Networks Patch cable colouring schemes in cabinets... Is there a standard scheme??

As the title says, is there any sorta standard (official or unofficial) colouring scheme for patch cables in cabs?

Im asking because we have just bought a load of switches for work to replace 90% of what we already have and every cab will be re-wired eventually... as they all look like a **** at the moment.

If they arent any standards already do you have any of your own?

I want to separate (with colouring) voice, uplinks and server connections so at a glance I know what's what.

Im thinking...

Voice = Green (contracters seem to use that colour anyway)

Uplinks = Pink

Servers = Orange

Patch panel to Switch = White


Sorry if it's a nooby questing but i've decided to take on the job of overhauling and upgrading the network to learn more about networking

 

nope never seen any kind of standard, all i'd say is if you start something make sure you have lots of spares in every color as you can garrentee if you don't and something needs changing someone will use the wrong color and everything will slowly fall apart.

Might be worth sticking a lable up in your rack too so if someone else needs to look at it they know what there looking at

It may vary from contracter to contracter but they ones we use for phones, use whatever color they have in there van, but then again I wouldn't go reccommending them to anyone.

 

actualy i do this for a living and we dont have any standarts, mostly the customer asks us if we want to put the data in one color and voice in an other.
one of our last customers asked if we wanted to do data in red and phones in yelow.

so just use the colours you want (and put a lable in there for other users like Sp! says)

 

In one office we have yellow for telephone and grey for data. In the other we have green and blue for telephone, grey, blue, yellow, green for data. To be quite frank, it's a complete mess and it could really do with being untangled and a proper colour standard put in place. Maybe one day I'll get around to it, when there's no one in the office.

 

Thanks for the help, I will just make something up and add colour schemes to the network diagram I made a few weeks back.

I'm just trying to do things properly, network wise my work had been neglected for years so me and the network manager (we both started last year) have just been overhauling absolutely everything from the start. We are getting there and i'm learning a lot, which is main thing really

 

On networking jobs i've done, I just used to wire everything up and use cable ties or sticky lable's. A colour scheme would be a pretty good idea though, just make sure when cables are replaced the right colour is used.

 

We uses blue for data and white for voice.

 

When I used to do building wiring (voice and data) as a contractor, I would always recommend to the customer that they use the following.

Grey = Punch down panels to switch cables
Blue = Data/patch Cables
White = Voice (normally VOIP)

But I always had a few spools of what ever color they wanted/requested so that I could do repairs and keep with the current standards.


As others have stated the best thing is to label everything. I always built up a VISO worksheet of the work that I did, for billing reasons, but customers love them too) and would put a copy of the VISO file on a cd and put it in the wiring closet along with a print out that was laminated. All of my cables would be labeled with a Brother PT-65 (yes it’s a 'hobby labeler' but it works great and they last for ever) and had a piece of clear heat shrink tubing around it.

Also if you are upgrading just part of a network, or replacing/repairing/adding new capability to a current site. Always do your best work, make it clean and neat, and show up in the proper cloths. More then once, a minor job, adding a switch, or putting in just a few (say +<15) drops have turned in to monster over halls that took months and put a lot of cash in to my pocket. (I know this may not apply to everyone/anyone but all advice is good)

 

Feel sorry for the colour-blind network technicians out there!

At college we use data for green, and I have seen data cables in green for most places.

 

They would still see different shades of gray so it would work fine. They just wouldn't see it the same, but it is still different.

 

we use mostly purple, with some green, grey, white, blue and orange

It just makes sense to make your own scheme and stick to it

 

all our cat6 was green when we did our overhaul, so that became the server/gigabit connection color, voice was grey, data blue.. i think. patch panels to switches were also grey, but at the back of the cab so didnt really intefere.

 

at my tafe we have 3 wall sockets for each computer.
a blue one goes into the main tafe network
a green one for our routers/switches learning stuff
and i think there is a red one thats just there for rollover cables and things like that.
it would be very confusing when we go into the patch room if the were not coloured like that.

 

We use this colour schema + cable labelling

BK (Black) - Console (KVM)
BL (Blue) - Virtual and restricted LAN
GN (Green) - VoIP
GY (Gray) - Servers - switches (common LAN)
OR (Orange) - Heart beat, reverse cables
RD (Red) - RS-232
WH (White) - Patch-panel - switches (workstations)
YL (Yellow) - Technical LAN (management and monitoring) and network
devices like HP JetDirect, digital registrators