he diagram below: www.whatis.com)CategoryMaximum data rateUsual applicationCAT 1Less than 1 MbpsAnalog voice (plain old telephone service)ISDN Basic Rate InterfaceDoorbell wiringCAT 24 MbpsMainly used in the IBM Cabling System for Token Ring networksCAT 316 MbpsVoice and data on 10BASE-T EthernetCAT 420 MbpsUsed in 16Mbps Token RingOtherwise not used muchCAT 5100 Mbps100 Mbps TPDDI155 Mbps ATMAs you can see, the twisted pairs can range greatly in bandwidth by the different levels of CATs. For a LAN environment, the CAT 2 and above are used because they can transmit greater amounts of data. These generally are used for Token Ring LANs except for the CAT 3, which is only supported by the Ethernet LANs. Most companies who have networks in the offices use twisted pair system to run their LAN. Using the twisted pair media for LANs is very attractive because of its low cost; mainly the UTP setup because it cost much less than the STPs and the STP cabling are far more difficult to put into walls than the UTPs. On the other hand, the risk of going with the twisted pair setup is the instability of the data flow because it’s susceptibility to line interference.The coaxial cabling is known as the “Original LAN Media” (www.datapro.com). The Coaxial cable is similar to the copper wires with the exception that one wire is braided or solid sheath that encompasses the other wire. Insulation material separates the two wires, the center wire is at high signal level, and the shield wire is at ground potential. The grounding of the outer shielding wire means that interference cannot penetrate the coaxial cable and induce noise onto the circuit. Shielded also do not radiate signals to other circuits as non-shielded circuits. The coaxial media also has two variations. The “thick” Ethernet, which runs on RG-8 coaxial cabling with a diameter of 0.4” and the “thin” Ethernet, which uses RG-58 coaxial ca...
