Ethernet Speed Certification

Ethernet speed certification goes a step beyond network cable testing by employing a variety of factors to guarantee a cabling system complies to specific industry standards. It also ensures a network is installed and functions properly at prescribed speeds under specific loads.

Ethernet speed certification is a useful tool for both new network deployments and in troubleshooting an existing network.  Most modern Ethernet speed testing tools run the network cable against a TIA568 Interconnect Standards to measure noise and delay, but our Ethernet speed certification does so much more.

Freebird Solutions Ethernet speed certification takes an in-depth look at your network by evaluating the following criteria:

• Pin-to-Pin and wiremap display: We test every wire within your ethernet cable to ensure it connects properly at the opposite end. In addition, our equipment displays a graphic showing the wiremap for each cable tested. Improperly terminated cables are clearly displayed on a color graphical wire-mapping display, and the graphic displays length for each pair in feet or metres.
• Wiremapping: We correctly hook up each wire so that there are no shorts or opens. Each pair must also be connected to the right pins at the jacks and plugs. Finally, the contacts in the terminations must be in working condition. Our equipment allows for us to test for any opens, shorts, split pairs, miswires, reversals, or high-resistance faults. We can even determine distance to faults and total cable length.
• BER (Bit Error Rate): We test the number of bit errors being transmitted. Fast Ethernet originally targeted a BER of 1 error for every 10 billion bits of information passing through the cable. For a data transfer rate of 100Mbps, this translates to one error every 100 seconds, which is acceptable.  A higher BER rate may therefore adversely affect data throughput and may start to slow down network performance.
• Signal-to-Noise Ratio Testing: Signal-to-Noise Ratio (SNR) is a critical factor in the performance of a network; SNR is a measure of a network’s immunity to noise. Expressed in Decibels (dB), SNR represents the additional noise the cabling can accommodate before violating BER (Bit Error Rate). We are able to effectively measure SNR in both 100 Megabit and 1 Gigabit cables allowing you to determine quality issues in the network that might impact high-speed data transmission.
• Delay Skew:  Delay Skew is when multiple pairs in the same cable exhibit different delay performance. Delay skew is determined by measuring the difference between the pair with the least delay and the pair with the most delay. TIA568-A recommends that the delay skew between the fastest and slowest pair in a cabling system should not exceed 45 nanoseconds on a 100-metre cable.