Ethernet vs coax

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 Question by Alan Puckhaber posted 23 Feb 2003
 Ethernet vs coax
My house is almost 8 years old and was wired with coax into each room, with a number of splitters. I've got broadband internet service. Is it a good investment to put in the best (Cat6) cable when running a new line from a router to a second computer 50 feet away? In other words does the coax have the throughput/spec capability well in excess of the current best Cat specs?

Thanks in advance.

Al Puckhaber
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 Answer by Dmitri Abaimov posted 24 Feb 2003
Dear Alan,

In that sense, you can only get 1.5Mbit/s between your ISP and the cable modem, so at 100MBit/s throughput of CAT5 or CAT6 cable, the twisted pair cable has much more capability than coax does. Besides, it's impossible to share the cable modem connection over the coax (unless you get another ISP account), so you still have to pull a twisted pair cable between you remote computer and the router.

In this particular case you will not see much difference between CAT5E and CAT6.

Sincerely,
Dmitri Abaimov, RCDD

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