T-1 Line Extension

T-1 Line Extension for Haywood Regional Medical Center

The Haywood Regional Medical Center acquired a new data processing contract that would be handled remotely. The data was to arrive at the facility through T-1 lines and be processed at their Data Center. The problem they had was that the Demarcation point was on the opposite side of the building from the Data Center. While they did have an IDF at the Dmarc with a multi-mode fiber link to the Data Center, it was of no use for T-1 signals. Rather than have AT&T provide a new Dmarc to the Data Center, they decided the most cost-effective way to extend the Dmarc itself was through the use of a 25 pair cable. The data rates for a modern T-1 are only 1.544 megabits per second, so the bandwidth needed for its transmission is very low. Category 3 cable will actually handle 100BaseT Ethernet at short distances even though it isn’t specified for that purpose. Of course, the T-1 usually comes into the building via a copper cable which is Category 3 at best. Therefore, the IT department saw no need to use Category 5e cable for the extension which is often used unnecessarily.

Instead, they decided to spend the extra money on an armored cable, so we selected the Superior Essex AR Series Riser.  The riser rating was necessary since the cable had to transition from the second to the first floor of the building. The cable run spanned over 615 feet and was terminated at the Dmarc on a 66 block for an easy cross-connect with the incoming circuit. We used keystone Rj-45 jacks at the data center end to interconnect with the appropriate equipment with basic five foot Ethernet patch cords.