed, intelligent decision.(design)(Cover Story)
April 1, 2005... Today, the only standards-based LAN solutions for 10-Gigabit Ether net (10-GbE) are optical fiber and twinax cable (two-conductor coaxial cable). Now, the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE; www.ieee.org) is working to...

Triple-play over LAN still off in the distance: it will be some time before multiple applications run over a single medium in a structured environment.(Installation)
April 1, 2005... For professionals in the information-transport systems (ITS) industry today, the word "nanometer" is relevant as a term used to describe the wavelengths at which optical signals are transported--850 nm, 1300 nm, and others. On a much...

The advantages of staying flexible: the degree of your success often depends on your materials.(NEWS in TECHNOLOGY)(Advertisement)
April 1, 2005... There are many instances during a network construction project where owners and builders are challenged to balance current and future capacity needs against existing budget constraints. Increasingly, managers, engineers and contractors are...

No-splice advantage boosts indoor/outdoor cabling: once in limited supply and demand, indoor/ outdoor cabling is gaining in popularity because of its time and labor-saving deployment in the campus.(technology)
April 1, 2005... Indoor/outdoor cabling is developing a strong following as contractors and end users alike are discovering a media that saves time and labor by bringing one cable from an out side plant setting into a building without having to perform a...

Not all cable testers are created equal.(Advertisement)
April 1, 2005... In today's competitive cable test market, there are new test tools emerging at a rapid rate to perform various tasks at various price points. While all cable test tools are useful for specific applications, not all meet TIA/ISO standards and...

Distributed power-data-video for closed-circuit TV applications: convergence of security and IT means changes in cabling infrastructure.(security)
April 1, 2005... Since the dawn of closed-circuit television (CCTV), RG-59 coaxial ca ble has been used to transmit video signals from the camera to the receiver end equipment. The system installer had to provide a nearby outlet and/or a power transformer....

General Cable, Panduit speed PanGen solution.(INDUSTRY spotlight)
April 1, 2005... General Cable and Panduit are moving full speed ahead to market their jointly developed copper and optical-fiber infrastructure solutions for open architecture. General Cable (Highland Heights, KY; www.generalcable.com) and Panduit (Tinley...

Broadband over Powerline becoming more than a curiosity.(INDUSTRY spotlight)(Ambient Corp. (Brookline, Massachusetts))
April 1, 2005... There are signs that Broadband over Powerline is gaining momentum, but analysts describe it as a cautious momentum that will take time to gain a true following. "Do I think it has an opportunity? Absolutely," says Barry Goodstadt, vice...

Massive uninstall, installation continues at Maryland campus.(INDUSTRY spotlight)
April 1, 2005... Editor's note: This is a second article in a series of stories Cabling Installation & Maintenance is writing about the cable installation project at Maryland's Sheppard Pratt Health System. The complicated installation work at Maryland's...

University of Texas turns to UTP for cable TV.(INDUSTRY spotlight)
April 1, 2005... Unshielded twisted pair cable (UTP) is being used to deliver cable TV to 25 display systems in the Applied Computational Engineering and Sciences (ACES) building at the University of Texas in Austin. Kurt Bartelmehs, the technologist at the...

UTP connectors stake their claim in 10-Gigabit performance: a new breed of UTP connectors has emerged as vendors introduce product lines they predict will comply with yet-to-be-standardized Augmented Category 6 specifications.(product update)
April 1, 2005... Defining an Augmented Category 6 UTP cabling and component specification to support 10-Gigabit Ethernet over 100 meters involves extrapolating performance to 500 MHz and minimizing the new critical alien crosstalk (ANEXT) parameter. For UTP...

Network controlled audio-visual system.(New Products)
April 1, 2005... The latest version of NetControl Starter, designed for controlling audiovisual use over a network, now supports the EIKI NPC-1 TCP/IP network interface and more than 70 different EIKI projector models over a LAN/WAN connection. The software...

Easy-to-find conduit.(New Products)
April 1, 2005... Signal-Guard is a high-density polyethylene (HDPE) resin-locatable conduit. The product is locatable by traditional locating equipment, either when empty or with dielectric optical-fiber cables. The insulated 16-gauge copper conductor is...

Live cable ID.(New Products)
April 1, 2005... The Verifier Vision Cable ID feature is now available as part of the Vision Cable Locating and Fault Finding System. Cable ID, which works with energized and non-energized electric systems and locatable telecommunications lines, identifies...

Optical fiber with flame-retardant buffer.(New Products)
April 1, 2005... A flame-retardant telecom fiber features 900-[micro]m UL94 V-O-rated PVDF secondary buffer. The buffered fiber has a -40[degrees] C to +85[degrees] operating temperature range, and is designed so that there is virtually no buffer shrinkage over...

Pocket-sized distance measurer.(New Products)
April 1, 2005... Working from a single location, the PD 32 Laser Range Meter lets one person take highly accurate and access-free distance measurements for determining cable lengths, and simplifies measuring areas and volumes. The pocket-sized device also...

Two-for-one connector.(New Products)
April 1, 2005... The FAST-SC universal connector can terminate to both 250- and 900-[micro]m diameter fiber. This two-for-one solution is achieved through a staggered clamping method to the fiber's outer coating. The field-installable connector promises...

Battery-powered cable stripper.(New Products)
April 1, 2005... An enhanced version of the portable Power Cable Stripper delivers up to 250 strips per charge. A replaceable, three-level cutter head is pre-set to stip coax cable for standard BNC and M-BNC connectors. Individual blades are adjustable for...

Workgroup switch.(New Products)
April 1, 2005... The TigerSwitch 10/100 Standalone 24-port, 10/100 +2 1000Base-T/SFP combo ports, designed especially for workgroup switching applications, features 24 fixed 10/100 ports and two 1000Base-T/SFP combo ports. Providing flexibility for fiber or...

Lightning protection.(New Products)
April 1, 2005... The ZoneBarrier 91292 is designed to protect high-speed digital interfaces from transients caused by direct or indirect lightning strikes. The three-stage device features silicon avalanche diodes, which are ultra-fast diodes and gas tubes...

Firestop system selector.(New Products)
April 1, 2005... Hilti's FS 411 Firestop System Selector puts firestop system recommendations into the installer's hand via a PDA containing a "smart" questionnaire. Sorting through the many thru-penetration firestop systems, the FS 411 quickly determines all...

OSP connector system.(New Products)
April 1, 2005... The RC Rugged Connector System for the outside plant is an extension of the manufacturer's Pathways FTTP end-to-end connectivity solution. Included are a connector system, drop cables, drop terminals, and MDU terminals. The RC optical connector...

PC-based OTDR.(New Products)
April 1, 2005... The uOR series are billed as the smallest fully functional line of PC-based OTDRs on the market. The uOR-100 series multimode OTDR, with a dynamic range of 26 dB, is designed for the premise market while the uOR-200 series singlemode devices...

Enhanced labeler.(New Products)
April 1, 2005... Designed with new import capabilities, design options, and faster printing, TagPrint Pro 2.0 promises to provide fast and thorough label creation and printing on-site. Among the new features are: complete serialization, auto date and time...

Intelligent cabinet monitoring.(New Products)
April 1, 2005... The Smart Cabinet II is a technically integrated enclosure engineered to secure servers and computer equipment. It allows remote monitoring and control via a Web browser, and lets you control personnel security access. Using Simple Network...

Ground resistance and resistivity tester.(New Products)
April 1, 2005... The Amprobe GP-2 Ground Resistance and Resistivity Tester is designed to measure earth ground resistance using three-point or two-point tests, and automatically calculates resistivity using four-point tests. The tester features an automatic...

Firestopping sleeve system endcap.(New Products)
April 1, 2005... A solution for sleeve systems being harvested when abandoned cables are removed, these endcaps are designed to seal the ends of empty sleeve systems. Available for the manufacturer's Smooth Penetrator (EMT) and Threaded Penetrator (rigid)...

Limited-combustible UTP cables.(New Products)
April 1, 2005... PlenumPlus is a family of copper cables manufactured with a ThermoPlen LC jacket. According to the manufacturer, the jacket material offers flexibility, strip-ability, and reduced memory effect. Additionally, the cable is improved over...

Dual-zip multimedia cable.(New Products)
April 1, 2005... The CatLink Dual Zip is a 24/4-pair Category 5e unshielded twisted-pair cable tested to 200 MHz that is joined with a satellite-grade RG-6/U quad-shield coaxial cable that is tested to 2.4 GHz. Designed for TIA/EIA Residential Grade 1 wiring...

Legacy-equipment remote monitoring.(New Products)
April 1, 2005... The SNMP-Link SL81 is a remote-site management device that can be used for unmanned sites housing non-SNMP-enabled equipment, such as power sources, old PBXs, batteries, aging telecommunications boxes, serial alarms, contact closures, and...

Handheld mini-OTDR.(New Products)
April 1, 2005... The FIS Certification Mini-OTDR is now available in a handheld design. It measures 7.1 x 4.6 x 3 inches and tests at 850, 1300, 1490, and 1550 nanometers. According to the manufacturer, it is ideal for repair and maintenance applications, as...

Mini-coaxial cable.(New Products)
April 1, 2005... The Mini-Coax cable from CommScope is designed for high-density security camera applications where space is at a premium. The CM-rated cable is more lightweight, flexible, compact, and economical than RG-59 and RG-6 cables, says its...