VITAL PRINCIPLES IN PRECISE INSTALLATION FOR PATCH PANELS

Installing the patch panel in a right way help to save cost, increase working efficiency and saves execution time a lot. So T.A.T’s technicians will raise the vital principles for installing patch panels which will be detailed below.

Patch panel is a plug board, through which the cables will connect the machines in the LAN to be more compact than the direct plugging, and also easy to preserve and repair when there are problems. The installation of a patch panel is not complicated but requires certain knowledge to make the implementation smooth from the beginning.

Techniques for installing patch panels for rack

A professional computer network of a business usually has its own server room. In this server room, it usually contains rack, which contains servers, KVM switches (to control multiple servers with one monitor), switches, routers, firewalls ... and an equally important device is patch panels.

 

As we know, usually when connecting computers together between floors of a building, we often pull the network cables directly (using RJ45 connectors) connecting from the server room switch to the switches of each floor (call is a floor switch), then from the floor switch pulls the network cable to the outlet of each room for computer users.

 

But often after a while, the RJ45 connectors plugged directly into the switch in the server room are often oxidized, causing the signal to be flickering and faulty, affecting the overall operation of the network. To make it easier to manage and check the network signal, and to help the wire system be more neat and aesthetic, people use patch panels to solve these problems.

 

Currently, patch panels commonly used in rack cabinets are 24 ports and 48 ports. A standard 24 port AMP patch panel Cat.5e (already available with RJ45 UTP jack) costs about 92 USD, and the AMP Patch Panel 48 port Cat.5e standard (already available with RJ45 UTP jack) costs about 200 USD. These devices are warranted for 12 months.

 

To install the patch panel, we need to prepare the tools such as: a wrench to tighten the hexagonal nuts into the bolts fixing patch panels into 2 fixed bars on the front sides of the rack, One punch down tool ”to fix the network cables to the back of the patch panels.

 

Before going into the patch panel installation technique, I would like to mention that the network systems with patch panels are usually connected as follows: From the switch of the floors, the network cable is pulled to the back of the patch panel, then from the front of patch panel to the switch in server room. After all is prepared, the following steps can be taken to install the patch panel.

 

1. Fix the network cable from the floor switch to the back of the patch panel.

With patch panels, the front side is jacks using for plugging RJ45 connectors (plugged from the patch panel to the switch in server room), the back (corresponding to the RJ45 jacks of the front) are the slots to fix the network cable pulled from the floor switch. Fixing a network cable into these slots is like fixing a network cable into the modular jacks that we often do.

Usually the back of the patch panel has a label stating the color order of 586A or 586B and the port ordinal number, so if we use the 586B standard for pressing network cables, when the network cable is pressed into the slot, we also use the standard 586B. Note when pressing the network cable into the slot, let the blade of the punch tool downward to cut off excess wires and then use the cable ties to tie the network cables neatly.

2. Fix the patch panel on the 2 front bars of the rack cabinet.

When buying a patch panel, usually in the 4 corners of the patch panel there will be 4 holes for fixing the patch panel to 2 front bars of the rack by botls. In this step, we can squeeze the nut into the bolt by hands, or use a wrench to tighten the nut so that the system is secure, ensuring long-term safety.

3. Plug the network cable from the front of the patch panel to the switch ports

In this step, we can manually click the network cable to plug from the switch to the patch panel, but as mentioned above, in order to keep the signal stable, buy a network cable to plug from patch panel to switch, because the network cable type This is pre-fabricated with 2 heads and pre-coated with an antioxidant protection.

For a network system that uses patch panels in the server room, we find that management will become much easier, and in the future if there is a moving device, just pull the network cable from the patch panel to the desired location.



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