TechMonkey Posted February 8, 2019 Posted February 8, 2019 So we found something in the office and I can't remember where it came from and can't for the life of me think what it would be for. It has 2 short RJ45 cables going into a moulded box with 2 RJ45 sockets on the opposite side. Any ideas?
Garacesh Posted February 8, 2019 Posted February 8, 2019 (edited) Oooh I know this one! It's an RJ45/Ethernet splitter. So officially you actually only need 4 of the 8 strands for an Ethernet cable to work, the 4 in the middle iirc. This weird converter allows you to split one 8-core patch lead into two 4-core ones by crossing the pins from 1 ,2, 7 and 8 to pins 3, 4, 5 and 6 on the second cable. It effectively halves your network speed though. Disregard! Didn't realise it had two sockets on both ends. Edited February 8, 2019 by Garacesh
TechMonkey Posted February 8, 2019 Author Posted February 8, 2019 That was my first thought when I saw it and nearly threw it out straight away, but surely it would have one in and two out? This has two to two.
DJ-1701 Posted February 8, 2019 Posted February 8, 2019 But why would you have two plugs and two sockets? Spliters usually have one plug and two sockets and are needed at both ends of the data run.
Garacesh Posted February 8, 2019 Posted February 8, 2019 Yeah, realised after I posted that it was 2-2 not 2-1. Crack open the moulding, see what the pinouts are like?
FishCustard Posted February 8, 2019 Posted February 8, 2019 Oooh I know this one! It's an RJ45/Ethernet splitter. So officially you actually only need 4 of the 8 strands for an Ethernet cable to work, the 4 in the middle iirc. This weird converter allows you to split one 8-core patch lead into two 4-core ones by crossing the pins from 1 ,2, 7 and 8 to pins 3, 4, 5 and 6 on the second cable. It effectively halves your network speed though. Disregard! Didn't realise it had two sockets on both ends. They don't halve your speed, they just limit you to 100 Mbit/s - all eight strands are needed for Gigabit ethernet. 1
synaesthesia Posted February 8, 2019 Posted February 8, 2019 Something where someone designed a product with the RJ45 sockets too far recessed, so needed a "breakout" cable?
sted Posted February 8, 2019 Posted February 8, 2019 Something where someone designed a product with the RJ45 sockets too far recessed, so needed a "breakout" cable? thats my thought make a cable easier to reach as its plugged in internally or in an inaccessible place this brings it within easier reach
bald_pig Posted February 8, 2019 Posted February 8, 2019 [ATTACH=CONFIG]52163[/ATTACH] Its obviously a spatula...... For me it settled with "Electronics"
localzuk Posted February 8, 2019 Posted February 8, 2019 If you don't need it, try cracking it open to see what the pinout is like?
TechMonkey Posted February 8, 2019 Author Posted February 8, 2019 I'm glad to see we all tried the same methods. The "stupid designer made the stupid ports stupidly inaccessible so lets sling a stupid extension doohickey in the box" idea does make the most sense but if you are going to struggle to put two fiddle attached cables in why not just do that with the cables you are going to use. Unless it is a racking aid, unracked everything is fine so you fit this, once it is in the rack, everything is harder to get at so this helps? Next step may be to break it open, just seems a shame to ruin its good looks.
Chris_ Posted February 8, 2019 Posted February 8, 2019 Looks like a Dell K9703 for extending the network ports on a Dell PowerEdge 1850. 1
dcwhitworth Posted February 8, 2019 Posted February 8, 2019 Perhaps designed for an environment where you plug and unplug RJ45 connectors very often, puts the wear and tear onto this thing instead of onto your wall socket which would be harder to replace. Or maybe there's some kind of a filter built in ? Final desperate idea, are the connectors actually RJ45, could it be an RJ11 to RJ45 converter ? (would such a thing even be useful ?)
hardtailstar Posted February 8, 2019 Posted February 8, 2019 Looks like a Dell K9703 for extending the network ports on a Dell PowerEdge 1850. We have a winner!
TechMonkey Posted February 8, 2019 Author Posted February 8, 2019 Looks like a Dell K9703 for extending the network ports on a Dell PowerEdge 1850. DING DING DING Give the man a prize. https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Dell-K9703-PowerEdge-1850-Dual-RJ45-Network-Port-Extender-Cable-0K9703-/251684051341
FishCustard Posted February 8, 2019 Posted February 8, 2019 Looks like a Dell K9703 for extending the network ports on a Dell PowerEdge 1850. Are they particularly inaccessible? Seems a rather weird thing to make...
Garacesh Posted February 8, 2019 Posted February 8, 2019 Are they particularly inaccessible? Seems a rather weird thing to make... They look fairly standard to me?
TechMonkey Posted February 8, 2019 Author Posted February 8, 2019 Knowing what to look for I've found a Reddit thread discussing these and one person says The cases make it very difficult to access the ports to begin with, these just make it easier. If i recall, there was a tab on the server you could push that would push the tabs on the cable down so you could pull the piece out once it was installed. And another: Having the ports conjoined means they are less likely to twist around each other
Chris_ Posted February 8, 2019 Posted February 8, 2019 The ports are pretty recessed. https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Dell-Poweredge-1850-EMU-1U-Intel-Xeon-Processor-3GHz-2x-146GB-HDD-2GB-DDR2-Ram/351970410599?hash=item51f3124067:g:HuMAAOSw4DJYj3bD:rk:38:pf:0
TechMonkey Posted February 8, 2019 Author Posted February 8, 2019 Well thank you all for playing and helping pass this blowy Friday afternoon!
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