4 ms·
Cost and simplicity of installation. Twisted pairs and crimp-on RJ connectors were already widespread in telecom due to POTS. If not for anything else, they wer
by avian 8y ago
Cost and simplicity of installation. Twisted pairs and crimp-on RJ connectors were already widespread in telecom due to POTS. If not for anything else, they were cheap and their reliability well understood due to economies of scale.
On the other hand, coax cable was significantly more expensive per length. Compared to RJ, BNC coax connectors were expensive and hard to correctly crimp onto the cable. When computer industry tried to make them cheaper it also resulted in very crappy products.
Unreliable connections were cause of most of the gripe with older coax-based networks. Which is kind of counter intuitive. A properly made BNC is very reliable and still used extensively in electronics test equipment and RF applications. But apparently reliability just didn't scale down cost-wise.
- flyinghamster 8y agoI also don't miss the daisy-chain wiring of coax Ethernet. Any one connector getting out of whack, or a bad/missing terminator on either end, would take the whole network down.
- ansible 8y agoAnd adding a new drop with coax meant taking down the entire network temporarily.
- avian 8y agoYes, but network topology is orthogonal to the type of cable used. We could have just as well used coax for modern switched connections.
- chrisdhoover 8y agoWe did star configure CCTV systems using RG59 and RG6. The cables are heavy and the connectors big. You can't get the same density as with UTP. A 48 port coax switch took 4U versus a 1U UTP switch