At work we have the following set up (I think) All network cables are hard wired into the back of a rack thing with 48 ports on it. Cables then come out of that and back into a 48 port switch directly below it and that is then connected to the server. What is the first things name? And as it's ancient and some of the connections in the back of it are coming loose can we just get rid of it, put connectors on the ends of all the cables and just go directly into the switch instead?
If the server is close to the switch, it can be plugged in directly. As can other devices, however they tend to plug into wall sockets which themselves terminate into the patch panel. That prevents CAT-5 cables trailing all over the floor and stairs etc.
The one disclaimer about the switch; they can be unmanaged (hub) or managed. If the latter, the server may need to be plugged into the specific port configured for it.
Thankyou. Our switch and apparently the patch panel (thankyou for that too) is in one room and the server in another so a few of the more recent additions to the network are plugged directly into the server just because it was closer. The rest are into the patch panel and then into the switch. Despite the patch panel and the switch being about 3 inches apart they're connected with random cables that are up to 10 metres long just curled up in the bottom of the cabinet. It's safe to say it's a a mess
That sounds like a very typical Comms room. Or spaghetti junction. I have seen very neat, pristine Comms cabinets using coloured, short patch leads turn into a tangled mess within weeks. Some of the newer patch leads have an led on the ends to help diagnose broken or unplugged endpoint. I actually used to find it very therapeutic doing cabling.
I've seen one good comms room in nearly 30 years - and we spent bloody ages colour coding and labelling all the cables. It was a work of art. Then they made us all redundant. The worst I've seen involved the network guys taking hacksaws to the cables to sort out the mess.
The best one I ever did, at a big law firm in London, I squeezed behind the rack before we put it back in situ to take a photo; tripped and ragged a fibre cable out of a clustered SAN unit.
