Affordable Ethernet Qualifier?

[chazzy2501]

I have some pretty old cable runs and I may be suffering from something called "flapping" where the signal through the CAT5e is marginal and is causing the network card to constantly change speeds.

 

My fluke tester will say if the cable is connected correctly and the length of each pair but isn't going to run a test to check this...

 

So I think I'd like a qualifier (if that is the right term) 

[Aprice]

Something like a Fluke Link IQ, however it's not cheap.

 

If it's not a regular thing, maybe hiring in might be more viable.

[k-strider]

If we wired a classroom of 32 computers ourself in CAT6A rather than paying a contractor I would probably be able to justify to myself buying something like that, a Fluke Link IQ £2.2K knowing that we would also run the CAT6A in to the false ceilings for every classroom for AP's as well going forwards.... but right now i can't justify it... Though I know i need to get the AP data cables changed they are all very old over 20 years (I've been there that long and they were already in place) they are at least 5E not 5 thankfully but sometimes the AP's drop from either 2.5/1Gb to 100mb until rebooted and I'm convinced its the cable but i can't check really...

 

Looks like rental of a Fluke Link IQ is about 140GBP a week but I would have to have everything done and ready... I too am looking for something that does a bit more than just tells you that you have the wires in the right order...

 

One thing I have done when questioning cables ability to run at speed is use iPerf - I did this at work on a link between cab and AP and at home from one end of my house to the other (only at 1Gb as that's all i had to test) and that was able to saturate the cable constantly get 950ish meg so didn't point to cable issue from that perspective... 

[ColonelPanic]

Hi Chazzy, we had the same problem with some longer length (90m) Cat6a runs in our 'new' build school. It took me a few weeks to figure out why the network was so intermittent in one of the rooms. As it was all still under warranty, the original installers came back out with a Fluke DSX2, and printed out all the attenuation graphs, which all tested fine when they plugged their meter in. We had quite severe link flapping between 100/1gbps too. I had to plug the problematic runs into a PC and run ping -t to the switch to show the link dropping out.

The only solution we had was to re-run the room back to the network cabinet, or fix the PCs to 100mb FD. 

[TechMonkey]

Not sure if it fits your use case but we got a Trend Networks Navitek NT Pro.  Does what we need, from cable tests to full testing. Around £1200, but worth its weight in gold to check if you have the right port and that it is on the right VLAN.