Category 6 Cables

[paulyy]

I just started to run wire in my home for a fios set. My buddy gave me a large roll of cat 6. The house is wired just have to put the ends on. I have been reading that cat 6 is over kill for a home. I have 4 runs to my bed room for 2 imacs, 2 for down the road and 2 runs over to the apple tv and xbox 1 run for wife's pc and 1 for a printer. I was thinking about get short cat 6 patch cables to go from the wall plates to the hardware. Since I will be only paying for wall plate and patch cables. I think over kill is ok, plus the price is good or should i run cat 5 in the house? I did the math the cat 5 cable plus parts will cost a lot more. Will this wire work?

Thanks

[EricNau]

Yes, Cat6 will be fine. It's backwards compatible with Cat5e, and better in every way.

[hookem12387]

Is cat6 necessary for gigabit? When is it necessary? Thanks

[EricNau]

Is cat6 necessary for gigabit? When is it necessary? Thanks
No; Cat5e is capable of gigabit as well. Cat6 is currently not necessary, but it maybe at a future time.

[paulyy]

sweet off to the store to get wall plates plus patch wires


thanks paul

[Le Big Mac]

No; Cat5e is capable of gigabit as well. Cat6 is currently not necessary, but it maybe at a future time.

Cat6 is likely to have more upgradeability than 5e, so you won't have to rewire. My view of it is that with more video coming over ethernet, having extra bandwidth can't be a bad thing. Also, the labor is the costly part of wiring a house--the price differences between Cat 6 and Cat 5e aren't huge--redrywalling a wall would cost more.

[saltyzoo]

I just ran 50 feet of CAT5/e across my attic and from there it's another 20 feet of existing CAT5 to my destination and I can still get gigabit without significant packet loss.

So yeah, it's completely overkill.

Now.

But it might not be in the future. I'd definitely do it.

[hookem12387]

Also, just a heads up to any and everyone, for all your cabling needs, www.monoprice.com is the cheapest place I've ever found. That's for A/V cables, computer cables, pretty much everything is amazingly well priced and the stuff I've gotten in the past from them is quality. They have cat 6 for what appears to be a super cheap price as well