If you were refurbishing a large office.

.... would you go fibre at this point or stick with CAT V?

[trillianjedi]

Someone asked me this the other day and I thought it was an interesting dilema.

Take a lifespan of the refurb at 7-10 years and the fact that cabling again after doing this would be a nuisance (though not impossible), would you take the opportunity to go for a fibre run around the building to strategic points where you can access the cables, even if you didn't need or use the fibre immediately?

I remember an office re-fit we did in 1993 and had a 10-base-2 network (or whatever that old coaxial based 2mb system was called). We thought it would be plenty at the time. The downside we discovered later (we were badly advised) was not so much speed, but that we couldn't use the cable for a subsequent PBX that was installed in 1995. Data and telephones tend to use CAT V. It's the "universal" cable of today, but what will be the "universal" cable of tomorrow?

Some considerations I guess would include things like "Does fibre date?" - i.e. are there different types of fibre optic cables, or are they all based on a standard likely to last the next 10 years?

I can see a time when all data, telephony and video is run over fibre. I'm just not exactly sure when that's likely to be.

I don't have this dilema by the way. My office is small and cabling here is easy so we can do it as and when. I just thought it was an interesting question.

TJ

[uncle_bob]

Neither - I'd install Cat 6, which supports Gigabit Ethernet (1000Mbps) (along with 10Mbps/100Mbps/Phones).

Most office networks are running happily at 100Mbps so you've built in plenty of room for growth, at almost no more cost installing Cat 5.

Just my 2c worth

[bateman_ap]

When we moved into an office a couple of years ago this question was brought up. We ended up installing this hollow tubing throughout alongside Cat6 for when we wanted to finally install fibre. Apparantly they could push the fibre through without having to take up the floor again. The cost was literally pennies and was quite a good future proofing idea.

[lovethecoast]

bateman beat me to it! We just built a new house and installed PVC throughout so we can run new cabling in the future.

With wireless becoming more and more prevalent though, I'm not sure how much worry we need to place on any of this stuff.

S

[trillianjedi]

PVC is a great idea - is it really that easy to "push" cables through it though? Don't things get stuck?

With wireless becoming more and more prevalent though, I'm not sure how much worry we need to place on any of this stuff.

Security is still an issue for an office, if not so much in the home.

TJ

[bateman_ap]

Don't think wireless will easily match the speeds that you need for transporting multi gb files around as well!

[ncreegan]

Security is still an issue for an office, if not so much in the home.

A hugely overlooked issue at that. Plus, cable saves you the hassle of wave interference, crossing networks, and it's always faster and more reliable -- wireless is great , but only when you *need* it!