DIY Ethernet Cable

[TomJ]

Hi Guys,

 

I have since found, on the advice of another forum, that CAT cables ripped, freed of all ballast (isulation, shielding, 2 twisted pair cables not used for 100BaseT) sound best - best resolution, detail and seperation of instruments/voices.

My LAN cables are only 2 twisted pairs from standard solid core cat 6a cables.

 

Now I am looking to improve this approach. 

 

I have been looking around the market for twisted pair cables (I want to use ready made twisted pair cables) that meet the specifications of Ethernet. Thereby I became aware of a new standard "Single pair ethernet". Ethernet is run over a twisted pair cable in full doublex. The cables are shielded and intended for industrial use. https://www.igus.de/info/single-pair-ethernet-spe-kabel
I first thought that the sound improvement comes from the high distance that the two twisted pairs have because of less interference and cross-talk.
But this is not so - my DIY "Double Single Ethernet" from two of these cables (one for TX and one for RX) can not reach the stripped cable.

 

Now I continue to search for cables that I can use for the DIY cable.

I have become aware of Belden Bonded technology. And that there is Plenum Cat cable in the US (I live in Germany) that has Teflon (FEN) insulation on the wires.

Could use two of the twisted pairs for my DIY cable.

 

Has anyone here ever compared Plenum cables with standard Cat cables and seen a difference? 
Likewise with Bonded Technology: are there any audible differences?

 

I've also become aware of cables from Gore that use Gore insulation, which is supposed to be superior to regular PTFE.
The cables are hard to get, as they are actually designed for military use and only sold there.
On Ebay there is a store that sells cables from this: https://www.ebay.com/itm/380833692654
The question here, however, is whether these cables have the required 100Ohm impedance.

 

I'm curious if someone has suggestions or experience on this.

 

Regards,

 

TomJ

 

 

[TomJ]

No one out there with some experience?

[plissken]

As a dual CCNP and ACEP (Cisco and HPE Aruba) I know a ton about networking and structured cabling.

 

Unfortunately when I tell you that the people making these recommendations have no idea what they are talking about it starts up a pages long thread were engineering outfits like Texas Instruments and Siemons, with heavily instrumented papers, showing what is going on with Data cabling are somehow ignored.

 

My advice is get UTP CAT5e from Panduit or Tripplite and to ignore the people giving you this advice.

[lpost]

'Unfortunately when I tell you that the people making these recommendations have now idea what they are talking about it starts up a pages long thread were engineering outfits like Texas Instruments Siemons with heavily instrumented papers showing what is going on with Data cabling are somehow ignored.' 

 

I wholeheartedly agree with @plissken

 

or ask Belden themselves. Galen Garis is now retired from Belden but had a hand in the design of nearly all Belden cables including Ethernet over the past 35 years. He's quite accessible on PS Audio forum if you'd like to learn from the horse's mouth.

 

P.S. I don't hold any certifications, those on my staff do, but I manage a large corporate Cisco network with HP Aruba wireless. We use and recommend Belden bonded cables. They resist change keeping the pairs in perfect position. The installers don't like the extra work to terminate but when you build a network to last 30 years+ it matters. Plenum cables have PTFE by code. If it burns you don't want the toxic PVC jacket getting into the HVAC system. The data doesn't care about the insulation type.

[jabbr]

I anyone wants to make their own state of the art Ethernet cables, then Belden REVConnect is as good as you (or anyone for that matter) can do. The only copper cables that are better than these are the ones they are smoking 🤷‍♂️

[lpost]

We just completed a large conference center build with REVConnect. With Covid I've never been to the site but I can see the lack of errors with the system ;).

 

I know the installers really liked the speed or time savings terminating them. That's how Belden sold it as a time saver. Time is money in the structure cable game. I believe one need a tool though which unless you need a bunch of cables I would just buy measured patch from Blue Jeans and call it a day.

 

I intended to mention to the OP, all he's done is completely violate the Ethernet spec and yet to its robustness it still works! At least over the short distances in a house or patch cable.

 

Don't use shielded cable unless you're in a noisy industrial environment. It's a waste otherwise and few it any home installations are going to be properly grounded network systems anyway. The shield only serves as a potential noise conduit between two devices.

 

I prefer bonded 5 (or 5e) UTP for home use with measurements to ensure it meets spec. A 'better' cable can do no better.

[plissken]

4 minutes ago, lpost said:

I believe one need a tool though which unless you need a bunch of cables I would just buy measured patch from Blue Jeans and call it a day.

 

I know Tripplite guarantees their patch to pass ISO spec.

[lpost]

Good to know and have another source.  When I started in networking in the late 80s I had to deal with vampire taps (remember those?), 10base2 'cheapernet' and AppleTalk over 2 wire or was it 4 wire telephone line cord all in the same buildings, all 3 types! I still work for the same company all these years later. We've not gone beyond dual 10Gbit uplinks as we simply don't require it but it's nice to know 40G and 100G is now readily available and 400G is possible. With the exception of upsampling 192k-24bit PCM to even higher rates we still don't need more than 100Mb/s for audio and even most video.

 

Oh how things have improved and in many ways become must simpler.

 

It seems about every 10 years we replace our network core because they approach EOL. End of the month a pair of Nexus 7k are being replaced with a pair of 9606R. The Nexus replaced a pair of Cat6513 with 13 years service and before that a 10M Cisco router running in bridge mode! Silliness.

 

Be safe out there and don't hack Ethernet cables for no good reason.

[plissken]

14 minutes ago, lpost said:

I intended to mention to the OP, all he's done is completely violate the Ethernet spec and yet to its robustness it still works! At least over the short distances in a house or patch cable.

 

Need to mention that if you force your interface to 100Mbit you are only on two pair... No need for modifying the cable.

[jabbr]

21 minutes ago, lpost said:

We just completed a large conference center build with REVConnect. With Covid I've never been to the site but I can see the lack of errors with the system ;).

 

I know the installers really liked the speed or time savings terminating them. That's how Belden sold it as a time saver. Time is money in the structure cable game. I believe one need a tool though which unless you need a bunch of cables I would just buy measured patch from Blue Jeans and call it a day.

 

 

I use BJC and don't argue with that advice. I've personally migrated to fiberoptic ... for the sake of disussion, when making your own  Ethernet cables, Belden bonded is the way to go -- you ***can't*** roll your own cable that comes close, and if you don't understand it, then let's just forget talking (not you @lpost but anyone reading). If anyone is concerned about RF/EMI then it should be obvious that fiberoptic has an inherent benefit, yet for the sake of discussion here, the termination is the "weak area" of Ethernet cables ... so you have to untwist carefully etc ... fine for 1Gbe but 10Gbe is much more sensitive to impedance mismatch at the connector. REVConnect is a brilliant solution. and yeah it's quick too.

 

*** of course if you are smoking your own hand rolled cables and listening to Pink Floyd, its all good too!

[plissken]

2 minutes ago, lpost said:

Good to know and have another source.  When I started in networking in the late 80s I had to deal with vampire taps (remember those?), 10base2 'cheapernet' and AppleTalk over 2 wire or was it 4 wire telephone line cord all in the same buildings, all 3 types! I still work for the same company all these years later. We've not gone beyond dual 10Gbit uplinks as we simply don't require it but it's nice to know 40G and 100G is now readily available and 400G is possible. With the exception of upsampling 192k-24bit PCM to even higher rates we still don't need more than 100Mb/s for audio and even most video.

 

Oh how things have improved and in many ways become must simpler.

 

It seems about every 10 years we replace our network core because they approach EOL. End of the month a pair of Nexus 7k are being replaced with a pair of 9606R. The Nexus replaced a pair of Cat6513 with 13 years service and before that a 10M Cisco router running in bridge mode! Silliness.

 

Be safe out there and don't hack Ethernet cables for no good reason.

 

Yep, thinnet over RG59. I also did Appletalk and hand crimped many 110 ohm resistor into an RJ11 for appletalk termination.

 

Novell, Banyan Vines, DECNet, LanTastic.

[lpost]

I've tried FO in my setup a number of times, as I have access to many flavors of patch and SFP. Depending on the implementation, I've found the PCI-e NIC to make more noise than the fiber link removed. Not needing the RF immunity I didn't hunt for 'better cards' or transceivers and remain completely happy with copper.

[TomJ]

Hi all,

 

thanks for your recommendations.

 

But regarding Ethernet cable and sound I think it is not about data integrity.

I was longtime a believer that if once the data arrives without error caused by jitter or something else, the sound could bot be effected.

But I learned that Ethernet cable can for sure effect the sound, maybe in the same way or  maybe more than analoge cable.

I think it depends on geometry and material. But this is very cloudy and one is groping in the dark. Maybe it has something to do how the cable handles the frequencies and produces itself HF noise which affect then the process aof converting digital to analog in the DAC.

 

I think ethernet engineers cant help here - they will think I'm crazy. 

All I can say is, that the stripped 2x2 TP cable without isolation are the most resolving i heard so far.

If you have an old patchcord, just give it a try - remove the overall isolation and cut the unused wires.

 

As I know the isolation (e.g. PTFE) of the wire in the analoge sector makes a difference, maybe this is also valid for Ethernet cable.

 

 

 

 

[lpost]

Just now, plissken said:

Novell, Banyan Vines, DECNet, LanTastic.

Wow, I haven't thought about some of these names in years. Novell 2.15c, ah the good ol' days. Novell's directory from 1995 still beats MS AD 2019 in features but that war has long since been lost. Reminds me of Beta vs. VHS. The better doesn't always win.

[plissken]

Enjoy then....

 

[lpost]

2 minutes ago, TomJ said:

I think cant help here - they will think I'm crazy. 

All I can say is, that the stripped 2x2 TP cable without isolation are the most resolving i heard so far.

If you have an old patchcord, just give it a try - remove the overall isolation and cut the unused wires.

 

As I know the isolation (e.g. PTFE) of the wire in the analoge sector makes a difference, maybe this is also valid for Ethernet cable.

 

 

 

 

Enjoy the experimentation, it's a hobby and since it's low voltage no one dies.

[jabbr]

 

[TomJ]

2 minutes ago, lpost said:

Enjoy the experimentation, it's a hobby and since it's low voltage no one dies.

Yes, thats what I will do.

Problem with Belden Plenum cable is, I have to order it in the US with high shipping cost.

Meanwhile I have also an offer for Gore Ethernet cable made for airforce use - but 150€ per meter.....

[plissken]

1 hour ago, lpost said:

but I manage a large corporate Cisco network with HP Aruba wireless.

 

Are you getting hammered by the chip shortage yet? We are having issues with anything with an SFP cage. We are forecasted out till June now on some SKU's.

[TomJ]

22 minutes ago, lpost said:

Be safe out there and don't hack Ethernet cables for no good reason.

Isnt music and sound a good reason?

[lpost]

No, got lucky and managed to get the Cisco order fulfilled without issue. Lead time was 3 months but I didn't care at all. I expect the shortages will get worse.

 

Last year, cable was in short supply. Belden nearly screwed us saying they couldn't supply more than have the bonded pair they had committed to provide. In the end, they 'found' it. Almost had a half and half install.

[TomJ]

Regarding Belden Bonded technology, there is a good demonstration how this improves the impedance stability on youtube: 

 

[lpost]

That is Galen Garis, the man.

[plissken]

I just want to make sure that we are talking about something like this:

 

 

[TomJ]

3 minutes ago, lpost said:

That is Galen Garis, the man.

Ok, will register on PS Audio and try to contact the master....