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Thread: A good use for old Cat5!

  1. #21
    I mod everything I touch. Indybird's Avatar
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    Default Re: A good use for old Cat5!

    Would anyone be willing to make and sell some to me? I'm using some plain ol' stock wires for my Z-5500. I wouldn't be able to do all of that braiding, and then have it work right.

    First, would you be willing to do that for a decent rate?
    Second, would it help my setup as much as yours?

    Thanks,
    Indybird

  2. #22
    Fresh Paint Brockgrimes's Avatar
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    Default Re: A good use for old Cat5!

    Old thread I know, but if you wanted to go thicker and not take up a terrible amount of room, you could use 4 strands of cat-5 and use a 4-strand Plait Braid, or a modified crown knot.

    But with the wires already twisted and shielded inside the cat-5 casing, I'd just bundle them and use electrical tape to keep them together and try it that way first, then test it braided. I'm sure it'll be minimal if even noticeable difference.
    For a perminate fix I'd take the 4 bundles and route them through some a wire cover similar to this:


    Or the plastic braided stuff or the cheapy wire cover sold at autostores.
    There will be BLOOD!

  3. #23
    Noobsauce
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    Default Re: A good use for old Cat5!

    Yes, another necro post for this, but I just came across it and decided to give it a shot. I've got my first 3 cat5 strand braided together and the wires stripped. My question, awful as it probably seems, is this:

    I imagine that this will work for say, the white/red RCA cables as well, and I just need to group Solid wires->Red Jack, Striped wires->white Jack, yes? Can the cables be inserted into these?

    I know nothing of electronics (have help testing the stuff), but I'd like to make the RCA Audio plugs out of this stuff for my media components. Thanks for this idea though, it rocks!

  4. #24
    Measure once, curse twice nevermind1534's Avatar
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    Default Re: A good use for old Cat5!

    I say buy the plug to put on the end, or cut up an existing cord, although it would probably be best to stay away the ones from the dollar store, but they would work. You could just connect it to the plug. The prong in the center is for the signal and the outer ring is for ground.

  5. #25
    Noobsauce
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    Default Re: A good use for old Cat5!

    I was going to go to my local fry's electronics to pick up the shrink wrap and ends. So using this cat5 method w/ the signal/ground info, as long as you do say... solid -> signal and stripe -> ground it should work, right?

  6. #26
    Religiously tolerant. Luke122's Avatar
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    Default Re: A good use for old Cat5!

    Yes, this method (braiding) will work for RCAs, but dont do it! I tried it, and found that the capacitance was too high, and the sound output was.. strangely affected.

    If you want to make RCAs, just use a single piece of Cat5. As you said solid-signal, stripes-ground, and solder them up carefully. I used some nylon cable sleeving on it as well, then did some heatshrink on the ends before screwing the plugs back together on the ends, and it turned out really nice. Sound was good with $12 Radio Shack gold plated plugs, definitely better than my Monsters.

    Or even better, pull out one twisted pair from the cat5, and use that. Yes, one single twisted pair of 24ga wires. I did this with a set of Eichmann bullet plugs (around $60 USD) and they absolutely destroyed my expensive Monster brand RCA cables. I also noticed a slight boost in bass with the single strand cables as well.

    The Eichmann bullets are awesome though, and I cant say enough good things about them. Also, make sure you use solder with the highest silver content that you can.. that makes a big difference too.

    \m/ d(-_-)b \m/

    R9 290X+Kraken+Corsair H90, Xeon 5649@4ghz, Asus P6T-WS Pro

  7. #27
    Religiously tolerant. Luke122's Avatar
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    Default Re: A good use for old Cat5!

    Quote Originally Posted by Indybird View Post
    Would anyone be willing to make and sell some to me? I'm using some plain ol' stock wires for my Z-5500. I wouldn't be able to do all of that braiding, and then have it work right.

    First, would you be willing to do that for a decent rate?
    Second, would it help my setup as much as yours?

    Thanks,
    Indybird
    I'll make some up for you for free if you want, I have 8000' of cat5 here (reclaimed from building upgrade) so I can spare some. You just pay for shipping, and it's yours.

    Sorry for the slow reply.. if you still want it, let me know.

    \m/ d(-_-)b \m/

    R9 290X+Kraken+Corsair H90, Xeon 5649@4ghz, Asus P6T-WS Pro

  8. #28
    Noobsauce
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    Default Re: A good use for old Cat5!

    Quote Originally Posted by Luke122 View Post
    A lot of good information
    Thanks a lot Luke. I had already started doing the RCA braid thing. I'll have to junk the wire and start over. Certainly not a huge idea. I'm going el-cheapo for my first few times around, just to be sure I can actually make this stuff work. As I said, I know virtually nothing about electronics. I'll try the single cable before I attempt the single twisted pair though. Should make for interesting results.

    Maybe I'll make some of this speaker wire for my 5.1 creative set in the future though. It'll probably blow it up

  9. #29
    Religiously tolerant. Luke122's Avatar
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    Default Re: A good use for old Cat5!



    The single twisted pair is actually the easiest, since all you are doing is splitting open a cat5, and taking out one pair of twisted wires. (Blue/white for example) Solder ends onto it, and you are done.

    With the single cat5 strand, you are splitting all the twisted pairs into solids and stripes, then soldering to each group. Soldering 2 wires into a plug is much easier than soldering in 8 wires. Just my 2 cents..

    \m/ d(-_-)b \m/

    R9 290X+Kraken+Corsair H90, Xeon 5649@4ghz, Asus P6T-WS Pro

  10. #30
    Noobsauce
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    Default Re: A good use for old Cat5!

    Hm.. and maybe this would've destroyed me, but I was under the impression that after stripping the 4 wires (stripes), you'd then twist up all of the exposed wiring together, and then solder that, and then follow suit the same way with the solids? Is this incorrect?

    Sorry for all the questions

    I'll attempt the single pair idea based on your mini jack talk through earlier in this post, and just modify it like you suggest for RCA, that may indeed be easier. hmmmm... this should be interesting.

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