3.1 Identify basic cable types

Question 1

Most of our Ethernet networking operates using ___.

Answer 1

twisted pair wiring

Question 2

Twisted pair copper cabling uses something called ___. That means there are two wires that interact with each other. They’re both sending the same information– one is a positive value and one is in negative value.

Answer 2

balanced pair operation

Transmit+, Transmit- / Receive+ Receive-

Question 3

What is the purpose of twisting wires in cables?

Answer 3

Because these wires are twisted, there will be a wire always moving away from any potential interference, and when this information gets to the other end of the wire, those opposite signals can be compared to each other to reconstruct anything that may have been corrupted by this interference.

Question 4

“CAT” denotes what for a twisted pair Ethernet cable?

Answer 4

Its category, each of these has a different twist rate, these determine how well traffic is able to get through the network when there’s interference.

Question 5

What are the three CAT types expected on the exam, and what are their maximum distances?

Answer 5

CAT5 : 100 meters - 100BASE TX, 1000BASE-T

CAT5e (enhanced) : 100 meters - 100BASE TX, 1000BASE-T

CAT6 : 37-55 meters - 10GBASE-T

Question 6

What is plenum?

Answer 6

Plenum is a space provided for air circulation for heating and air-conditioning, might also run network cables.

Question 7

When should you use plenum-rated cables, and what is their disadvantage?

Answer 7

You should use it wherever a fire + water hazard is a concern, PVC cable can release toxic fumes when burnt.

Plenum-rated cable may not be as flexible as PVC cable.

Question 8

If you were to look above the drop ceiling of your office and you saw that there was duct work providing air supply from the HVAC and there was separate duct work providing the air returned to the HVAC, then you would say that there was no ___ in this office configuration.

Answer 8

plenum

Question 9

When should you use shielded twisted pair?

Answer 9

Whenever interference is a great concern.

Question 10

STP requires that the cable be ___.

Answer 10

grounded

Question 11

What do the abbreviations U, S, and F represent on twisted pair cables?

Answer 11

U - unshielded
F - foil shielding; foil around the cable
S - braided shielding; foil around entire cable and individual pairs

Question 12

The Ethernet standard for matching wires with pins is called ___ and ___ termination standards.

Answer 12

568A

568B

Question 13

568A is traditionally used for ___ cabling, although many organizations use 568B.

Answer 13

horizontal

Question 14

Terminating one side of the cable with the 568A pin-out and the other side of the cable with the 568B pin-out will create what problem?

Answer 14

you won’t be able to run Ethernet at gigabit speeds

Question 15

Identify the following connector based on the wire color order

1  | White Green
2 |  Green     
3 | White Orange
4 | Blue
5 | White Blue
6 | Orange 
7 | White Brown
8 | Brown

Answer 15

568A

Question 16

Identify the following connector based on the wire color order

1  |  White Orange
2 |  Orange      
3 | White Green
4 | Blue
5 | White Blue
6 | Green  
7 | White Brown
8 | Brown

Answer 16

568B

Question 17

Another type of cable that you might find for a wide area network cable modem and other uses is a ___.

Answer 17

coaxial cable

Question 18

coaxial means what?

Answer 18

Coaxial means there are two or more forms that share a common axis in the cable.

Question 19

RG-6 is used for?

Answer 19

television/digital cable modem connections, high speed internet

Question 20

RG-59 is used for?

Answer 20

Patch cables; connecting electronic or optical devices over very short distances.

Question 21

568A, 568B, coaxial cable, plenum, CAT5/6 all share what in common?

Answer 21

they’re copper cables

Question 22

This is transmission between these devices using visible light instead of radio frequency signals.

Answer 22

optical fiber communication

Question 23

What is the weakness of fiber optic cable?

Answer 23

Difficult to monitor/tap.

Question 24

When should you use optic cable?

Answer 24

Long distance connections, or areas with high radio/electrical interference.

Question 25

The optic fiber you would put between two devices will either be ___ fiber or ___ fiber.

Answer 25

multimode single-mode

Question 26

single-mode denotes what?

Answer 26

Travels much further than than multimode, uses expensive lasers.

Question 27

multimode denotes what?

Answer 27

Light bounces inside the optic cable core at angles, used for shorter distances, uses LED, cheaper than single-mode.

Question 28

Something that’s very standardized onVGA connectors is the color __.

Answer 28

blue 15 pins

Question 29

A VGA connection is an ___ connection.

Answer 29

analog

Question 30

There’s no ___ option if you’re connecting with a VGA connection.

Answer 30

digital

Question 31

___ video connections greatly degrade as distance increases.

Answer 31

analog

Question 32

Video and audio can both be sent through this connection, digital only.

Answer 32

HDMI / miniHDMI

Question 33

___ is a royalty-free standard, which means manufacturers can add these interfaces to their components and not have to pay any royalties

Answer 33

DisplayPort

Question 34

Data is sent over ___ video connections in a packetized form.

Answer 34

DisplayPort

Question 35

DVI (digital visual interface) connections can be ___ link or ___ link.

Answer 35

single-link | dual-link

Question 36

DisplayPort is compatible with what two connection types via an unpowered adapter?

Answer 36

DMI and DVI

Question 37

Single-link DVI supports ___ gigabits of throughput which allows you to have HDTV at ___ frames per second.

Answer 37

3.7 60

Question 38

Dual-link DVI which extends this to __ gigabits per second supporting an HDTV connection at __ frames per second, making it ideal for gaming.

Answer 38

7.4 85

Question 39

___ can support both analog and digital communication

Answer 39

DVI

Question 40

DVI-A supports ___ signals

Answer 40

analog (A = analog)

Question 41

DVI-D supports ___ signals

Answer 41

digital (D = digital)

Question 42

DVI-I supports ___ signals

Answer 42

digital and analog (I = both are integrated)

Question 43

What DVI connectors have only a single dash looking pin on the left with no squares?

Answer 43

DVI-D

Question 44

8 pin connectors used exclusively for apple mobile devices

Answer 44

lightning

Question 45

What advantage does lightning have over microUSB?

Answer 45

can be inserted either way, charges faster, durable.

Question 46

Thunderbolt uses what kind of connector? What are they typically used for?

Answer 46

miniDisplayPort for v1 and v2, USB-C for v3. Typically storage device or a video display.

Question 47

___ allows the daisy-chaining of devices from one to the other, and you can daisy-chain up to six different devices using the single connection from your computer. Can be optical or copper.

Answer 47

Thunderbolt

Question 48

USB 3 doesn't specify a max cable length T or F?

Answer 48

True

Question 49

While ___ can replace all other USB connectors, it isn't necessarily USB 3

Answer 49

USB-C

Question 50

Serial cable connectors tend to use ___ connectors, and are commonly used for ___ connections.

Answer 50

DE-9 RS-232

Question 51

What are some examples of networking devices that could need a serial connection?

Answer 51

Management ports on routers, switches, firewalls, or modems.

Question 52

What are SATA connectors used for?

Answer 52

SATA is a very common way to connect our storage devices. (serial attachment)

Question 53

SATA data connectors have __ pins while SATA power connectors have __ pins. The data is smaller in order to save space on the motherboards.

Answer 53

7 15

Question 54

The ___ connectors on SATA devices is smaller in order to save space on the motherboards.

Answer 54

data

Question 55

IDE, SATA, and SCSI are all commonly used to connect what to motherboards?

Answer 55

hard drives

Question 56

IDE cables have a ___-like appearance. They can only support __ drives. They have ___ pins and are used on older systems.

Answer 56

ribbon two 40

Question 57

This standard was designed to connect many different kinds of devices together into the standard format. So you might have hard drives, optical drives, scanners, and other devices all along the same ___ bus. In many versions of the ___ standard, you can support up to 16 devices chained together one after the other.

Answer 57

SCSI

Question 58

Because the standard has evolved so much through the years, you’ll find that there are many different ways to communicate over ___ using many different interfaces, and as such there are both parallel and serial versions of ___ available.

Answer 58

SCSI

Question 59

___ is one of those old formats that continues to be used in today’s data centers. You’ll certainly find ___ being used in virtual machines and physical drive arrays.

Answer 59

SCSI

Question 60

___ SCSI no longer supports daisy chaining but has increased throughput.

Answer 60

serial attached

Question 61

Use a ___ to convert between different connectors if they are electrically compatible. If they are not electrically compatible use a ___ instead.

Answer 61

adapter converter

Question 62

One type of adapter you might use for video is when you need to convert from a digital ___ connection to an ___ connection.

Answer 62

DVI HDMI

Question 63

One type of adapter used for analog video is one that might convert from a ___ connection to a ___ analog connection.

Answer 63

VGA DVI If using the digital version of DVI a converter is needed.

Question 64

One of the things you may have noticed with newer laptops is they don’t tend to have physical ___ interfaces as part of the laptop. Thus you would need this kind of adapter/converter.

Answer 64

Ethernet EthernetUSB