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Category 3 cable, commonly known as or station wire, and less commonly known as VG or voice-grade (as, for example, in 100BaseVG), is an
was widely used in
How Low Voltage Cable is Made - Cat5e, Cat6, Cat3 and OSP
{{DEFAULTSORT:Category 3 Cable Ethernet cables
Category 3 cable, commonly known as or station wire, and less commonly known as VG or voice-grade (as, for example, in 100BaseVG), is an unshielded twisted pair
Twisted pair cabling is a type of communications cable in which two conductors of a single Electronic circuit, circuit are twisted together for the purposes of improving electromagnetic compatibility. Compared to a Single-ended signaling, sin ...
(UTP) cable used in telephone
A telephone, colloquially referred to as a phone, is a telecommunications device that enables two or more users to conduct a conversation when they are too far apart to be easily heard directly. A telephone converts sound, typically and most ...
wiring. It is part of a family of standards defined jointly by the Electronic Industries Alliance
The Electronic Industries Alliance (EIA; until 1997 Electronic Industries Association) was an American standards organization, standards and trade organization composed as an alliance of trade associations for electronics manufacturers in the ...
(EIA) and the Telecommunications Industry Association
The Telecommunications Industry Association (TIA) is accredited by the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) to develop voluntary, consensus-based industry standards for a wide variety of information and communication technology (Informat ...
(TIA) and published in TIA/EIA-568-B
ANSI/TIA-568 is a technical standard for commercial building cabling for telecommunications products and services. The title of the standard is ''Commercial Building Telecommunications Cabling Standard'' and is published by the Telecommunications ...
.
Although designed to reliably carry data up to , modern data networks run at much higher speeds, and or better cable is generally used for new installations. Cat 3 cables may have 2, 3, 4, or more pairs.
Networking
was widely used in computer network
A computer network is a collection of communicating computers and other devices, such as printers and smart phones. In order to communicate, the computers and devices must be connected by wired media like copper cables, optical fibers, or b ...
ing in the early 1990s for 10BASE-T
1 (one, unit, unity) is a number, numeral, and glyph. It is the first and smallest positive integer of the infinite sequence of natural numbers. This fundamental property has led to its unique uses in other fields, ranging from science to sp ...
Ethernet and, to a much lesser extent, for 100BaseVG Ethernet, Token Ring
Token Ring is a Physical layer, physical and data link layer computer networking technology used to build local area networks. It was introduced by IBM in 1984, and standardized in 1989 as IEEE Standards Association, IEEE 802.5. It uses a sp ...
and 100BASE-T4. The original Power over Ethernet
Power over Ethernet (PoE) describes any of several technical standard, standards or ad hoc systems that pass electric power along with data on twisted-pair Ethernet cabling. This allows a single cable to provide both a data connection and en ...
802.3af specification supports the use of cable, but the later 802.3at Type 2 high-power variation does not.IEEE 802.3at-2009, clause 33.1.1c In some use cases and for short distances, Cat 3 may be capable of carrying 100BASE-TX (2 pairs) or even 1000BASE-T (4 pairs). Such use cases include hobbyist retrofitting short home telephone Cat 3 networks for Ethernet.
Dedicated 100BASE-T4 networks, supporting over Cat 3, appear to have been a rarity as very few network interface controllers and switches were ever released. Some examples include the 3com
3Com Corporation was an American digital electronics manufacturer best known for its computer network products. The company was co-founded in 1979 by Robert Metcalfe, Howard Charney and others. Bill Krause joined as President in 1981. Metcalfe ex ...
3C250-T4 Superstack II HUB 100, IBM
International Business Machines Corporation (using the trademark IBM), nicknamed Big Blue, is an American Multinational corporation, multinational technology company headquartered in Armonk, New York, and present in over 175 countries. It is ...
8225 Fast Ethernet Stackable Hub and Intel
Intel Corporation is an American multinational corporation and technology company headquartered in Santa Clara, California, and Delaware General Corporation Law, incorporated in Delaware. Intel designs, manufactures, and sells computer compo ...
LinkBuilder FMS 100 T4. The same applies to network interface controller
A network interface controller (NIC, also known as a network interface card, network adapter, LAN adapter and physical network interface) is a computer hardware component that connects a computer to a computer network.
Early network interface ...
cards. Bridging 100BASE-T4 with 100BASE-TX required additional network equipment.
Replacement
Starting in the mid-1990s, newstructured cabling
In telecommunications, structured cabling is building or campus cabling infrastructure that consists of a number of standardized smaller elements (hence structured) called subsystems. Structured cabling components include twisted pair and opt ...
installations were often built with the higher performing cable required by 100BASE-TX
In computer networking, Fast Ethernet physical layers carry traffic at the nominal rate of . The prior Ethernet speed was . Of the Fast Ethernet physical layers, 100BASE-TX is by far the most common.
Fast Ethernet was introduced in 1995 as t ...
. or is now used for all modern structured cabling installations. Many large institutions have policies that any upgrade to a network using must involve upgrading to .
See also
* Copper cable certificationReferences
External links
How Low Voltage Cable is Made - Cat5e, Cat6, Cat3 and OSP
{{DEFAULTSORT:Category 3 Cable Ethernet cables