The word LAN, whose full form reads as Local Area Network, is very useful in the sharing of software, hardware, and or information. The resource sharing that this breed of network provides, improves efficiency and reduces overhead.
LAN is a system that liaisons together a wide range of electronic office equipment, and frames a network within the area of an office and or building. LAN cabling is structured around the above mentioned format, and is used for computer networks, that more often than not, cover a limited range.
Four basic varieties of media are applied in LANs. These are coaxial cable, twisted pair wires, wireless, and fiber optic cable. From these four types of media, the preferred medium of choice for high speed local area networks happens to be fiber optic cable. LAN cabling plays an important role in the physical layout of a network, and the most commonly seen LAN topology is the bus. A message carried over a bus spreads in both directions and goes through each tap, till the time that it is eventually soaked up at the ends.
There is a very interesting side to the LAN cabling story, and that is the fact of it being generically called UTP. The above short form stands for Unshielded Twisted Pair, and it is common knowledge that UTP are identified with a category rating. UTP comes in two forms, solid or stranded. Generally speaking, solid cable is used for backbone wiring, and the stranded variety is used for PC to wall plug cables.
A vast majority of buildings with existing LAN wiring plants, will not change over to the new T568A LAN cabling standard, until such time as the building is either left alone or abandoned, or goes through a major remodeling project. This is one area of LAN cabling which must be borne in mind.   

This entry was posted on Monday, November 10th, 2008 at 4:04 pm and is filed under The practical implications of LAN cabling. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.