Coaxial Cable

The coaxial cable consists of a solid wire core which is surrounded by one or more foil or wire shields, and each is separated by some kind of plastic insulator.

In coaxial cable, the inner core carries the signal, and the shield provides the ground.

The coaxial cable has high electrical properties.

The coaxial cable is suitable for high speed communication.

The coaxial cable is less popular than twisted pair cable.

The coaxial cable is widely used for television signals.

In the form of CATV cable, coaxial cable provides a cheap means of transporting multi-channel television signals around metropolitan areas. It is also used by large corporations in building security systems.

The data transmission characteristics of the coaxial cable are better than those of twisted pair. Therefore, this opens the possibility of using the coaxial cable as the basis for a shared cable network, with part of the bandwidth being used for the data traffic.

Types of Coaxial Cable

There are basically two types of the coaxial cable that are given here:

• Thicknet
• Thinnet

Let's discuss in detail about the above two types of coaxial cable.

Thinnet Cable

Thinnet cable was the first cable that was used in network cable. This cable was used in approximately 1995-1996.

Thinnet cable was only used in bus topology.

Thinnet cable also known as IEEE 10base-2. Here IEEE is an institution that decides the standards of all the cable.

Here 10 means data transmission rate of 10Mbps and 2 is the maximum segment length. The exact distance of this is 185metre.

When we buy a cable, then there are two most important thing to notice, the data transmission rate that the cable is of how much mbps or gbps speed, and second is the segment length, decides how many maximum data can be transferred by the cable without cutting.

The thinnet cable uses Baseband signal to transfer the data. In baseband, there is only signle frequency, and in case of broadband there are multiple frequency.

The connector used in thinnet cable called as BNC (barrel net connector) T type connector.

Thicknet cable

Thicknet cable is the second type of the coaxial cable.

Thicknet cable also known as IEEE 10base-5.

Here 10 means 10mbps which is data transmission rate, and base means baseband signal, and the segment length is 500 metre.

The use of segment length is for LAN.

The connector used in thicknet cable is AUI (attachment unit interface).

Advantages of Coaxial Cable

Here are the list of some advantages of using the coaxial cable:

• As already said that the data transmission characteristics of coaxial cables are better than those of twisted pair cables
• The coaxial cables can be used as the basis for a shared cable network
• The coaxial cables can be used for broadband transmission
• Offers higher bandwidths, upto 400Mbps

Disadvantages of Coaxial Cable

Here are the list of some disadvantages of using the coaxial cable:

• The coaxial cables are expensive than twisted pair cables
• The coaxial cables are not compatible with twisted pair cables

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