Tracing connections from patch panels to wall ports

[Kalny]

I'm in the middle of a network infrastructure audit of our site and it's a complete mess. The majority of the patch panels are not even labelled and the ones that are do not correlate with the labelled connections they have in other rooms.

 

I need some ideas/methods on how I can begin to start mapping these correctly.

 

Is there any way to getting a network card to pulse packets to make the switch it's plugged into flash distinctively?

 

I'm open to any ideas!

[manc_techie]

A Linkrunner AT would show you which port on a switch a wall socket is going back to, they aren't cheap but Fluke do a 30 day trial.

[jonnykewell1]

We have a tester that plugs into the port and sends out a signal, then you hold your wand next to the cables and it starts to beep when near/next to the cable to make it easier to find.

[Kalny]

What's it called?

[jonnykewell1]

It's a tone generator. see here Buy Video, Data & Voice Wiring Testers Pro3000 analog tone & probe kit Fluke Networks 26000900 online from RS for next day delivery.

[linkazoid]

I also agree with mac_techie! we was recommended one on here last year and it's been one of our best purchases. It makes finding switch ports so easy.

[IrritableTech]

We use a tone generator to find unlabeled ports, but also our lan tester has a couple of useful features. We bought the extra ends, which could be plugged into all the network points in a room for example, and each testing end has an ID number which shows up on the tester. When it detects it is connected to a switch, you can have it send data, which makes the activity light flash in a regular pattern.

 

This is the one we went for in the end (oh you can get a tone generator that works with it as well).

 

Buy Video, Data & Voice Wiring Testers Wiring Tester,Voice,Data & Video NC-500 Greenlee NC-500 online from RS for next day delivery.

[Chris_]

What's it called?

 

We have a Fluke IntelliTone/Probe kit. Not too expensive but very handy for tracing cables, especially when we have more cabinets than letters in the alphabet!!

 

http://www.flukenetworks.com/datacom-cabling/copper-testing/IntelliTone-Pro-Toner-and-Probe

[pete]

Assuming your machines are named in the format Room-XX (where XX is an incremental number) and they're laid out in order, you could trace the lit ports by comparing dhcp leases with the mac > port table on the switches.

 

For the rest, yeah - buy a tone generator.

[techie211]

It's a tone generator. see here Buy Video, Data & Voice Wiring Testers Pro3000 analog tone & probe kit Fluke Networks 26000900 online from RS for next day delivery.

 

I was looking into this product as well but the rep told me it doesn't work on Cat6 cabling? no RJ45 module....???

[plexer]

I was looking into this product as well but the rep told me it doesn't work on Cat6 cabling? no RJ45 module....???

 

No it has an rj45 connector.

 

We had a testum nt-750 set which had an rj45 network tester unit that can generate tones on an rj45 and could also flash the link led of a connected switch.

 

Ben

[Kalny]

Hi guys, thought I'd update you on this.

 

I managed to do the majority of work by going through switch Arp tables and tracing IP's through DHCP and in turn getting device MAC addresses from those IP addresses. I then went to the devices and marked the ports they were plugged in to. We ended up borrowing one of these too for a while and it worked brilliantly, but I only really used it for the points I could not find endpoints for.

 

I appreciate the suggestions raised in this thread. Thanks fellas!

[Davit2005]

We bought a Fluke LinkRunner a few months back, with over 60 switches and numerous vLANS all over the place it has been used almost daily since .

 

Tells you switch, vlan, POE status, DHCP status and a whole lot more.

[Duke5A]

Tone generators are nice, but the tone can bleed into adjacent ports. Do you have Cisco switches? If so, I would gut the entire cabinet and patch your panels back in to correspond to the same numbered port (panel port 13 goes to switch port 13). Then take a tour with a small laptop and use CDPR on all the ports in the rooms. Cisco Discovery Protocol is enabled by default on all Cisco switching hardware. Every 60 seconds a packet is sent out all the ports containing the switch name, management IP and port number. You can even turn down the default broadcast interval to every 5 seconds or so while your mapping the ports.