Wiring For Your House – Make It Cat5 Cable

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Cat5 Cable - Wiring Information and Tips

I don't care whether you have a 100 year old home or a new one that is being built. All homes today need Cat5 cable. What is this? It is a new standard of wiring that can network computers and appliances and take care of telephone needs all in one.

Category 5 wiring is low voltage cable. It has 4 pairs of wires within one cable. The coloring of the wires is standardized. You will find a solid blue, green, orange, and brown wire. Twisted around each of these is a white wire that has a same color tracer on the wire. So you will have a solid blue twisted with a white wire that has blue dashes or streaks on it.

Cat5 cable allows you to network different electronic devices.

What is really cool about this wiring is that you can network a computer to another one and have two different phone lines all in the same space as you would normally have a regular duplex outlet! Not only that, there is actually space within the box and special outlets for three other connections.

Here is an example of what I am talking about. This is a photo of a special outlet system made by the Wiremold company. In this particular outlet, I have four different phone connections for the four different lines in my office. Notice the blank filler piece in between the phone plugs. I can easily remove the blank and insert a single outlet that would allow me to network my computer to another one. Cat5 wire should be extended to every location in a house where you think you might have a computer or an appliance. In the future, many things may be networked together. Use the right wire and make sure it says Cat 5 and has a UL stamp on it!

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