INFORMATION SHEET 2.

4-1
Cable Networking Techniques

Learning Objectives:

After reading this INFORMATION SHEET, YOU MUST be able to:

1. Set up network cable

Introduction

Good cable management defined is making cables, cords, and wires cleanly
and neatly arranged, and it facilitates easy tracing of cables and simplifies
replacing bad cables. A lot of time, these are all mutually exclusive, so we
concentrate on the task at hand and taylor our cable management to that end.
It also promotes good air flow in the back of the machines, which should be
reason enough to do it.

SERVER CABLE MANAGEMENT

Cable management is, to a lot of people, something you would rather be done
with than do. It’s also far easier to do when you don’t have to take down the
network or power from a running system. For this reason, it’s important to
keep it in mind in the beginning, when you’re figuring out how you are going to
cram all those wires wherever they need to go. The job isn’t made easier by the
huge number of places wires have to go, nor by the types of wires that you’re
dealing with. Lets break it down a little and see what the best policies are for
each.

Shelved Computers
Whether this is a scene from your work, or your basement, almost all of us
have been there. Industrial shelving with tower servers everywhere. Wild
tangles of cable in the back, probably inaccessible against the wall, where they
attract dust bunnies and cobwebs. It’s not ideal, but it’s all a lot of us have to
deal with. What do you do to make it useful?

First, if your shelves are against the wall, pull it out at least a foot, if at all
possible. The amount of heat being built up in the back is immense, and with
nowhere to go, you’re just baking the back of your equipment. Once you’ve got
some space back there, you can go to work.

The major problem with industrial shelving is that it’s not meant to hold
servers, and there-for it has no cable management. It’s easy to add your own. I
have several runs of plastic cable runs that are open sided, with fingers to hold
cable. Here’s an example:

They can be several feet long, and work great on industrial shelves. Just mount
them to the back of each shelf layer, and run your cables through there. Since
they have the fingers, you just pull the cable out of the run and into the server
where-ever you need. It works great, and looks neat and tidy.

It is important to remember that long runs of power cable should not be mixed
with network cable. It would be best to run your ethernet cable along the top
shelf, and power across the middle shelf. That would keep them separated, so
as not to create massive packet loss.

If your cable duct is like those in the picture, with a “lid” to keep the cables
contained, then great! Use it! They snap on and off easily, and really improve
the look and airflow. They do make cheap ones without that cover though. I
know because I have several. In that case, you’re going to want to secure the
cables together, so they don’t fall out of the channel. For this task, lots of
admins use plastic zip ties. That was my preferred tool, as well, until I
discovered that velcro ties. They’re just as easy, reusable, and you don’t have to
carry wire cutters to snip that last 6 inches of extra plastic. These qualities
pale in comparison to the fact that, when you need to replace a cable at 3 in
the morning, you don’t need to find the wirecutters that you carry with you
during the day. It’s just “rriiiipp” and you have access to your cables. I cannot
recommend these highly enough for any cable runs that you foresee replacing.
Typical Server Rack
The other major form factor for servers is rackmount. If you’ve never used it
before, you might want to check the introduction I wrote a while back.

Since racks ARE meant to hold servers, all but the least expensive have built-in
cable management. Typically there are channels running vertically up and
down the back corners with access points placed intermittently along the way.
Ideally, all your servers would have power cords on one side and network
cables on the other. This is pretty much never the case. Still, I have all of my
ethernet on the right side (if you’re standing looking at the rack from behind it),
and all my power on the left.

One note, when it comes to installing servers in the rack. Lots of servers (Dell, I
know for sure. HP maybe) come with cable arms for the back of the rack. They
flex and pivot, and are meant to allow you to pull the server out the front of the
rack without having to unplug any of the cables. If your rack is low density,
they’re only mostly irritating, but if you’ve got several machines close together,
the cable arms are a menace. They block airflow, hold heat, and I can count
the number of times I’ve wanted to pull a server out while it was still on at 0.
They’re completely worthless to me, so I don’t install them. I’ll leave the
decision to you, but my advice is that they make excellent ballast for empty
garbage cans.

Cable length makes up a big part of keeping a rack clean, too. Assuming you
have a typical 42u rack, the farthest apart two network ports can be is just
over 6ft. Assuming you want to square off the corners and run the cable in
straight lines, it’s just over 9ft. Thus, you should never have a cable on your
rack longer than 10ft. If you place your switches intelligently (in this case,
facing the back of the rack, and in the middle, at around 21u from the bottom),
you can cut that in half, for network cables. The majority of bad cabling jobs
are due to improper lengths being used. If you’re making your own cables, this
is easy to remedy. If you’re ordering them, you’ll have to plan ahead. For my
blade systems, I planned the rack layout ahead of time, and ordered the exact
ethernet and fiber lengths I needed. Now there’s no extra cables to block air,
and there’s no pile of cables at the bottom of the rack that I have to worry
about.

You can crimp your own ethernet, but making power cables is a little more
difficult. I’d instead recommend ordering exact lengths. You can get anywhere
from 1ft to really long. Chances are very good that the right length exists for
you already. If you don’t have the time to wait on the cables, the next best
thing is to only unwind as much cable as you need from the twist-tied cable
bundle they sent with the computer. When you get the right length out, twist-
tie the bundle back together. It’s still neat, and stays out of the way.

Vertical / Horizontal Cable Runs

You won’t be running cables to servers all the time. In many cases, you’ll be
wanting to get the cables to a distribution panel, between patch panels, or
between a panel and a switch. In these cases, you’re going to be using vertical
and/or horizontal cabling. The names “vertical” and “horizontal” come from
network architecture ideas. Vertical cables are backbones that go between
distribution facilities. Horizontal cables go from distribution facilities to
endpoints.

For our purposes today, the

differences don’t matter much.
The important part is that we’re
running semi-permanent cables
between places. Because of this
difference, where I recommended
velcro before, I recommend zip ties
now. Due to the number of cables
that are frequently run in this
way, the bundle is often too big for
velcro anyway, and since the
install is permanent, you won’t have to worry about taking the cables down
often (at least, you hope not).