Hi,
I’ve just read this article about sufficient cabling for SLink:
https://support.allen-heath.com/hc/en-gb/articles/38290033891985-SLink-Connections
There it states that STP cables are the best and UTP is not supported. But when searching for EtherCon cables, I mostly find S/FTP and SF/UTP type. Are those also allowed? If not, where can I find STP etherCon cables?
Thanks in advance.
This might help explain the differences…..https://www.universalnetworks.co.uk/faq/what-does-utp-s-utp-ftp-stp-and-sftp-mean/
UTP (really U/UTP) cable doesn’t have any shielding to help prevent interference. This is why it is not supported. All of the other cables have at least one layer of shielding - either braided (S) or foil (F) - to help prevent interference.
Long story short, as long as the cable as either a foil or braided shield, it should be fine for SLink use IMHO. The higher rated cables might have both type of shielding or several layers of shielding which should work even better.
S/FTP and SF/UTP both have a layer of braided shielding and a layer of foil shielding. The difference in just whether the shielding surrounds the entire wire, or the individual pairs of wires.
In my experience, foil shielded stranded Cat5e cable works fine out to recommended 100m (300’), at least as far as Dante goes. Stranded works best for me because I am all mobile. Coils better and rolls out flat if you “over/under” it. If I were doing an install, I’d use foil shielded solid Cat5e.
If you need custom cables, feel free to PM me.
D.
Most installers use CAT7 cables these days.
@User9595
Nearly all cables used in the event industry are at least STP.
Don’t buy the cheapest you can find, sometimes they will tend to fail from time to time with no obvious reason.
Sorry I wasn’t clear. If I were doing a Dante install . . . . I have no experience but I have been told that using Cat6 or Cat7 cable is detrimental for use in a Dante network because the tight wrap causes maximum distances to be shortened considerably. I have specified Cat5e for all my Dante cables and have had perfect response even with big networks. No experience with huge, but I do’t have much doubt.
I’ll check in with Audinate to see what they say and report back.
D.
That is wrong. Nothing more to say.
Dante is using normal Ethernet, as it is using normal TCP/IP protocol.
Any Ethernet network capable of running 1Gbit is suitable for Dante.
S-link and the rest of A&H own protocols, I have used Cat5E UTP up to 50M without any problems, now I have changed to Cat6 S/FTP though due to more and more RF interference from other sources (solar installs, celluar/mobile networks etc)
Here is the reply I got from Audinate Technical Support, FWIW:
“That’s standard networking, not Dante specific.
The limitation of Cat6 is against 10GbE speeds, not 1GbE.
So if you’re not trying to go 300ft with a 10Gb Ethernet cable, the limitation doesn’t matter as much. Wiki:
Category 6 cable (Cat 6) is a standardized twisted pair cable for Ethernet and other network physical layers that is backward compatible with the Category 5/5e and Category 3 cable standards.
Cat 6 must meet more stringent specifications for crosstalk and system noise than Cat 5 and Cat 5e. The cable standard specifies performance of up to 250 MHz, compared to 100 MHz for Cat 5 and Cat 5e.[1]
Whereas Category 6 cable has a reduced maximum length of 55 metres (180 ft) when used for 10GBASE-T, Category 6A cable is specified for 500 MHz and has improved alien crosstalk characteristics, allowing 10GBASE-T to be run for the same 100-metre (330 ft) maximum distance as previous Ethernet over twisted pair variants.”
D.
Dave Rat has a series of videos about this topic:
BR,
HP
AES 50 IS NOT ETHERNET!!!
That is unrelated.
That’s true Steffen,
what I wanted to show was a series of videos about signal quality in (S/)FTP Cables. There are several of them on Daves channel.
Lenght vs. CAT. That’s it.
I apologize if that bothered you.
BR,
HP