Video Transmission/Control Devices

weird experience CAT5E

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si_kungs - 25 Jun 2008, 10:47 pm

we just finished a 3 day installation today. we used CAT5E as signal cable and the weird thing is only the pair of green and orange shows good picture quality. while the pair of blue and brown will give black and white picture and distorted video. what we did was to run a new CAT5E and just use the pair of green and orange. what do you think is the problem with these? can't the CAT5E handle the four video signal? or the cable i used was poor quality? does this have an issue with the computer color coding scheme (only pair of green and orange was used for computer also and not the blue and brown)

thewireguys - 25 Jun 2008, 11:41 pm

Did you certify the runs? That will tell you what is wrong.

si_kungs - 25 Jun 2008, 11:44 pm

yes. we installed 16 cameras . so i just run four cat5E and just tap the camera along the way. we noticed that only the pair of green and orange only showed good picture quality while the remaining pair give poor quality and distorted picture. the length of the wire is around 100m to 120m.

thewireguys - 26 Jun 2008, 12:24 am

What tool did you use to certify the runs? Mine tells me the length of each pair to the foot.

So you are using passive baluns for the video? Who makes them?

si_kungs - 26 Jun 2008, 12:33 am

i'm using passive balun from china. i didn't use any tool. i just connect the camera to a pair and check the video to check if it is good. what tool are you using? even at short run it seems that the pair of blue and brown has a problem. i don't know if this was caused by the cable. have you experienced this? have you tried using up all the 4 pairs?

thewireguys - 26 Jun 2008, 12:50 am

This is the tester I use to certify my network runs. It will tell you if anything is wrong with pairs. I normally use IP cameras but when I use cat5 for anything else I test them with this.

http://www.jdsu.com/product-literature/Validator_Ethernet_speed_certifier_overview.pdf

si_kungs - 26 Jun 2008, 01:00 am

it also acts like a TDR. i think it was a bad batch of CAT5E.

cocacola - 26 Jun 2008, 05:35 am

QUOTE:
i'm using passive balun from china. i didn't use any tool. i just connect the camera to a pair and check the video to check if it is good. what tool are you using? even at short run it seems that the pair of blue and brown has a problem. i don't know if this was caused by the cable. have you experienced this? have you tried using up all the 4 pairs?

blue, orange, green and brown have a all diverted twist.
I thinks thats the problem, why have you not used cat 6? same price and better quality:-)

You can see it clearly on my picture the deliverance between orange en blue:

[img]http://s6.photobucket.com/albums/y213/Zeta_0049/?action=view&current=HPIM0334.jpg[/img]

Here a other picture, green and blue have the same longer twist:
[img]http://s6.photobucket.com/albums/y213/Zeta_0049/?action=view&current=HPIM0320.jpg[/img]

si_kungs - 26 Jun 2008, 05:39 am

[quote:54af1781e4="cocacola"]

blue, orange, green and brown have a all diverted twist.
You can see it clearly on my picture the deliverance between orange en blue:

[img]http://s6.photobucket.com/albums/y213/Zeta_0049/?action=view&current=HPIM0334.jpg[/img]

Here a other picture, green and blue heve the same twist:
[img]http://s6.photobucket.com/albums/y213/Zeta_0049/?action=view&current=HPIM0320.jpg[/img]

yes there is a twist. did you tried running 4 cams on a single cat5e?

cocacola - 26 Jun 2008, 05:42 am

[quote:d3bb37d91b="si_kungs"][quote:d3bb37d91b="cocacola"]

yes there is a twist. did you tried running 4 cams on a single cat5e?

si_kungs - 26 Jun 2008, 07:25 am

[quote:57a46a68cf="cocacola"]

QUOTE:
ok. just shared what i experienced till now i don't know what went wrong. strange :(

The runs are to long for 2 pairs of the 4 pair.
Can you not run a second cat5 cable? or upgrade it to a cat 6 cable, that will work maybe..

that's what i did. i run a second cat5 cable. the original plan was to run four cat5 cables and utilize all the wires then the distorted pictures came up. even if the run for the (blue or brown pair ) was short the picture was distorted. so after figuring out that only green and blue pair is good. we rerun another four wire. only green and orange pair were used the picture was good. at first we thought it was the balun because the run was short. then we tried to swap the good cameras and it was still the same. then we tried switching the wire and we got it.

since the the four pair inside the cat5e have same length. it should work for all the color since only the color of the insulator is not the same. but unfortunately it did not. strange isn't it? :D