The Importance of Structured Wiring - Authorized Security Calgary

Why wires shouldn’t just be a mess under your desk

Posted 06/07/2018

In Access Control, Alarm Systems, Networking, Structured Wiring, Video Surveillance

Wires can be worse than a pest. And it seems as though with everything that is developed and added to our daily lives, it adds more and more wiring to our desks. There are however many reasons as to why wires should be kept organized and if possible even modified to be cut or bought at the length actually required instead of too long.

Wiring and Magnetic Fields

Wires are extremely important as they carry the data and power we use in our every day lives. Whether it is your smartphone, laptop or even some cars nowadays, everything needs a wire to function. In a standard business setting every desk can have multiple display cables, USB cables, power cables, data cabling and more, and unfortunately it is usually all bunched up behind a computer or under the desk.

A wire is essentially a means to carry a current.Unless you are using specialized wires such as fibre optic which carries light instead of electricity. The importance of organizing your wires comes in when closely analyzing the differences between the different applications. A data cable, such as a Cat 5 cable carrying your internet signal carries a current anywhere between 2 to 20VDC. Whereas a standard power cord in North America carries 120 VAC.

The difference between Volts AC and Volts DC is the type of current. DC carries a straight current, whereas AC carries alternating waves of power. Without going into detail, the effect that the different voltages have on each other are the difference in the magnetic field created by each. A magnetic field is created by electricity running through any medium, in this case being a wire. AC emanates a different type of magnetic field than a DC current would, which causes the two to interfere with each other. With line voltage being significantly higher than the low voltage wiring carrying all your data and charging your phone, this results in power cords having significantly larger magnetic field. If a power cord is run right beside a data cable it can cause losses to the extent that the data cable is rendered useless.

We have had customers in their businesses that had data cabling run in the same spaces that their power was run through. As a result, when the power to certain lights was turned on, the entire network would fail and would not come back online until the light was turned off again. The magnetic field created by turning on the light and allowing the flow of elctricity was large enough to jump to the other wire and force it to destroy all the data it was trying to send. This is a result of poor planning, lack of knowledge and can cost huge amounts of money to be rectified.

Troubleshooting Wiring

Apart from the electronics lesson that we have just presented to you another important fact about wiring is troubleshooting and premature failure. When something is pinched or bunched up, or even being stepped on regularly because it is under a desk, premature failure follows hand in hand with that. Losing connectivity in a wire can be very frustrating, because it could have been prevented very easily, but also can be hard to troubleshoot. If all wiring is nicely organized it is easy to troubleshoot wiring, because everything is labelled and can be unplugged and plugged back in without any effort. Wires can also be followed much more easily to where they run to, giving more troubleshooting capability. When wires are properly organized and also tied out of the way of your employees, wiring can outlast most devices, because it is properly placed and not prone to premature wear. No broken cable jackets and no kinks in the lines allow for full data speed capabilities and full longevity.

Keeping Wiring Clean

The last important fact is cleanliness and appearance. It looks much nicer to have a nicely organized strand of wiring instead of a bunched up ball of wiring that can be seen. It also allows for much easier access to cleaning, instead of having to lift the ball of wires and trying to clean it. Most of the time if the wiring is bunched up very badly, cleaning it is impossible and it becomes a nightmare.

If you have a wiring mess that needs some TLC, please let us know. We are more than happy to help you clean up your work space and networking cabinets. When we design and install a new solution or design the entire layout for a new build, we ensure the wiring is always future proof and reliably placed, so no interference can cause you problems. Contact us today to get some help with your wiring.