Do I need patch panel in a home?


  #1  
Old 11-05-16, 07:54 AM
C
Member
Thread Starter
Join Date: Jul 2010
Location: USA
Posts: 896
Received 5 Upvotes on 5 Posts
Do I need patch panel in a home?

I have used patch panel before at my previous work place; however, I don't know if it's advantages to use in a home. I was hoping to wire my whole house with ethernet cables. Thus, I was wondering about implementing patch panels. However, could I just purchase a switch with a lot of ports and forgo the patch panel? I forgot what the advantage of a patch panel is. It's been a long time since I've used one...but I didn't install it either.
 
  #2  
Old 11-05-16, 08:48 AM
C
Member
Join Date: May 2015
Location: USA
Posts: 3,167
Received 169 Upvotes on 137 Posts
I don't see much advantage to a Patch Panel for most homes. 16 and even 24 port gigabit switches are relatively inexpensive.

Patch panels are convenient when you anticipate reconfiguring a network, such as when you have multiple switches and need to be able to reconfigure to hot spares, etc.
 
  #3  
Old 11-05-16, 08:49 AM
PJmax's Avatar
Group Moderator
Join Date: Oct 2012
Location: Jersey
Posts: 64,929
Received 3,950 Upvotes on 3,543 Posts
Patch panels are used when you have a lot of ports and not enough switch inputs. The patch panels keep everything neat and orderly. They also allow the cable to be punched down to a jack rather than the need for an RJ-45 plug to be crimped on. Ultimately..... the punchdown method is more reliable than the crimp on end.

When we wire offices and corporate system we pull two data lines and at least one phone line to each location. Since most phones in offices now are VoIP... we actually run a date line as a phone line. Usually only one data line is patched to the switch and the second one is a spare. With a patch panel it can be chosen minimizing the need for more expensive switches.

With the prices of home routers it's not usually a problem to have one large enough to support all jack locations making a patch panel an unneeded expense.
 
  #4  
Old 11-05-16, 09:00 AM
F
Member
Join Date: Mar 2006
Location: Wet side of Washington state.
Posts: 16,321
Received 38 Upvotes on 30 Posts
You need to terminate all the field run Ethernet cables. Some people choose to simply crimp on 8-position (RJ-45) plugs but field cable is solid conductor and plugs do NOT reliably crimp onto solid wire.

What I did is made my own patch panel by using 6-position face plates and snap-in jacks. I have a jack for each field Ethernet cable as well as coaxial connectors for each coaxial cable. My four-pair (cat. 3) telephone cables I punched down onto a 110 block. This not only makes excellent connections it gives me great versatility.
 
  #5  
Old 11-05-16, 02:04 PM
C
Member
Thread Starter
Join Date: Jul 2010
Location: USA
Posts: 896
Received 5 Upvotes on 5 Posts
Thanks for all the responses. I have a better idea now.
 
  #6  
Old 11-14-16, 07:33 PM
N
Member
Join Date: Nov 2016
Posts: 5
Upvotes: 0
Received 0 Upvotes on 0 Posts
Depends how OCD you are about keeping cables neat and tidy. If you want something that you show off to your friends, get one. They're not that expensive (
 
  #7  
Old 11-16-16, 05:44 PM
G
Join Date: Nov 2016
Location: USA
Posts: 10
Upvotes: 0
Received 0 Upvotes on 0 Posts
In residential, if it terminates in a finished wall, we use Cat6 jacks in plates.
If it terminates in the basement, we use a patch panel.
I agree with the others that punch down is better.
 
 

Thread Tools
Search this Thread
 
Ask a Question
Question Title:
Description:
Your question will be posted in: