Hardware·18,976 discussions

Structured Zones Cabling

Locked

Over the past few years there has been a movement to run data in office inviroments in what is call a structured zone system. What this means a consolidation points placed in strategic place in the building allowing an outlet tag to go from these points to the end users desk. this does seem like a good system as it does cut costs on reconfigerations in the building. What I am looking for is some technical literature that supports this type of installation. I seem to find a lot of literature on the net supporting the old concept of homeruning all caabling but there has to be some somewhere talking about this as it seems to be very popular in many areas. Does anyone know a web site that could help me out?

Topic

Reply To: Structured Zones Cabling

In reply to Structured Zones Cabling

Try http://tinyurl.com/xrr0 for the International Engineering Consortium tutorials and references.

Sounds to me like a new name for an old approach. The Premise Distribution System consolidated horizontal runs to “closets” for cross connect to horizontal runs. Where the “closets” were placed was always a matter of choice provided distance limitations were observed, and the use of fiber for the vertical riser goes back to the early 1980’s although it wasn’t under any standards.

Network Cabling magazine http://tinyurl.com/xrtz covered a number of points in March of 2000.

Annexter always does a good job of explaining their products. See http://tinyurl.com/xru8

Reply To: Structured Zones Cabling

In reply to Structured Zones Cabling

Homerun is a term out of telephone wiring not networking.
The practice of having a “wiring closet” in each section, and a “Riser” as the “Trunk” or “Backbone” (depending on configuration, etc. ) is done, not to assist in upgrades; it is done to insure proper network response and reliability.
A “home run system”, as you would use in a telephone installation, would be a nightmare.
The excessive collision problem would be an almost continuous occurance. Isolating problems would be more difficult, and the excessive cable runs would be out of bounds.
That is just for starters.
Even small companies do not use “home run” anymore.
The last one I saw was over ten years ago.
Everybody uses segmented networks with backbone.
There may be some people using new vocabulary as a fad, but network design is pretty stable, and a commodity item.
(That’s probably why the hype.)
Regards, Chris

Reply To: Structured Zones Cabling

In reply to Structured Zones Cabling

We have been doing this since the 60’s. It is simple economics.

16 offices on a floor times 200′ to the computer room is more expensive than a 16 port hub and one home run.

Lee

[Author]

Replies