[SOLVED] Intermittent problem on long ethernet cable

[StarEye]

This problem is driving me crazy.
I laid down an unshielded CAT 6 ethernet cable (exterior reinforced cable) between my house and a shack in the garden, this over a length of roughly 30 meters.
The cable is mostly running outside, except for a stretch of 5 meters where it's running in a 230V power cable conduit. (this detail might be important). On this stretch the power cables are running at less than a cm from the ethernet cable.

I placed a PC on one end and a router on the opposite end of the cable (the connection is Gb ethernet full duplex)
Here is the problem: if I ping the router over a period of several hours, I have intemittent losses of connections. On average every hour for a duration of approximately 20 seconds.

At the beginning I though this might be due to faulty RJ45 connectors, I crimped new ones (different connector model) but the problem persist.
I rule out, router or PC problems as I swapped them with different devices and the problem persist.

What do you think I should check? Do you think the problem might be due to interference from the power cables?
Help!!

 

[bill001g]

It is possible but not real likely it is the power. Most times it would be something with a large motor that causes a surge on the electrical and even then I am not so sure. We used to have racks of servers that all had 3 ethernet connections and 2 power connections. There were a massive number of cable all very close together and it never caused a issue. I suspect it is not possible because it runs the computer in the remote location but you can test if it is the power by turning off the breaker to the electrical wire.

Part of the reason you seldom see this problem is it is against almost all building codes to run low voltage cable (ie ethernet) in the same conduit with a power cable. This is not for interference reasons it is for safety. They are concerned that if the power cable develops a fault it could get into the other cable and hurt someone.

Check that your cable is not CCA cable. You want pure copper. The CCA cable has issue going long distances. Since you put ends on the cable I am going to assume this is not that flat cable which you see much more of because of the price of copper metal. Neither CCA or flat cable is certified to be used as ethernet.

You would think the port would actually go to a disconnected state if it was down 20 second. Most time interference issues on a cable is random packet loss.

 

[StarEye]

Hi bill001g,
Thanks for your answer and your advices. I checked the cable specifications on the manufacturer website and nothing is mentioned, but I found later on another website that it's a CCA cable. That would explain the amount of errors, especially that the cable has been treated pretty harshly during the installation (pulled very strongly through the conduits).

I am ruling out the interferences from the 230V lines, since I disconnected the corresponding line breaker and I have the same errors.

I believe that the only option is to replace the cable.

Thanks again.

 

[kanewolf]

Hi bill001g,
Thanks for your answer and your advices. I checked the cable specifications on the manufacturer website and nothing is mentioned, but I found later on another website that it's a CCA cable. That would explain the amount of errors, especially that the cable has been treated pretty harshly during the installation (pulled very strongly through the conduits).

I am ruling out the interferences from the 230V lines, since I disconnected the corresponding line breaker and I have the same errors.

I believe that the only option is to replace the cable.

Thanks again.

YEP, CCA cable needs to be used as a pull string to get a good 100% copper 22 - 24 ga Cat5e cable there.