Should You Choose Unshielded, Shielded, Screened, or Fiber-Optic Cable for Your Horizontal Wiring?

Should You Choose Unshielded, Shielded, Screened, or Fiber-Optic Cable for Your Horizontal Wiring?

Many network managers and cabling-infrastructure systems designers face the question of which cabling to choose. Often the decision is cut and dried, but sometimes it is not.
For typical office environments, UTP cable will always be the best choice (at least until active components—for example, transceivers—drop in price). Most offices don’t experience anywhere near the amount of electromagnetic interference necessary to justify the additional expense of installing shielded twisted-pair cabling.
Environments such as hospitals and airports may benefit from a shielded or screened cabling system. The deciding factor seems to be the external field strength.
If the external field strength does not exceed three volts per meter (V/m), good-quality UTP cabling should work fine.
If the field strength exceeds 3V/m, shielded cable will be a better choice.
However, many cabling designers think that if the field strength exceeds 3V/m, fiber-optic cable is a better choice. Further, these designers will point out the additional bandwidth and security of fiber-optic cable.
Although everyone has an opinion on the type of cable you should install, it is true that the only cable type that won’t be outgrown quickly is optical fiber.
Fiber-optic cables are already the media of choice for the backbone. As switches, routers, and workstation network interface cards for fiberoptic
cables come down in price, fiber will move more quickly into the horizontal cabling space.

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Source : LinkedIn

Credits: Mr. Ahmed Fawzy Shaaban, CCNA, RCDD®’s Post