Messy office cabling can cause a number of both technical and safety problems: in addition to being a nasty trip and electrical hazard, bad cabling can lead to overheating, poor network performance, unnecessary stresses on equipment, expensive repair costs, and can make routine maintenance more confusing.
It doesn’t have to be this way – we share our 5 top tips to tame your office cabling and avoid the scourge of messy electronics.
- Get POE (‘Power Over Ethernet’) Switches and Phones
It really isn’t necessary for every device to have both a power lead and network cabling – investing a little more in a network switch which provides both data AND power to networked devices immediately halves the number of unnecessary cables left trailing around desks.
Modern VOIP phone systems typically include pass-through ports, to network your PC via the phone, cutting the need for yet another long network cable.
- Get a Server Cabinet
If you’ve got significant onsite hardware, such as servers, larger switches or NAS devices, these tend to accumulate wherever there’s a space for them, however inconvenient.
This is a significantly easier evolution to manage with a purpose built server cabinet – in addition to the clear security benefits of being able to lock your hardware away, a server cabinet provides the racking necessary to ‘stack’ equipment vertically safely and ventilate electronics efficiently.
It’s best to investigate a larger cabinet than is actually required for your long-term hardware investment: to allow long-term room for expansion.
- Shorter Cables for the Cabinet
If you’ve ever laughed at the uselessness of a 10cm network cable you’ve clearly never wired up a server room: short cables are a lifesaver to connect servers to switches without a vipers pit of excess cable trailing all over the place.
It’s also good for the environment not to use metres of unnecessary copper just to bridge a gap of only a few centimetres – so don’t do it!
- Get a meshed WiFi Network
It’s not 2006 anymore. Many devices can and should be connected wirelessly to save both the hassle and expense of yet more office cabling cluttering up the place.
Modern business WiFi networks use a series ‘meshed’ access points that pass signal to ensure consistent signal strength, and can be managed centrally from the cloud with ease at low costs. If you’re covering a larger premises or supporting staff with portable devices, it really is a no-brainer.
- Call the experts
We understand how messy office cabling happens: over time small additions are made until the overall system is a mess, and sooner or later someone is forced to admit it’s a problem.
Whether it’s installing a meshed WiFi network across your site, moving your document sharing to a virtual space in the cloud, or re-wiring an ageing server room: call the Lineal team for professional network expertise.
