Can 1 CAT5 Cable be used for Home Network and Phone Line?

Question

I have only one run of Cat5 Cable out to a remote area of my house and want to have phone as well as Home Network access. Can I split the 4 pairs in some way to have both?

Answer 1

That's a different question.

Technically? Yes. There are only four wires used out of the eight that need to be hooked up for ethernet to work. The green's and the oranges'

which leaves 4 wires the blue's and the brown's. The phone uses four wires so it could be done but you would have to wire the phone jack plug on each end along with the RJ45 jack/plug.

You could also get a service that allows your phone to connect with the internet VoIP.


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edit at 12:38 am.

to the chump (bostonianinmo) above me (who takes delight in ragging on others)

In theory it should work on short distances.

I wouldn't recommend it as a matter of course, especially not in a company production environment, but for home use or your own small office it might be the creative solution.

I don't like calling people names but bostonianinmo has a bit to learn about being tactful.

20 years experience hummph.

Don't be fooled by my avitar it is apprearances only ... I had over 20 years experience with telephone networks and switching before mr. knowitall even started.

Answer 2

No, you can't do that. While it might work initially, every time the phone rings the network will go down. While the phone is in use, the network may or may not come back up but even if it does the performance will be terrible.

I ran into that exact situation at one of my company's branch offices. They were screaming that network performance was terrible and blamed it on the connection to the corporate office a few weeks earlier. When I arrived on site, I discovered that they had replaced all the wiring with new CAT5 and put the phones on the unused pairs on the cable runs a few days after we set up the WAN connection. I had to pull 35 drops and install new jacks all over the place.

The idiot that pulled the cable had provided certification paperwork but when I looked at it it was obviously not for that installation. None of the distance markings matched up with the survey and all of the distance measurements were wrong. To top it off it was for an installation with 40 drops, not 35. He was screaming to get paid but stopped sending bills when I showed him the fraudulent certification that he had signed.

Please ignore the d00b that said it should work. He's probably the dweeb that did that installation that I had to fix!

OK, another 568B chump. Ignore the below one as well!

And to wizzie b: It won't work. Read up on the 568b spec. The unused pairs are required for shielding and may NOT be used for telephone signalling. (there is a draft specification for providing DC power on pins 7 & 8 -- power over ethernet -- but that's it.) I run into this problem with telco installers all the time. It works for the phones, but kills the ethernet.

Answer 3

Should work... voice on one pair, phone on the other. Wouldn't hurt to try. Might be easer just to get a wireless phone tho.

Ok Bost. I'll grant you your exp. Just curious as to why. The instlation that you used as an example sounded like it had more problems than just phone on the same cable as the network. Does the ring voltage induce a spike into the net pair? I would have thought that the twisted pairs would have nulled that out

Answer 4

Category 5 cable, commonly known as Cat 5, is an unshielded twisted pair cable type designed for high signal integrity. Category 5 has been superseded by the Category 5e specification. This type of cable is often used in structured cabling for computer networks such as Gigabit Ethernet, although they are also used to carry many other signals such as basic voice services, token ring, and ATM (at up to 155 Mbit/s, over short distances).


Usage and wiring methods

Category 5

T568B wiring diagramThe original specification for category 5 cable was defined in ANSI/TIA/EIA-568-A, with clarification in TSB-95. These documents specified performance characteristics and test requirements for frequencies of up to 100 MHz.

Category 5 cable included four twisted pairs in a single cable jacket. It was most commonly used for 100 Mbit/s networks, such as 100BASE-TX Ethernet, although IEEE 802.3ab defined standards for 1000BASE-T - gigabit Ethernet over category 5 cable. Cat 5 cable typically had three twists per inch of each twisted pair of 24 gauge copper wires within the cable.

The twisting of the cable reduces electrical radio frequency interference which causes crosstalk. Also, the wires are insulated with a plastic (FEP) that has low optical dispersion, that is, the dielectric constant of the plastic does not depend greatly on frequency. Special attention also has to be paid to minimizing impedance mismatches at connection points.


Category 5e
Cat 5e cable is an enhanced version of Cat 5 that adds specifications for far-end crosstalk. It replaced the specification for Cat 5 with the 2001 introduction of the TIA/EIA-568-B standard. Although 1000BASE-T was designed for use with Cat 5 cable, the tighter specifications associated with Cat 5e cable and connectors make it an excellent choice for use with 1000BASE-T. Despite the stricter performance specifications, Cat 5e cable does not enable longer cable distances for Ethernet networks: horizontal cables are still limited to a maximum of 90m (295ft) in length. Cat 5e cable performance characteristics and test methods are defined in TIA/EIA-568-B.2-2001.


Connectors and other information
Generally solid core cable is used for connecting between the wall socket and the socket in the patch panel whilst stranded cable is used for the patch leads between hub/switch and patch panel socket and between wall port and computer. Cable types, connector types and cabling topologies are defined by TIA/EIA-568-B. RJ-45 electrical connectors were nearly always used for connecting category 5 cable.


(Cat 5: Currently unrecognized by TIA/EIA. Provided performance of up to 100MHz, and was frequently used on 100Mbit/s ethernet networks. Suitable for 1000BASE-T gigabit ethernet.)

Answer 5

No...don't forget frequency interference