9th May 2002

Who put the bomp in the bomp ba-bomp ba-bomp? Probably the same person who put the cat in the category cable. Kenneth Maples runs us through a brief history of network connectors. "Cat 1 - voice only, household station cable. Cat 2 - voice only, high-pair count feeder cable. Cat 3 - voice or 10baseT data levels, available in 4-pair for workstation cabling or in high-pair count for feeders. Cat 4 - voice or 10baseT data levels, no longer produced. Cat 5 - voice or 100baseT data levels, available in 4-pair for workstation cabling or in a high-pair count for feeders (the one most often used in home network environments). Cat 5e - enhanced Category 5 performance, normally only available in 4-pair workstation cable [the one I use on my home network, for less data collisions]. Cat 6 - gigahertz level data transmission (1000baseT), available in 4-pair workstation cable (overkill for most users today)." Well, that's quite helpful. Twisted, but helpful. And if someone tries to sell you some 'Cat 9,' you know where you can tell them to stick it. In the wall, of course.