Question What kind of phone cable is this?

[Sneaky666]

Hi I'm trying to convert my phone line into ethernet cables, but I'm trying to figure out how to do it. I read that you need cat 5+ cables to use for decent speeds. But when I look in the closet box, I see a strange cable that has 6 wires inside.

1. orange with white stripes
2. white with orange stripes
3. blue with white stripes
4. white with blue stripes
5. green with white stripes
6. white with green stripes

And I couldn't figure out what kind of cable this it. Reading the text on it, I don't see any catX names. Instead I see stuff like FT4.

Does anyone know what kind of cable this is and if it can be converted to ethernet, and if so what kind of speeds are expected from it?

 

[Ralston18]

No.

Do not use old (or even new) telephone wires for network connections.

All that will happen is more problems.

FYI:

https://www.elephantenergy.org/best...he phone and,cables come in different colours.

Unfortunately, the problems are getting worse due to fake and otherwise substandard cables. Ethernet or otherwise.

And old telephone cables even in prime condition do not meet Ethernet cable specs.

My suggestion is to update your post with details about your environment and what you are trying to do.

 

[Sneaky666]

Thanks. I will add more details. Do you happen to know the exact name for this cable? Like is it a cat or something?

 

[USAFRet]

Hi I'm trying to convert my phone line into ethernet cables,

Don't.

You expend brain power and maybe money, and only get more problems.

 

[Sneaky666]

Ok I see that converting this to ethernet is a terrible Idea and I wont, but out of curiosity, does anyone know what the exact name for this type of cable is?

 

[bill001g]

Hard to say there might be a marking up farther on the cable. All you can see is that is it is 24 gauge wire. CSA is some obsolete standard used in canada before they went to the system the USA uses.... I think maybe I am wrong.

It might be cat3 telephone cable. The wire pairs do not appear to be twisted. But it could be pretty much any 4 pair wire used for telephone and other low voltage applications like say thermostats.

You might get 10mbps if you are lucky. If you really want to use it there are special device that run a private form of dsl over the telephone wires in your house. Been a while since I looked at these units but if I remember correctly they were not real fast and cost quite a bit.

 

[Inthrutheoutdoor]

Those wires are usually referred to as THHN, and are just plain, 24ga stranded or semi-copper wire, of low voltage/low capacity and typically were used for POTS (plain old telephone service !) doorbells/bussers, and old mechanical or mercury-activated thermostats from way back in the day.....

Great for low-voltage household electrical current, but they are NOT suitable for digital signal transmissions in any way, shape or form, like real ethernet cable is