CAT5e or COAX?

[Jock 0]

Hi,

 

I'm based in the UK and I've just bought a 4 camera system with PC DVR.

 

It's all working perfectly well on the bench and now I'm ready to install it. Here's where I have some questions.

 

The system is intended to be monitored from any one of three locations, all of which are connected via computer network. The network run on CAT5e cabling.

 

I have a choice here - I can use the existing CAT5e cabling to run the video over, or I can install co-ax. My preference is to use the CAT5e - do I gain or lose anything from this?

 

If I decide to use the CAT5e is there a standard for wiring?

 

Do I have to use baluns or can I get away with just terminating two cores to a BNC plug?

 

Thank you for your help.

[AVCONSULTING 0]

How far will the cameras be away from the DVR? You will have to use baluns and the type of balun will vary with the distance you are running. Also try to power the cameras locally instead of using the CAT 5 wire since you have a pretty big voltage loss in such thin wire.

[Jock 0]

Thanks for that - the maximum distance will be around 50 metres.

 

As far as using local power, that's my intention - I can feed that into a RJ45 patch box local to the cameras quite easily. From the patch box to the camera is probably around 3 metres so the voltage drop over that isn't so much of an issue.

 

I'd just like to use the existing cabling instead of having to run in new wiring with all the inherent problems!

[rory 0]

check out www.NVT.com lots of UTP cable products, from just the small transmitters to the big 32 port hubs up to 1.5 miles.

 

Not sure what metres are in feet, let us know.

[Jock 0]

check out www.NVT.com lots of UTP cable products, from just the small transmitters to the big 32 port hubs up to 1.5 miles.

 

Not sure what metres are in feet, let us know.

 

Thanks for the info.

 

As a rule-of-thumb, I reckon 1 metre to be 3 feet, (it's not quite, but good enough.)

[justme 0]

I have a similar question, but my run is much longer - about 750 feet. Can I run cat5 for the video and double up for video (and perhaps even power)? I can do cat5 far cheaper than coax with power leads, but if it won't work as well, obviously that's not the thing to do. Or, as the above link mentions, UTP? Would UTP be better than cat5?

 

Thanks for any feedback.

[rory 0]

You can use Twisted Pair up to 3000 feet, with an active transceiver. 1.5 miles with cat5.

 

You can run power with it, not too far though. 750' may be too far for that wire.Id run a seperate wire, or like you said, double up the thickness of the UTP multi pair. Check with the camera manufacturer first.

[JKelsey 0]

I just think this is a cute breakdown:

 

http://www.vigitron.com/applications.htm