Meridian Unplugged - Powered by MrTechGuy.co.uk Forums Discussion Meridian - Systems cat5 or cat6 advice needed

OUCH!! And there really is no benefit to using the M cable? Hmm hard to justify that one.

found this . Whats the difference in the 3 versions ( im only a plumber )

http://www.minitran.co.uk/pages/pro...ter=Cat7%20Cable&manufacturer=Nexans

unfortunatley its in 100m increments and i only want about 21m . any one else want some .

neil

Meridialien posted the following link to Speakerlink;

http://www.Meridian-audio.info/show.php?compid=223

In this document Meridian state "No cables are supplied with the product as you can use standard Ethernet cabling as long as it is STP (Shielded Twisted Pair) CAT 5 or 6 cable. You may need to meet additional standards when installing cable in-wall, but as far as SpeakerLink is concerned, CAT 5/6 STP is all there is to it."


I think it is important to note that all Meridian RJ45 sockets found on the AC11, DSP speakers, HD621 have the metal frame around the socket that earths the shielding within shielded cable, hence Meridian's recommendation to use STP Cat 5 or Cat 6.

Therefore it would be foolish to go with plain vanilla Cat 5 cable without shielding, particularly given the purchase costs of the equipment being connected !


Cheers,


Steve

Looks perfect , Neil . If I ever finish racking my system I may use it as well as I'm toying with the idea of a hi-spec cable and balun instead of the movable feast that is HDMI . Might be worth checking with M that its GG45 connectors which are backward compatible with RJ45 are ok for use with 7200s . I'm sure they are but better safe than sorry ??



~M~

We don't seem to have reached the stage of silver-plated, OFC OCC Cat cables yet!

Has anyone got any real world experience of using Cat7a in a DIY project?

I wired my existing home with CAT5e and it was not a problem, but when I move home I am looking to future proof possibly using CAT7a dual/shotgun and we intend to build an office/study in the garden so would want to cable to take a multitude of services, including phone, video (bi directional) and gigibit (or faster) network plus ofcourse, any Meridian standard such as speakerlink or MMHR. I have had no experience of the (GG45?) connectors needed to wire CAT7 nor how it works in wall sockets.

Ideally looking for CAT7a low/zero skew cable suitable for video and speakerlink applications - ie better than network/data grade to minimise data skew between each pair of TP's.

Ian:

I personally don't see the value beyond Cat6.

Video? Multiple Cat6/Cat6a would work fine. An entire HDMI link @60i / 30p is < 2Gbits/second.

Speakerlink? Doesn't exceed 5 Mbits/channel (24*192000)

I seriously doubt you could hear or see any difference with the Cat7 cabling.

You'd be able to see the difference quite easily.

In your bank balance.

John's right. Cat 6 is more than plenty until M come up with a human teleportation device.

dpstjp

For short point to point runs, I completely agree, but in the grand scheme of things, the small additional cost of cat7 means that I can get a couple of backbones in that will carry all my future needs multiple digital and analogue services over a long cable run.

Its whether the practical limitations of cat 7 termination by a DIYer outweigh the possibility of having to replace underground services to my outdoors office in 5 or 10 years time.

Cat 6a is good to 100m @ 10Gbit. Are you going more than 100m or 10 Gbit?

As I say, future needs. 10 years ago when I wired the house for 10Mb/s I would not have believed that I would have been needing well in excess of 100Mb/s. Thankfully I overspecced and there was no need to change the infrastructure.

Its going to cost about �100 extra to do the job in dual/shotgun Cat7 so its worth seriously considering. I just don't have practical experience of Cat7, GG45 and applicable wall sockets to know whether the hassle of this will be worth it.

Old thread, but i just fond out what the speakerlink cabling costs.
I had to tell which length cable i would need, so i told 10m and 2 x 15m

The dealer called me that he now received the cables and with that a bill for over 400 Euro. The distributor made a mistake since the cables are not included with a 5200 it seems. So they offered 50% discount.

Since i can get terminated cat6 STP for like 1 Euro per meter on-line, it seems useless to pay like 5 Euro per meter for Meridian stp.

So it seems to cost like 10 Euro per meter new..