Network Cabling

This section talks about the cabling used in today's networks. There's a lot of different type of
cabling in today's networks and I am not going to cover all of them, but I will be talking about
the most common cables, which include UTP CAT5 straight through and crossover, Coax and
a few more.
Cabling is very important if you want a network to work properly with minimum problems and
bandwidth losses. There are certain rules which must never be broken when you're trying to
design a network, otherwise you'll have problems when computers try to communicate. I have
seen sites which suffer from enormous problems because the initial desgin of the network was
not done properly !
In the near future, cabling will probably be something old and outdated since wireless
communication seems to be gaining more ground, day by day. With that in mind, around 95%
of companies still rely on cables, so don't worry about it too much :)
Let's have a quick look at the history of cabling which will allow us to appreciate what we have
today !

The Beginning
We tend to think of digital communication as a new idea but in 1844 a man called Samuel
Morse sent a message 37 miles from Washington D.C. to Baltimore, using his new invention
The Telegraph. This may seem a far cry from today's computer networks but the principles
remain the same.

Morse code is type of binary system which uses dots and dashes in different sequences to
represent letters and numbers. Modern data networks use 1s and 0s to achieve the same
result. The big difference is that while the telegraph operators of the mid 19th Century could
perhaps transmit 4 or 5 dots and dashes per second, computers now communicate at speeds of
up to 1 Giga bit, or to put it another way, 1,000,000,000 separate 1s and 0s every second.
Although the telegraph and the teletypewriter were the forerunners of data communications, it
has only been in the last 35 years that things have really started to speed up. This was borne
out of the necessity for computers to communicate at ever ncreasing speeds and has driven the
development of faster and faster networking equipment, higher and higher specification cables
and connecting hardware.
Development of new network technology

Ethernet was developed in the mid 1970's by the Xerox Corporation at its Palo Alto Research
Centre (PARC) in California and in 1979 DEC and Intel joined forces with Xerox to
standardize the Ethernet system for everyone to use. The first specification by the three
companies, called the 'Ethernet Blue Book', was released in 1980, it was also known as the
'DIX standard' after their initials.
It was a 10 Mega bits per second system (10Mbps, = 10 million 1s and 0s per second) and used
a large coaxial backbone cable running throughout the building, with smaller coax cables
tapped off at 2.5m intervals to connect to the workstations. The large coax, which was usually
yellow, became known as 'Thick Ethernet' or 10Base5 - the '10' refers to the speed (10Mbps),
the 'Base' because it is a base band system (base band uses all of its bandwidth for each
transmission, as opposed to broad band which splits the bandwidth into separate channels to
use concurrently) and the '5' is short for the system's maximum cable length, in this case 500m.
The Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE) released the official Ethernet
standard in 1983 called the IEEE 802.3 after the name of the working group responsible for its
development and, in 1985, version 2 (IEEE 802.3a) was released. This second version is
commonly known as 'Thin Ethernet' or 10Base2; in this case the maximum length is 185m even
though the '2' suggest that it should be 200m.
Since 1983, various standard have been introduced because of the increased bandwidth
requirements, so far we are up to the 40Gigabit rate!

Unshielded Twisted Pair (UTP) - CAT 1 to CAT5, 5e & 6

Written by Administrator. Posted in Network Cabling
4.20930232558 1 1 1 1 1 Rating 4.21 (43 Votes)
inShare

Unshielded Twisted Pair cable is most certainly by far the most popular cable around the
world. UTP cable is used not only for networking but also for the traditional telephone (UTPCat 1). There are 6+ different types of UTP categories and, depending on what you want to
achieve, you would need the appropriate type of cable. UTP-CAT5e is the most popular UTP
cable, it came to replace the well known coaxial cable which was not able to keep up with the
continuous growth for faster and more reliable networks.
Characteristics

The characteristics of UTP are very good and make it easy to work with, install, expand and
troubleshoot and we are going to look at the different wiring schemes available for UTP, how
to create a straight through UTP cable, rules for safe operation and a lot of other cool stuff !
So let's have a quick look at each of the UTP categories available today:

Category 1/2/3/4/5/6 a specification for the type of copper wire (most telephone and network
wire is copper) and jacks. The number (1, 3, 5, etc) refers to the revision of the specification
and in practical terms refers to the number of twists inside the wire (or the quality of connection
in a jack).
CAT1 is typically telephone wire. This type of wire is not capable of supporting computer
network traffic and is not twisted. It is also used by phone companies who provide ISDN, where
the wiring between the customer's site and the phone company's network uses CAT 1 cable.
CAT2, CAT3, CAT4, CAT5 and CAT6 are network wire specifications. This type of wire can
support computer network and telephone traffic. CAT2 is used mostly for token ring networks,
supporting speeds up to 4 Mbps. For higher network speeds (100Mbps plus) you must use
CAT5 wire, but for 10Mbps CAT3 will suffice. CAT3, CAT4 and CAT5 cable are actually 4
pairs of twisted copper wires and CAT5 has more twists per inch than CAT3 therefore can run
at higher speeds and greater lengths. The "twist" effect of each pair in the cables will cause any
interference presented/picked up on one cable to be cancelled out by the cable's partner which
twists around the initial cable. CAT3 and CAT4 are both used for Token Ring and have a
maximum length of 100 meters.
CAT6 wire was originally designed to support gigabit Ethernet (although there are standards
that will allow gigabit transmission over CAT5 wire, that's CAT 5e). It is similar to CAT5 wire,
but contains a physical separator between the 4 pairs to further reduce electromagnetic
interference.
The next pages show you how UTP cable is wired and the different wiring schemes. It's well
worth visiting and reading about.
Reader interested can also visit our Network Cabling section to select amongst a number of
articles covering UTP, X-Over cables, Fiber Optic cables and much more.

Straight Thru UTP Cables

Written by Administrator. Posted in Network Cabling

3.69230769231 1 1 1 1 1 Rating 3.69 (13 Votes)

inShare

Introduction

This article covers the commonly known Unshielded Twisted Pair, UTP, cable and shows how
many pairs the UTP Cat5, Cat5e & Cat6 cables consists of, the colour coding they follow, the
different wiring standard that exist (T-586A & T-586B) plus the pin number designations for
both standards.
We will be mainly focussing on the wiring of CAT5e & 6 cables as they are the most popluar
cables around! Information on wiring the classic CAT1 phone cables is also included, plus a
lot more.
Understanding the correct wiring methods of UTP cables because it's the base of a solid
network and will help avoid hours of frustration and troubleshooting if done correctly the first
time. On the other hand, if you are dealing with a poorly cabled network, then the information
provided here will most likely assist you locating and resolving the problem.
Wiring the UTP cables !
We are now going to look at how UTP cables are wired. There are 2 popular wiring schemes
that most people use today: the T-568A and T-568B, that differ only in which color coded pairs
are connected - pair 2 and 3 are reversed. Both work equally well, as long as you don't mix
them! If you always use only one version, you're OK, but if you mix A and B in a cable run,
you will get crossed pairs!

UTP cables are terminated with standard connectors, jacks and punchdowns. The jack/plug is
often referred to as an "RJ-45", but that is really a telco designation for the "modular 8 pin
connector" terminated with a USOC pinout used for telephones. The male connector on the end
of a patchcord is called a "plug" and the receptacle on the wall outlet is a "jack."

As I've already mentioned, UTP has 4 twisted pairs of wires, we'll now look at the pairs to see what
colour codes they have:

As you can see in the picture above, the 4 pairs are labeled. Pairs 2 & 3 are used for normal
10/100Mbit networks, while Pairs 1 & 4 are reserved. In Gigabit Ethernet, all 4 pairs are used.
UTP CAT5, 5e & 6 cable is the most common type of UTP around the world ! It's flexible,
easy to install and very reliable when wired properly.

The left and center pictures show the end of a CAT5 cable with an RJ-45 connector; used by
all cables to connect to a hub or to your computer's network card. The picture to the right shows
a stripped CAT5 cable, indicating the 4 twisted pairs.

T-568A & T-568B 4-pair Wiring

Ethernet is generally carried in 8-conductor cables with 8-pin modular plugs and jacks. The
connector standard is called "RJ-45" and is just like a standard RJ-11 modular telephone
connector, except it is a bit wider to carry more pins.
Note: Keep in mind that the wiring schemes we are going to talk about are all for straight
through cables only ! Cross over cables are examined on a separate page !
The eight-conductor data cable contains 4 pairs of wires. Each pair consists of a solid colored
wire and a white wire with a stripe of the same color. The pairs are twisted together. To
maintain reliability on Ethernet, you should not untwist them any more than necessary (like
about 1 cm). The pairs designated for 10 and 100 Mbit Ethernet are Orange and Green. The
other two pairs, Brown and Blue, can be used for a second Ethernet line or for phone
connections.

There are two wiring standards for these cables, called "T568A" (also called "EIA") and
"T568B" (also called "AT&T" and "258A"). They differ only in connection sequence - that is,
which color is on which pin, not in the definition of what electrical signal is on a particular
color.
T-568A is supposed to be the standard for new installations, while T-568B is an acceptable
alternative. However, most off-the-shelf data equipment and cables seem to be wired to T568B.
T568B is also the AT&T standard. In fact, I have seen very few people using T568A to wire
their network. It's important not to mix systems, as both you and your equipment will become
hopelessly confused.

Pin Number Designations for T568B

Note that the odd pin numbers are always the white with stripe color (1,3,5,7). The wires
connect to RJ-45 8-pin connectors as shown below:

Color Codes for T568B

Pin Color
Pair Name
1 white/orange (pair 2) TxData +
2 orange (pair 2)
TxData 3 white/green (pair 3) RecvData+
4 blue (pair 1)
5 white/blue (pair 1)
6 green (pair 3)
RecvData7 white/brown (pair 4)
8 brown (pair 4)

The wall jack may be wired in a different sequence because the wires are often crossed inside
the jack. The jack should either come with a wiring diagram or at least designate pin numbers.
Note that the blue pair is on the centre pins; this pair translates to the red/green pair for ordinary
telephone lines which is also in the centre pair of an RJ-11. (green=wh/blu; red=blu)

Pin Number Designations for T568A

The T568A specification reverses the orange and green connections so that pairs 1 and 2 are
on the centre 4 pins, which makes it more compatible with the telco voice connections. (Note
that in the RJ-11 plug at the top, pairs 1 and 2 are on the centre 4 pins.) T568A goes:

Color Codes for T568A

Pin Color Pair Name
1
white/green (pair 3) RecvData+
2
green (pair 3)
RecvData3
white/orange (pair 2) TxData +
4
blue (pair 1)
5
white/blue (pair 1)
6
orange (pair 2)
TxData 7
white/brown (pair 4)
8
brown (pair 4)

The diagram below shows the 568A and 568B in comparison:

Where are they used ?

The most common application for a straight through cable is a connection between a PC and
a hub/switch. In this case the PC is connected directly to the hub/switch which will
automatically cross over the cable internaly, using special circuits. In the case of a CAT1
cable, which is usually found in telephone lines, only 2 wires are used, these do not require
any special cross over since the phones connect directly to the phone socket.

The picture above shows us a standard CAT5 straight thru cable, used to connect a PC to a
HUB. You might get a bit confused because you might expect the TX+ of one side to connect
to the TX+ of the other side but this is not the case. When you connect a PC to a HUB, the
HUB it will automatically x-over the cable for you by using its internal circuits, this results
Pin 1 from the PC (which is TX+) to connect to Pin 1 of the HUB (which connects to
RX+).This happens for the rest of the pinouts aswell.

If the HUB didn't x-over the pinouts using its internal circuits (this happens when you use the
Uplink port on the hub) then Pin 1 from the PC (which is TX+) would connect to Pin 1 of the
HUB (which would be TX+ in this case). So you notice that no matter what we do with the
HUB port (uplink or normal), the signals assigned to the 8 Pins on the PC side of things, will
always remain the same, the HUB's pinouts though will change depending wether the port is
set to normal or uplink.
This pretty much concludes our discussion on straight thru UTP cables !

CAT5, CAT5e, CAT6 UTP X-Over Cable

Written by Administrator. Posted in Network Cabling
4.33333333333 1 1 1 1 1 Rating 4.33 (6 Votes)
inShare
Introduction

The cross-over (x-over) CAT5 UTP cable has to be one of the most used cables after the classic
straight-thru cable. The x-over cable allows us to connect two computers without needing a
hub or switch. If you recall, the hub does the x-over for you internally, so you only need to use
a straight thru cable from the PC to the hub. Since now we don't have a hub, we need to
manually do the x-over.

Why do we need an x-over ?

When sending or receiving data between two devices, e.g computers, one will be sending while
the other receives. All this is done via the network cable and if you look at a network cable you
will notice that it contains multiple cables. Some of these cables are used to send data, while
others are used to receive data and this is exactly what we take into account when creating an
x-over cable. We basically connect the TX (transmit) of one end to the RX (receive) of the
other !
The diagram below shows this in the simplest way possible:

CAT5 X-over

There is only one way to make a CAT5 x-over cable and it's pretty simple. Those who read the
"wiring utp" section know an x-over cable is a a 568A on one end and a 568B on the other. If
you haven't read the wiring section, don't worry because I'll be giving you enough information
to understand what we are talking about.
As mentioned previously, an x-over cable is as simple as connecting the TX from one end to
the RX of the other and vice versa.
Let's now have a look at the pinouts of a typical x-over CAT5 cable:

As you can see, only 4 pins are needed for a x-over cable. When you buy a x-over cable, you
might find that all 8 pins are used, these cables aren't any different from the above, it's just that
there are cables running to the unsed pins. This won't make any difference in performance, but
is just a habit some people follow.
Here are the pinouts for a x-over cable which has all 8 pins connected:

Where else can I use a x-over ?

X-over cables are not just used to connect computers, but a variety of other devices. Prime
example are switches and hubs. If you have two hubs and you need to connect them, you would
usually use the special uplink port which, when activated through a little switch (in most cases),
makes that particular port not cross the tx and rx, but leave them as if they where straight
through. What happens though if you haven't got any uplink ports or they are already used ?

The X-over cable will allow you to connect them and solve your problem. The diagram below
shows a few examples to make it simpler:

As you can see in the above diagram, thanks to the uplink port, there is no need for a x-over
cable.
Let's now have have look at how to cope when we don't have an uplink to spare, in which case
we must make a x-over cable to connect the two hubs:

All the above should explain a x-over cable, where we use it and why we need it. I thought it
would be a good idea to include, as a last picture, the pinouts of a straight thru and a x-over
cable so you can compare them side by side:

10Base-T/2/5/F/35 - Ethernet
Written by Administrator. Posted in Network Cabling
4 1 1 1 1 1 Rating 4.00 (4 Votes)
inShare
Introduction

The 10Base-T UTP Ethernet and 10Base-2 Coax Ethernet were very popular around the early
to mid 1990's when 100Mbit network cards and hubs/switches were very expensive. Today's
prices have dropped so much that most vendors don't focus on the 10Base networks but the
1000Base (Gigabit Ethernet) ones and, at the same time, support the 100 BaseT standard for
backward compatibility. We will also touch on the older 10Base5/F and 35 standard.
So what does 10 BaseT/2/5/F/35 mean ?

To make it simpler to distinguish cables they are categorised; that's how we got the CAT1, 2,
3 etc cables. Each category is specific for speed and type of network. But since one type of
cable can support various speeds, depending on its quality and wiring, the cables are named
using the "BaseT" to show exactly what type of networks the specific cable is made to handle.
We are going to break the "10 Base T (and the rest) " into 3 parts so we can make it easier to
understand:
10
The number 10 represents the frequency in MHz (Mega HertZ) for which this cable is made.
In this case it is 10 MHz. The greater the MHz, the greater speeds the cable can handle. If you
try to use this type of cable for greater frequencies (and, therefore, speeds) then it either will
not work or become extremely unreliable. The 10 MHz speed translates to 10Mbit per second,
which in theory means 1.2 MBytes per second. In practice though, you wouldn't get more than
800 KBytes per second.
Base
The word "Base" refers to Baseband. Baseband is the type of communication used by Ethernet
and it means that when a computer is transmitting, it uses all the available bandwith, whereas
Broadband (cable modems) shares the bandwidth available. This is the reason cable modem
users notice a slowdown in speed when they are connected on a busy node, or when their
neighbour is downloading all the time at maximum speed ! Of course with Ethernet you will
notice a slowdown in speed but it will be smaller in comparison to broadband.
T/2/5/F/35

The "T" refers to "Twisted Pair" physical medium that carries the signal. This shows the
structure of the cable and tells us it contains pairs which are twisted. For example, UTP has
twisted pairs and this is the cable used in such cases. For more information, see the "UTP Unshielded Twisted Pair" page where you can find information on pinouts for the cables.
10Base-T
A few years ago, the 10 BaseT cables used CAT3 cables, which are used for speeds up to
10Mbit, but today you will find mostly CAT5 cables, which are good for speeds up to 100 Mhz
or 100Mbit, these cables are also used for 10Mbit networks. Only 2 pairs of the UTP cable are
used with the 10Base-T specification and the maximum length is 100 meters. Minimum length
between nodes is 2.5 meters.
10Base-2
This specification uses Coaxial cable which is usually black, sometimes also called "Thinwire
coax", "Thin Ethernet" or "RJ-58" cable. Maximum length is 185 meters while the minimum
length between nodes is 0.5 meters. 10Base-2 uses BNC connectors which, depending on the
configuration, require special terminators. The 10Base-2 specification is analysed here in great
detail (also contains pictures) if you wish to read more about it.
10Base-5
This specification uses what's called "Thickwire" coaxial cable, which is usually yellow. The
maximum length is 500 meters while the minimum length between nodes is 2.5 meters. Also,
special connectors are used to interface to the network card, these are called AUI (Attachment
Unit Interface) connectors and are similar to the DB-15 pin connectors most soundcards use
for their joystick/MIDI port.
Most networks use UTP cable and RJ-45 connectors or Coaxial cable with BNC "T"
connectors, for this reason special devices made their way to the market that allow you to
connect an AUI network card to these different cable networks.
The picture below shows you a few of these devices:

10Base-F

This specification uses fibre optic cable. Fibre optic cable is considered to be more secure than
UTP or any other type of cabling because it is nearly impossible to tap into. It is also resistant
to electro magnetic interference and attenuation. Even though the 10Base-F specification is for
speeds up to 10Mbits per second, depending on the type of fibre and equiptment you use, you
can get speeds of up to 2Gigabits per second !
10Base-35
The 10Base-35 specification uses broadband coaxial cable. It is able to carry multiple baseband
channels for a maximum length of 3,600 meters or 3.6 Kms.
Summary
To summarise, keep the following in mind:

10Base-T works for 10Mbit networks only and uses unshielded twisted pair cable with RJ-45
connectors at each end and maximum length of 100 meters. They also only use 2 pairs of
cables.
10Base-2 works for 10Mbit networks only and uses Coaxial cable. Maximum length is 185
meters and BNC "T" connectors are used to connect to the computers; there are special
terminators at each of the coaxial cable.
10Base-5 works for 10Mbit networks only and uses Thick Coaxial cable. Maximum length is
500 meters and special "AUI" connectors (DB-15) are used to interface with the network card.
10Base-F works for 10Mbit networks only and uses cool fibre optic cable!

100Base-(T) TX/T4/FX - Ethernet

Written by Administrator. Posted in Network Cabling
4.44444444444 1 1 1 1 1 Rating 4.44 (9 Votes)
inShare
Introduction

The 100Base-TX (sometimes referred to 100Base-T) cable is the most popular cable around
since it has actually replaced the older 10Base-T and 10Base-2 (Coaxial). The 100Base-TX
cable provides fast speeds up to 100Mbits and is more reliable since it uses CAT5 cable (see
the CAT 1/2/3/4/5 page).There is also 100Base-T4 and 100Base-FX available, which we
discuss later.
So what does 100Base-TX/T4/FX mean ?

To make it simpler to distinguish cables they are categorised; that's how we got the CAT1, 2,
3 etc cables. Each category is specific for speed and type of network. But since one type of

cable can support various speeds, depending on its quality and wiring, the cables are named
using the "BaseT" to show exactly what type of networks the specific cable is made to handle.
We are going to break the "100Base-T?" into 3 parts so we can make it easier to understand:
100
The number 100 represents the frequency in MHz (Mega HertZ) for which this cable is made.
In this case it is 100 MHz. The greater the MHz, the greater speeds the cable can handle. If
you try to use this type of cable for greater frequencies (and, therefore, speeds) it will either
not work or become extremely unreliable. The 100 MHz speed translates to 100Mbit per
second, which in theory means 12 MBytes per second. In practice though, you wouldn't get
more than 4 MBytes per second.
Base
The word "Base" refers to Baseband. Baseband is the type of communication used by
Ethernet and it means that when a computer is transmitting, it uses all the available bandwith,
whereas Broadband (cable modems) shares the bandwidth available. This is the reason cable
modem users notice a slowdown in speed when they are connected on a busy node, or when
their neighbour is downloading all the time at maximum speed ! Of course with Ethernet you
will notice a slowdown in speed but it will be smaller in comparison to broadband.
TX/T4/FX
The "T" refers to "Twisted Pair" physical medium that carries the signal. This shows the
structure of the cable and tells us it contains pairs which are twisted. For example, UTP has
twisted pairs and this is the cable used in such cases. The 100Base-T is used sometimes to
refer to the 100Base-TX cable specification. For more information, see the "UTP -Unshielded
Twisted Pair" page where you can find information on pinouts for the cables. All 100Mbit
rated cables, except the 100Base-FX, use CAT5 cable.
100Base-TX
The TX (sometimes refered as "T" only) means it's a CAT5 UTP straight through cable using
2 of the 4 available pairs and supports speeds up to 100Mbits. Maximum length is 100 meters
and minimum length between nodes is 2.5 meters.
100Base-T4
The T4 means it's a CAT5 UTP straight through cable using all 4 available pairs and supports
speeds up to 100Mbits. Maximum length is 100 meters and minimum length between nodes
is 2.5 meters.
100Base-FX
The FX means it's a 2 strand fiber cable and supports speeds up to 100Mbits. Maximum
length is usually upto 2 kms.
Summary

To summarise, keep the following in mind:

100Base-TX/T4 works for 100Mbit networks only and uses unshielded twisted pair cable with
RJ-45 connectors at each end
All CAT5 UTP cables have 4 pairs of cables (8 wires).
100Base-TX (sometimes called 100Base-T) uses 2 of the 4 available pairs within the UTP cable,
whereas the 100Base-T4 uses all 4 pairs.
100Base-FX also works for speeds up to 100Mbits but uses fibre optic cable instead of UTP.

Fibre Optic Cables

Written by Administrator. Posted in Network Cabling
4.33333333333 1 1 1 1 1 Rating 4.33 (6 Votes)
inShare
Introduction

In the 1950's more research and development into the transmission of visible images through
optical fibres led to some success in the medical world where it was being used in remote
illumination and viewing instruments. In 1966 Charles Kao and George Hockham proposed
the transmission of information over glass fibre and realised that to make it a practical
proposition, much lower losses in the cables were essential.
This was the driving force behind the developments to improve the optical losses in fibre
manufacturing and today optical losses are significantly lower than the original target set by
Charles Kao and George Hockham.
The advantages of using fibre optics

Because of the Low loss, high bandwidth properties of fibre cables they can be used over
greater distances than copper cables. In data networks this can be as much as 2km without the
use of repeaters. Their light weight and small size also make them ideal for applications where
running copper cables would be impractical and, by using multiplexors, one fibre could replace
hundreds of copper cables. This is pretty impressive for a tiny glass filament, but the real benefit
in the data industry is its immunity to Electro Magnetic Interference (EMI), and the fact that
glass is not an electrical conductor.

Because fibre is non-conductive it can be used where electrical isolation is needed, for instance,
between buildings where copper cables would require cross bonding to eliminate differences
in earth potentials. Fibres also pose no threat in dangerous environments such as chemical
plants where a spark could trigger an explosion. Last but not least is the security aspect, it is
very, very difficult to tap into a fibre cable to read the data signals.
Fibre construction
There are many different types of fibre cable, but for the purposes of this explanation we will
deal with one of the most common types, 62.5/125 micron loose tube. The numbers represent
the diameters of the fibre core and cladding, these are measured in microns which are millionths
of a metre.

Loose tube fibre cable can be indoor or outdoor, or both, the outdoor cables usually have the
tube filled with gel to act as a moisture barrier to the ingress of water. The number of cores in
one
cable
can
be
anywhere
from
4
to
144.
Over the years a variety of core sizes have been produced but these days there are three main
sizes that are used in data communications, these are 50/125, 62.5/125 and 8.3/125. The 50/125
and 62.5/125 micron multi-mode cables are the most widely used in data networks, although
recently the 62.5 has become the more popular choice. This is rather unfortunate because the
50/125 has been found to be the better option for Gigabit Ethernet applications.

The 8.3/125 micron is a single mode cable which until now hasn't been widely used in data
networking due to the high cost of single mode hardware. Things are beginning to change
because the length limits for Gigabit Ethernet over 62.5/125 fibre has been reduced to around
220m and now using 8.3/125 may be the only choice for some campus size networks.
Hopefully, this shift to single mode may start to bring the costs down.
What's the difference between single-mode and multi-mode?

With copper cables larger size means less resistance and therefore more current, but with fibre
the opposite is true. To explain this we first need to understand how the light propagates within
the fibre core.
Light propagation
Light travels along a fibre cable by a process called 'Total Internal Reflection' (TIR), this is
made possible by using two types of glass which have different refractive indexes. The inner
core has a high refractive index and the outer cladding has a low index. This is the same
principle as the reflection you see when you look into a pond. The water in the pond has a
higher refractive index than the air and if you look at it from a shallow angle you will see a
reflection of the surrounding area, however, if you look straight down at the water you can see
the bottom of the pond.

At some specific angle between these two view points the light stops reflecting off the surface
of the water and passes through the air/water interface allowing you to see the bottom of the
pond. In multi-mode fibres, as the name suggests, there are multiple modes of propagation for
the rays of light. These range from low order modes, which take the most direct route straight
down the middle, to high order modes, which take the longest route as they bounce from one
side to the other all the way down the fibre.

This has the effect of scattering the signal because the rays from one pulse of light arrive at the
far end at different times; this is known as Intermodal Dispersion (sometimes referred to as
Differential Mode Delay, DMD). To ease the problem, graded index fibres were developed.
Unlike the examples above which have a definite barrier between core and cladding, these have
a high refractive index at the centre which gradually reduces to a low refractive index at the
circumference. This slows down the lower order modes allowing the rays to arrive at the far
end closer together, thereby reducing intermodal dispersion and improving the shape of the
signal.

So what about the single-mode fibre?

Well, what's the best way to get rid of Intermodal Dispersion?, easy, only allow one mode of
propagation. So a smaller core size means higher bandwidth and greater distances. Simple as
that ! :)

Important Direct Cable Connection Notes

Written by Administrator. Posted in Network Cabling
5 1 1 1 1 1 Rating 5.00 (1 Vote)
inShare

Important Points for DCC

This page was designed to provide some notes on Direct Cable Connection (File-transfer) of
Win9x/ME/2000 with LAPLINK (Printer port) Cable or Null-Modem (serial port) Cable.
I've successfully used Laplink cable to link two PCs for FILE TRANSFER only (not playing
Games), with WIN95 and Direct Cable Connection program using the NetBeui protocol on
each computer. You can quickly check to see if the protocol is installed by doubleclicking on
the "Network Section" in Control Panel of your Windows operating system.
In addition to the above, you must have installed "Client for Microsoft Networks", "File and
Printer Sharing for Microsoft Networks" and optionally the TCP/IP protocol, which will
require some configuration. Providing a simply IP Address and subnetmask will be enough for
our purposes, the rest of the fields can be ignored. If you would like to allow users to access
your files and printer, then ensure both the options in "File and Print Sharing" are selected.
Once you have completed the above steps, you should have the following listed in the "Network
Selection" window::

Client for Microsoft Networks

TCP/IP
Netbeui
File and Printer Sharing for Microsoft Networks

Once your changes are complete, Windows might prompt you to reboot the system, so make
sure all work is saved before answering "yes"!
You should also share the Disks on both computers by right-clicking on the selected disks
installed in your system and select the "Sharing" option that will appear in the menu. You can
access them via your "My Computer" icon on your desktop.
After you complete these actions, you will see a blue hand "holding" your shared drives, indicating
that the drive is shared with the rest of the network!

USB Direct Cable Connection

Written by Administrator. Posted in Network Cabling

4 1 1 1 1 1 Rating 4.00 (4 Votes)

inShare

Introduction

Serial and Parallel Direct Cable Connections are considered to be a bit "old fashioned" these
days. USB Direct Cable Connection (DCC), on the other hand, belongs in the "new fashioned"
category :) USB DCC is a few years old, but because most people would use their network card
to transfer data, the DCC hasn't been very well known for the USB port, but does exist.... and
the catch is that you can't make it, but you must buy it ! But don't be tempted to leave the page
just as yet, there is a lot of information on USB which is always good to know. Keep reading
.... :)
Let's have a closer look and see what it's all about !
About USB
USB stands for Universal Serial Bus. Most peripherals for computers these days come in a
USB version. The USB port was designed to be very flexible and for this reason you are able
to connect printers, external hard drives, cdroms, joysticks, scanners, digital cameras, modems,
hubs and a lot of other cool stuff to it.
The Universal Serial Bus gives you a single, standardized, easy-to-use way to connect up to
127 devices to a computer. The 127 number is a theoretical number :) In practice it's a lot less
! The devices you connect can even power through the USB port of your computer if they draw
less than 500mA, which is half an Ampere (I). A good example is my little Canon scanner, it
only has one cable which is used to power the scanner up and to transfer the data to the
computer !

Currently there are 2 versions of the USB port, the initial version which is USB v1.1 and the
newer version USB v2 which has hit the market since the end of 2001. Most people have
computers and devices which use the first version, but all new computers will now come with
USB v2. This new version of the USB port is backwards compatible with the older version and
also a lot faster.
The table below compares the two USB ports so you can see the speed difference:

Keep in mind that when you're using a USB DCC cable, you won't get such great speeds, but
somewhere around the 500KBytes/sec. This also depends on the type of CPU, O/S, the quality
of the cable and electronic components and protocols running on your system.
Another thing which you should keep in mind is the Windows operating system that supports
the USB port:

The USB Cable

The USB standard uses A and B connectors to avoid confusion. "A" connectors head
"upstream" toward the computer, while "B" connectors head "downstream" and connect to
individual devices. This might seem confusing to some, but it was designed to avoid confusion
between consumers because it would be more complicated for most people to try and figure
out which end goes where.
And this is what the USB cable and connectors actually look like:

As mentioned earlier, the USB port can power certain devices and also transfer data at the same
time. For this to happen, the USB port must have at least 4 cables of which 2 are for the power,
and 2 for the data.
The diagram is to help you understand what the cable contains:

The USB DCC (Finally :) )

As I mentioned in the introduction of this page, the USB DCC cable cannot be made, because
it requires special electronic circuits built around the cable. Parallel Technologies manufacture
USB DCC cables and they call it the "NET-LinQ":

The USB DCC cable can also be used to connect a computer to your network. The way it works
is pretty simple. Assuming you have Computers A, B , C and D. Computer A, B and C are
connected via an Ethernet LAN and Computer D hasn't got a network card to connect to the
network. Using the NET-LinQ or other similar cables you can connect Computer D with any
of the other 3 computers as long as they have a USB port, then by configuring the network
protocols on Computer D, it will be able to see and connect to the rest of the network !

This completes the discusion about USB Direct Cable Connection.

LPT Ports - Parallel Direct Cable Connection and pinouts

Written by Administrator. Posted in Network Cabling
5 1 1 1 1 1 Rating 5.00 (3 Votes)
inShare

The Parallel Direct Connection is the second solution to transfer data from one computer to
another. The cable required is slightly more complicated as it has more wires that need to be
connected, but the speeds you will get from it will make it well worth the time and effort
required to make the cable.
This article covers the parallel port found on most PCs. We explain the pinouts, type of
transfers, supported data speeds, different type of LPT ports and much more.
Most people would know the parallel Direct Cables as "Laplink" cables. You get one when you
buy the Laplink program or PCAnywhere, it's usually a yellow cable, but you'll be able to make
your own by the time you finish reading this page.
Because of the variety of parallel (LPT) ports, 4 to be precise, but we use the same cable for
everyone one of them. We will have a look at them all to make sure we cover everything :)
Now, as far as speed's concerned, with a standard LPT port you're looking at around 40 to 60
KB per second whereas with the faster LPT ports you should expect something around 1MB
per second ! Whichever way you see it, it's a huge improvement in comparison to the serial
cable (Null modem cable).
Let's have a quick look at the way data is transferred over a parallel link, this will help us
understand why it's also a lot faster than the serial method of transfer:

This diagram shows a parallel transfer. In serial transfer there is one block of data moved at a
time, whereas with parallel and, more specificaly in our example, there are 4 data blocks moved
at a time. Parallel ports transmit data simultaneously over multiple lines and are therefore faster
than serial.
If you're having difficulties understanding the diagram just think of a 4 lane highway, which is
our parallel cable, where 4 cars at a time are moving whereas the serial cable is like a one lane
highway with one car at a time moving. Hope that helps :)
What does the parallel port (LPT) look like ?
The picture below shows a parallel port, also known as LPT port, of a new computer.

With new computers, you will always find the LPT port right above the two COM ports and
it's usually colour coded purple. No matter what type of LPT port you have, they all look the
same, it's the electronic characteristics which changes amongst the 4 different types of LPT
ports and that's transparent to everyone. All LPT ports are female DB-25 connectors.
So what are the different LPT ports?
Before we get stuck into the pinouts of the LPT port, let's have a look at the different types of
LPT ports available. Again, depending on the LPT port, you would expect different speed rates:

Because it might seem a bit confusing at the begining, I have include a bit more techincal
information on the various ports to help you understand more about them. To keep it simple, I
have categorised and colour coded them to show which ports match the table above:
4 bit ports
The port can do 8 bit byte output and 4 bit nibble input. These ports are often called
"unidirectional" and are most commonly found on desktop bus cards (also called IO expansion
cards, serial/parallel cards, or even 2S+P cards) and older laptops. This is still the most common
type of port, especially on desktop systems. 4 bit ports are capable of effective transfer rates of
about 40-60 KBytes per second in typical devices but can be pushed upwards of 140
KBytes/sec with certain design tricks.
8 bit ports
These ports can do both 8 bit input and output and are sometimes called "bidirectional ports"
but that term is often misused by vendors to refer to 4 bit ports as well. Most newer laptops
have 8 bit capability although it may need to be enabled with the laptop's vendor-specific
CMOS setup function. This is discussed below. A relatively smaller percentage of LPT bus
cards have 8bit capability that sometimes must be enabled with a hardware jumper on the board
itself. True 8 bit ports are preferable to 4 bit ports because they are considerably faster when
used with external devices that take advantage of the 8 bit capability. 8 bit ports are capable of
speeds ranging from 80-300 KBytes per second, again depending on the speed of the attached
device, the quality of the driver software and the port's electrical characteristics.
EPP ports
Can do both 8bit input and output at ISA bus speeds. These ports are as fast as 8 bit bus cards
and can achieve transfer rates upwards of 600 KByte per second. These ports are usually used
by non-printer peripheral devices such as external CDROMs, tape drives, hard drives, network
adaptors and more.
ECP ports
Can do both 8 bit input and output at bus speeds. The specification for this port type was jointly
developed by Microsoft and Hewlett-Packard. ECP ports are distinguished by having DMA
capability, on-board FIFOs at least 16 bytes deep, some hardware data compression capability
and are generally featured more than other ports. These ports are as fast as 8 bit bus cards and
can achieve transfer rates upwards of 1 Mbyte per second and faster on PCs whose buses will
support it. The design is capable of faster transfer rates in the future.
Laplink cable is used to link two PCs with MSDOS 6.0 or later very effectively by using
INTERSVR.EXE (on Host) and INTERLNK.EXE (on GUEST) PCs. But it can also be used
to data-transfer at faster speed with DCC Feature of Win9x/Me/2000.
Let's now have a quick look at the pinouts of an LPT port:

LPT Direct Connect Cable

As explained, there are different LPT ports, but the cable used is the same for all types of LPT
ports. Depending on your computer bios LPT settings you will be able to achieve different
speed transfers as outlined in the table above.
The picture below clearly shows the pinouts of the required cable:

One wire should be attached to the metal body of the Male pins on both sides, this is also shown
as the "metal body" on the diagram.

Now, because I understand how much trouble someone can fall into when trying to create a
cable and get it to work properly, I have included the DirectParallel Connection Monitor
Utility, for all the DCC users to troubleshoot and test DCC connection and cable on both
computers. It provides detailed information about the connection, the cable being used for the
connection, the I/O mode (4-bit, 8-bit, ECP, EPP), the parallel port types, I/O address, and IRQ.
And that pretty much finishes the discussion on Parallel Cable Connections!

Serial Direct Cable Connection, DB9, DB25, COM Ports and Pinouts
Written by Administrator. Posted in Network Cabling
5 1 1 1 1 1 Rating 5.00 (3 Votes)
inShare

Introduction

This article covers the popular serial ports on workstations, servers and laptop computers. We
cover serial data transfer, port pinouts, port speeds, interface types, null modem cables and
much more.
The Serial Direct Connection is the one which utilizes the COM ports of your computers. Every
computer has at least 2 COM ports, COM1 and COM2. The "COM" stands for
"Communications". It's pinouts are a lot simpler when compared to the parallel port, but the
speed is also a lot slower:)
To give you an idea of how fast (or slow) a serial port is, at its best you will get around 12 to
14 KB per second. That's pretty slow when you're used to a network connection, but let me
show you how serial data is transferred so you can also understand why it's a lot slower:

The above picture gives you an idea on how serial data is transferred. Each coloured block that
is numbered is sent from PC 1 to PC 2. PC 2 will receive the data in the same order it was sent,
in other words it will receive data block 1 first and then 2, all the way to block 7. This is a
pretty good representation of data flow in a serial cable. Serial ports transmit data sequentially
over one pair of wires (the rest of the wires are used to controll the transfer).

Another way you can think of it is like a one lane road where the road is wide enough to only
fit one car at a time (one data block at a time in our example above), so you would imagine that
the road cannont process several cars at one time.
The Serial port
Most new computers have two COM ports with 9 pins each, these are DB-9 male connectors.
Older computers would have one DB-9 male connector and one DB-25 male connector. The
25 pin male connector is pretty much the same as the 9 pin, it's just bigger.
Let's have a look at a serial port to see what we are talking about:

Different pinouts are used for the DB-9 and DB-25 connectors and we will have a look at them
in a moment. Let's just have another quick look at the COM ports of a new computer:

Notice the COM ports, they are both DB-9 connectors, there is no more DB-25 ! The connector
above the two blue COM ports is an LPT or Parallel port.
The serial port of a computer is able to run at different speeds, thus allowing us to connect
different devices which communicate at different speeds with the computer. The following
table shows the speeds at which most computers' serial ports are able to run and how many
KB/sec they translate to:

Now we will have a look at the pin outs of both DB-9 and DB-25 connectors:

The Cable
All that's left now is the pinouts required to allow us to use the serial cable for direct connection.
There is a special term for this type of a cable, it's call a "null modem" cable, which basically
means you need to have TX and RX crossed over. Because you can have different
configurations, e.g DB-9 to DB-9, DB-9 to DB-25, and DB-25 to DB-25, I have created
different tables to show you the pinouts for each one:
1) DB-9 to DB-9. You use this configuration when you need a cable with a DB-9 connector on
each end:

2) DB-9 to DB-25. You use this configuration when you need a cable with one DB-9 and one
DB-25 connector on either end:

3) DB-25 to DB-25. You use this configuration when you need a cable with a DB-25 connector
on each end:

Well, that pretty much covers everything about serial direct connection via a null modem cable.
If you're using third party software to connect your computers, you probably won't stumble
into big problems, but if you're using Windows software be sure you have unique names for
each of your computers because Windows will treat the direct connection as a "network"
connection. This means you will be able to see the other computer via Network Neighborhood.

Direct Cable Connection

Written by Administrator. Posted in Network Cabling
5 1 1 1 1 1 Rating 5.00 (1 Vote)
inShare

Introduction

From the early PC days, Direct Cable Connection (dcc) was the most popular way to transfer
data from one PC to another. Of course, it might seem a bit of an "old fashioned" way to transfer
data these days but remember that back then most PC's were running Dos 6.22 or Windows for
Workgroups 3.11 if you were lucky !
Today, most computers are equipped with a network card and have an x-over or hub which will
allow you to transfer data a lot faster than a serial or parallel cable. But still, there is always a
time when you require a simple transfer via serial or parallel and that's what this page is about.
There is a variety of programs which allow you to use the above mentioned cables to
successfully transfer data between PCs but you should know that you can achieve your goal
without them as well since Windows 95 and above supports the direct cable connection method.

Installing Windows programs or components to transfer data is out of this section's scope, but
I have included some notes on what you should check before attempting the Direct Connection
via cable, this info is included in the "Important DCC Info". We will also be learning how to
create the cables required to meet our goals and comparing the speed of the two (Serial and
Parallel)
Because the page ended up being quite long, I decided to split it in order to make it easier to
read. Simply click on the subject you'd like to read about:
Serial Direct Connection
Parallel Direct Connection

Serial Direct Cable Connection, DB9, DB25, COM Ports and Pinouts
Written by Administrator. Posted in Network Cabling
5 1 1 1 1 1 Rating 5.00 (3 Votes)
inShare

Introduction

This article covers the popular serial ports on workstations, servers and laptop computers. We
cover serial data transfer, port pinouts, port speeds, interface types, null modem cables and
much more.
The Serial Direct Connection is the one which utilizes the COM ports of your computers. Every
computer has at least 2 COM ports, COM1 and COM2. The "COM" stands for
"Communications". It's pinouts are a lot simpler when compared to the parallel port, but the
speed is also a lot slower:)
To give you an idea of how fast (or slow) a serial port is, at its best you will get around 12 to
14 KB per second. That's pretty slow when you're used to a network connection, but let me
show you how serial data is transferred so you can also understand why it's a lot slower:

The above picture gives you an idea on how serial data is transferred. Each coloured block that
is numbered is sent from PC 1 to PC 2. PC 2 will receive the data in the same order it was sent,
in other words it will receive data block 1 first and then 2, all the way to block 7. This is a
pretty good representation of data flow in a serial cable. Serial ports transmit data sequentially
over one pair of wires (the rest of the wires are used to controll the transfer).
Another way you can think of it is like a one lane road where the road is wide enough to only
fit one car at a time (one data block at a time in our example above), so you would imagine that
the road cannont process several cars at one time.
The Serial port
Most new computers have two COM ports with 9 pins each, these are DB-9 male connectors.
Older computers would have one DB-9 male connector and one DB-25 male connector. The
25 pin male connector is pretty much the same as the 9 pin, it's just bigger.
Let's have a look at a serial port to see what we are talking about:

Different pinouts are used for the DB-9 and DB-25 connectors and we will have a look at them
in a moment. Let's just have another quick look at the COM ports of a new computer:

Notice the COM ports, they are both DB-9 connectors, there is no more DB-25 ! The connector
above the two blue COM ports is an LPT or Parallel port.
The serial port of a computer is able to run at different speeds, thus allowing us to connect
different devices which communicate at different speeds with the computer. The following
table shows the speeds at which most computers' serial ports are able to run and how many
KB/sec they translate to:

Now we will have a look at the pin outs of both DB-9 and DB-25 connectors:

The Cable
All that's left now is the pinouts required to allow us to use the serial cable for direct connection.
There is a special term for this type of a cable, it's call a "null modem" cable, which basically
means you need to have TX and RX crossed over. Because you can have different
configurations, e.g DB-9 to DB-9, DB-9 to DB-25, and DB-25 to DB-25, I have created
different tables to show you the pinouts for each one:
1) DB-9 to DB-9. You use this configuration when you need a cable with a DB-9 connector on
each end:

2) DB-9 to DB-25. You use this configuration when you need a cable with one DB-9 and one
DB-25 connector on either end:

3) DB-25 to DB-25. You use this configuration when you need a cable with a DB-25 connector
on each end:

Well, that pretty much covers everything about serial direct connection via a null modem cable.
If you're using third party software to connect your computers, you probably won't stumble
into big problems, but if you're using Windows software be sure you have unique names for
each of your computers because Windows will treat the direct connection as a "network"
connection. This means you will be able to see the other computer via Network Neighborhood.

PT Ports - Parallel Direct Cable Connection and pinouts

Written by Administrator. Posted in Network Cabling
5 1 1 1 1 1 Rating 5.00 (3 Votes)
inShare

The Parallel Direct Connection is the second solution to transfer data from one computer to
another. The cable required is slightly more complicated as it has more wires that need to be
connected, but the speeds you will get from it will make it well worth the time and effort
required to make the cable.
This article covers the parallel port found on most PCs. We explain the pinouts, type of
transfers, supported data speeds, different type of LPT ports and much more.
Most people would know the parallel Direct Cables as "Laplink" cables. You get one when you
buy the Laplink program or PCAnywhere, it's usually a yellow cable, but you'll be able to make
your own by the time you finish reading this page.
Because of the variety of parallel (LPT) ports, 4 to be precise, but we use the same cable for
everyone one of them. We will have a look at them all to make sure we cover everything :)
Now, as far as speed's concerned, with a standard LPT port you're looking at around 40 to 60
KB per second whereas with the faster LPT ports you should expect something around 1MB

per second ! Whichever way you see it, it's a huge improvement in comparison to the serial
cable (Null modem cable).
Let's have a quick look at the way data is transferred over a parallel link, this will help us
understand why it's also a lot faster than the serial method of transfer:

This diagram shows a parallel transfer. In serial transfer there is one block of data moved at a
time, whereas with parallel and, more specificaly in our example, there are 4 data blocks moved
at a time. Parallel ports transmit data simultaneously over multiple lines and are therefore faster
than serial.
If you're having difficulties understanding the diagram just think of a 4 lane highway, which is
our parallel cable, where 4 cars at a time are moving whereas the serial cable is like a one lane
highway with one car at a time moving. Hope that helps :)
What does the parallel port (LPT) look like ?
The picture below shows a parallel port, also known as LPT port, of a new computer.

With new computers, you will always find the LPT port right above the two COM ports and
it's usually colour coded purple. No matter what type of LPT port you have, they all look the
same, it's the electronic characteristics which changes amongst the 4 different types of LPT
ports and that's transparent to everyone. All LPT ports are female DB-25 connectors.
So what are the different LPT ports?

Before we get stuck into the pinouts of the LPT port, let's have a look at the different types of
LPT ports available. Again, depending on the LPT port, you would expect different speed rates:

Because it might seem a bit confusing at the begining, I have include a bit more techincal
information on the various ports to help you understand more about them. To keep it simple, I
have categorised and colour coded them to show which ports match the table above:
4 bit ports
The port can do 8 bit byte output and 4 bit nibble input. These ports are often called
"unidirectional" and are most commonly found on desktop bus cards (also called IO expansion
cards, serial/parallel cards, or even 2S+P cards) and older laptops. This is still the most common
type of port, especially on desktop systems. 4 bit ports are capable of effective transfer rates of
about 40-60 KBytes per second in typical devices but can be pushed upwards of 140
KBytes/sec with certain design tricks.
8 bit ports
These ports can do both 8 bit input and output and are sometimes called "bidirectional ports"
but that term is often misused by vendors to refer to 4 bit ports as well. Most newer laptops
have 8 bit capability although it may need to be enabled with the laptop's vendor-specific
CMOS setup function. This is discussed below. A relatively smaller percentage of LPT bus
cards have 8bit capability that sometimes must be enabled with a hardware jumper on the board
itself. True 8 bit ports are preferable to 4 bit ports because they are considerably faster when
used with external devices that take advantage of the 8 bit capability. 8 bit ports are capable of
speeds ranging from 80-300 KBytes per second, again depending on the speed of the attached
device, the quality of the driver software and the port's electrical characteristics.
EPP ports
Can do both 8bit input and output at ISA bus speeds. These ports are as fast as 8 bit bus cards
and can achieve transfer rates upwards of 600 KByte per second. These ports are usually used
by non-printer peripheral devices such as external CDROMs, tape drives, hard drives, network
adaptors and more.
ECP ports

Can do both 8 bit input and output at bus speeds. The specification for this port type was jointly
developed by Microsoft and Hewlett-Packard. ECP ports are distinguished by having DMA
capability, on-board FIFOs at least 16 bytes deep, some hardware data compression capability
and are generally featured more than other ports. These ports are as fast as 8 bit bus cards and
can achieve transfer rates upwards of 1 Mbyte per second and faster on PCs whose buses will
support it. The design is capable of faster transfer rates in the future.
Laplink cable is used to link two PCs with MSDOS 6.0 or later very effectively by using
INTERSVR.EXE (on Host) and INTERLNK.EXE (on GUEST) PCs. But it can also be used
to data-transfer at faster speed with DCC Feature of Win9x/Me/2000.
Let's now have a quick look at the pinouts of an LPT port:

LPT Direct Connect Cable

As explained, there are different LPT ports, but the cable used is the same for all types of LPT
ports. Depending on your computer bios LPT settings you will be able to achieve different
speed transfers as outlined in the table above.
The picture below clearly shows the pinouts of the required cable:

One wire should be attached to the metal body of the Male pins on both sides, this is also shown
as the "metal body" on the diagram.
Now, because I understand how much trouble someone can fall into when trying to create a
cable and get it to work properly, I have included the DirectParallel Connection Monitor
Utility, for all the DCC users to troubleshoot and test DCC connection and cable on both
computers. It provides detailed information about the connection, the cable being used for the
connection, the I/O mode (4-bit, 8-bit, ECP, EPP), the parallel port types, I/O address, and IRQ.
And that pretty much finishes the discussion on Parallel Cable Connections!