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I have (2) LGS326P switches linked by one cat5e cable. I am considering replacing that cable with MM fiber but want to be sure it is worth the upgrade. Here is my setup in more detail....

House: (1) LGS326P switch 90% maxed

Garage (1) LGS326P switch 75% maxed

The run between the house and garage is roughly 270+/- linear feet. My concern is in the garage I am running (10) IP Cameras, (1) laptop, (2) Game Consoles, (1) DTV receiver, a few WiFi devices, and a few other misc items. All this data has only one cat5e cable cable linking it to the house router and switch. Would I benefit from replacing that cat5e cable with a run of MM fiber even though the switches only support SFP and not SFP+ ?

Thanks, Jimmie

gable74
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    `All this data has only one cat5e cable cable linking it to the house router and switch. Would I benefit from replacing that cat5e cable with a run of MM fiber even though the switches only support SFP and not SFP+ ?` - Is the link between the switches saturated? – joeqwerty Jan 25 '18 at 12:03
  • Thanks, but I am unsure how to tell if the line is saturated or not, I do know that I suffer from inconsistent connectivity from time to time. Netflix and other streaming activities buffer more sometimes where they never do this in the house. Is there a way I can measure the saturation? – gable74 Jan 25 '18 at 12:50

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On a LGS326P, all ports are 10/100/1000. So, unless you're experiencing frame drops (check port counters in web GUI) there's no point in using fiber. Using gigabit speed, error counters should be very similar on both sides. 100 Mbit/s links require you to check both sides.

Optical fiber has a longer reach than twisted pair (1000BASE-SX: 550 m, 1000BASE-T: 100 m) and is not susceptible to EMI. The former doesn't seem to be an issue, and if the latter isn't either, copper is fine.

Note however that the 1000BASE-T maximum reach over Cat-5e only applies to a mix of 90 m plenum cable (solid conductors) and 10 m patch cable (stranded conductors). Using longer patch cable runs significantly decreases the reach. Basically, using 30+ m of patch cable can use to fairly high error rates. The error counters in the switch and on the NICs should be able to tell you if there's a problem.

Zac67
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  • Great, thank you for the feedback and advice. My concern was whether that single run of cat5e could handle the bandwidth of all those devices in the garage at one time. All connections are solid conductor using 23 or 24awg cat5e terminated by me....no patch cables. – gable74 Jan 25 '18 at 18:58
  • Yes, 23 or 24 AWG are fine for longer runs. – Zac67 Jan 25 '18 at 19:11