Customer Reviews

Cables Unlimited UTP-7010-99 Cat6 2-Piece RJ45 Connector for Solid Wire 100 Pack (Clear)

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This product is a vast improvement over the single piece cable connector. Particularly for the enthusiast that is not making cable lengths every day, the single piece connector is a bit hit or miss with the test being done only after you have committed the single piece connector to the cable. The two piece connector takes the guesswork out of the cable assembly by making it very clear where the cable ends are landed and giving rise to less mistakes on this activity. Great product works fine with cat6 and cat5e cable.

Simply the best rj45 connectors I have ever used, the load bar can be finicky to work with at first if your not familiar with them. Once you figure out what works for you they are absolutely amazing. I had single piece connectors from several companies and most work very well but these will save you time and bad crimps. FYI stay away from bytecc connectors they would fall out of jacks by simply brushing the cable or any strain. I actually bought these to recap about 120 network cables that fell out constantly from the bytecc connectors. If you haven't used connectors with load bars please pick these up, one note to mention i had 2 crimpers one of which did very poorly making these crimps and several times it wouldn't crimp down all the pins.

I recommend http://www.amazon.com/Paladin-Tools-1556-Crimper-SS-Style/dp/B000982MMM/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=hi&qid=1270027953&sr=8-2

I wouldn't recommend rj45 crimpers of this style http://www.amazon.com/Ideal-Industries-IDEAL-Telemaster-Crimp/dp/B000ZZMC4M/ref=sr_1_47?ie=UTF8&s=industrial&qid=1270028077&sr=8-47

The photo of this item is not complete. The outer connector is shown, but the wire guide or load bar is not. I am wiring at home and have had great results with another product from a local retail store. The other product included two internal components. This one includes only the internal component that seems less helpful to me. I am hopeful that I can work with this and improve my results, but the "out-of-the-package" experience has been a bit disappointing. The product arrived in two zip-seal bags in a mailing envelope; one contained the outer connectors and one contained the inner guides. No wiring diagrams or instructions were included.

The connector that I used before was the "Ideal Cat6 modular plug." It appears to be offered on Amazon: CAT 6 MODULAR PLUG RJ45 25PC. The "Ideal" product is significantly more expensive than this Cables Unlimited product. There is no product image for the "Ideal" item on Amazon at present, but a Google search on that phrase yields an image of the 3-piece "Ideal" set.

The Cables Unlimited version contains the standard outer RJ45 connector. It also contains the wire guide that resembles two parallel rectangles connected by a bar. In the "Ideal" image, this would be the piece on the lower right. With the Cables Unlimited product, the most distant walls of the rectangles are open (in other words, you can bring the wires into each rectangle from the side, rather than threading the length of your wire through). The Cables Unlimited item does NOT contain the flatter bar shown in the Ideal image, through which one threads the ordered wires before placing them into the connector and crimping. I miss that flatter guide.

I visited the Cables Unlimited website to look for any additional tips in using these connectors efficiently, or to see if the flatter guides might be purchased separately. I was not able to locate any product on the website. At the top of the page is the following statement:

"Thanks for your interest in Cables Unlimited products. Your business is extremely important to us. We are in a period of reorganization. During this period we are not accepting any new orders. This is an exciting time for Cables Unlimited and will be making an announcement soon regarding our future. We appologize for any inconvenience and thank you for your continuing support."

Folks who build cables on a daily basis might find these to be a wonderful item. If my experience with them improves with practice, I will certainly update this review. My purpose in posting it at this point is to provide an "enhanced product description," because the product listing simply did not include enough information for me to shop as carefully as I would have liked.

If you have tips on making good connections with this type of connector and guide, I'd be happy to learn more.

This was my first time wiring Cat 6, so also my first experience with the new spacer that this uses. I used to be able to whip out a patch cable in a minute or so from start to finish, very easy to do with just wires and a plug. But the insert that these use to maintain the separation that allows for the Cat-6 name screwed my speed up.
I was using copper Cat-6 cables and the green and blue pairs were really twisted a lot more than the brown or orange. So the first two and last two went in here relatively easily, but the really twisted pairs were more of a pain since I had to straighten them out more to get the spacer to slide down them right.
Granted, they worked fine once I did those extra bits of work for the two pairs, but it REALLY made slow going.
I don't know if there are any out there that didn't have this spacer, but next time I'll look for those first as long as they can provide the same separation needed for cat 6.

As a service center owner creating my own patch cables is not a new concept to me. I recently thought we'd give these a try and they are nice! At first I wasn't sure how to assemble them since there is no paperwork on them, but a quick minute inspection made it clear.

1. Strip about 2" of your cable's outer coating back and cut away any exposed fiber or plastic sheathing (used to strengthen the cable)
2. Hold the small wire retainer in one hand with the corrugated side up
3. Insert your wires one at a time in order through the thicker side of the wire retainer
4. With all wires fed through the retainer, slide the retainer all the way back till its tight against the cables exterior coating
5. with a good pair of wire cutters cut away the excess wire sticking out of the end of the retainer
6. Lastly insert the loaded retainer into the back of the jack so that the corrugated side of the retainer will match up with the copper pins on the jack
7. Push the wire and retainer into the jack firmly until the retainer is fully seated into the jack
8. Lastly use your jack tool to crimp and that's it.

It may sound loaded but even though there are a few extra steps from traditional capping, we ultimately saved a lot of time and had 100% termination on our last project! This concept eliminates cross wires and short wires so that you get a solid connection every time, with a little practice we are now able to build our cables more quickly than we used to with traditional jacks.

***This review may seem negative, but I would still recommend this product***

Using a load bar can be kinda tricky. Once you get the hang out it you'll produce working cables almost every time. I got these because they are supposed to work with Solid Core cables as well. They do. The plastic part that get's crimped down is different than what I'm used to. Normally there is a solid plastic piece that crimps down on the insulation of the cabling, but with these it's two separate pieces of plastics that crimp down on either side of the cable, so the cabling and the insulation isn't even touched at all. It give the insulation room to wiggle and I'm not sure this is a benefit. It could potentially prevent incidents where cables are damaged due to crimping with the original style termination. I also feel that the picture is misleading and the description of the product isn't done very well.

My first 3 cables with these did not work at all. the second set of three worked fine. So far 50% success rate. It could just be user error, or me getting used to the load bar. There is a different connector that I love so much, but it's really expensive. It have an integrated load bar assembly that is part of the interior plastic.

Overall: For the Price though I think this product is a good value. I just wish there were some proper instructions for those who have never used a load bar before when crimping their own cable. Cables Unlimited has been liquidated and "Cables to Go" has taken over their liquidated stock. Which makes it harder to get any proper info about this product at all. In the end I'd recommend it if you need to make some cables, but expect to learn how to use the load bar first before you make working cables.

Fitting the wire strains into the load bar is a little tedious at first but it gets easier after a few trys. You may want to keep the strains longer so it is easier for your fingers to handle the strains.

I also have some difficulty pushing the cables into the connector after fitting the load bar. Takes a bit of force to push the cables in to the connector completely so the load bar can sit correctly before you crimp it.

Otherwise, its a good product. The load bars really helps. Much much easier to connect than the 1 piece connectors

Terminated my own home network. Saved $[...] bucks in labor. These terminals are easy to use, are of good quality, the cable guides are easy to thread. The price is right!

This was what we were looking for since we were installing CAT6 cables for a home network that was being built.