Unlimited cell phone service for less than $20/mo

Republic Wireless has just announced a service that will offer cell phone service for about $19 per month with unlimited talk, text and web. They use WiFi as much as possible to keep the costs down. Check the site out at http://www.republicwireless.com/join

Unconventional CAT5 terminations

Using a single CAT5 wire to terminate 2 data jacks. Since the Orange and Green pairs are only used in a CAT5 cable (not counting PoE or 10/100/1000 installs) the blue and brown pairs are not used, so they can be used to connect as a second "orange" and "green" pair on a second jack (as long as you terminate them both the same way on both ends of the cable). This should be avoided whenever possible, but can help to bring a second CAT5 jack somewhere that would be nearly impossible to pull a

This one is a little bit more creative. I needed to install push buttons for 3 door releases. My company did not want me pulling new runs. There was a CAT5 run near where the buttons needed to go to, but the fax line was connected to it. I installed a 8p8c connector terminated normally (568B) and split off the blue/white pair to a surface mount jack to connect the fax machine to. The remaining 3 pairs each went to a separate door release button. If needed to add more, I could have used a common wire for each button, to increase the amount of push buttons to a maximum of 5 + the fax dial tone. (or 7 if I did not need to have the dial tone working there.) Best thing about this installation, it is easily removable - or its concept can be used for other temporary applications using existing CAT5 wiring. 

Phone and network color codes

I know I posted a text version of the color code HERE  but to add to that I made some Images.

For network cables 568B is the most common used color code. To make a straight through or regular patch cord or jack both sides of the cable must be punched down to the same color code (either 568B or 568A). To make a cross over cable one end must be terminated as 568B and the other side as 568A) The only difference in terminations is that the orange and green pairs swap positions.

This is probably the color code that most people wiring a jack is looking for, What colors do the new CAT3/CAT5 colors go to inside of a phone jack since the colors are different. The first 2 (green/red+blue/white) are for line 1. The second pair does not usually need to be connected for residential customers unless they have a 2nd line. Some phone systems require both pairs to be connected.

 Here is the color code for the first 25 pairs of a telephone cable. This code repeats itself for cables larger than 25 pair by being wrapped in binder groups using the same color code (with the first 25 pair being wrapped in blue/white, and pairs 26-50 being wrapped in orange/white, etc.)

Need more than 25 pair? the colors will just continue to repeat, just wrapped in a different color binder, but here is what will be in the binders for 50 pair, 75 pair, 100 pair, and 125 pair. 

Click the image for a larger view. 



I made and posted this image too quickly.
The outter binder colors (top and bottom) should be BLUE-ORANGE-GREEN-BROWN



Vonage V-phone

This was in my draft folder since December - not sure why never published...

Vonage V-Phone with 250MB USB Flash Drive