Is it necessary to put a patch panel in front of the switch in a rack? I'm trying to figure out what the benefit to having one is... Why not just plug in directly to the switch?

Seems like an awful lot of cabling work for benefits that I'm not able to figure out.


BTW, I plan on putting in a 2 or 4 post rack in my home, hence why I'm asking.

 

The only benefit is that if something happens to the cable between the patch panel and the switch it is easy to replace that cable. The other benefit is it will look more professional. You won't have cables hanging all over the place.

 

It makes a cleaner install assuming your cat cables are in-wall.. otherwise..pointless..well to me at least.

 

http://www.ehow.com/about_5162384_pu...tch-panel.html

 

How many ports? If it's under 10, there's no need.

 

Another good use for them is when you have a lot of network drops, you can label the patch panels which helps when finding specific cables later on.

 

This is what my research led me to believe as well.

 

Yes sir, this is my primary usage. The vital connections that I need to be able to locate fairly quickly are setup just like that.

 

Another reason it is done if connections are being disconnected and reconnected frequently to prevent strain on the actual ports.

 

In theory, I could load up the 24 port switch I picked up.

But I still don't get it. Cleaner, OK. But the spaghetti still gets plugged into the patch panel, then the individual wires are connected to the back of the patch panel, to the switch. Seems like an awful like of wiring work, for what???

 

For home use, probably no need unless you "desire" that look and level of neatness.

 

Like I've mentioned above for in-wall seamless connection the patch make sense. I use 1 foot cats to connect to the switch, it's very neat and I'm a little OCD... It gives me more control over the specific connections.

I doubt this is something you'd need in your home.. You need a 24 port in your home???

 

It is really intended for mixed-use/mixed-technologies. The idea is that in a enterprise environment you may have separate switches for separate purposes, one for voip, one for private, one for public, etc. You would then patch the correct port to the correct infrastructure switch.

Certainly for home use it is overkill, but it does look good.

 

My parents have a patch in their house because each room has two ports. The phone system that came with the house is basically a business system and uses rj45 connections for the phones as well so by having the patch we can easily switch which port is network and which is phone in the rooms. We didn't chose this system it was in the house when my parents bought it.

 

Yes, I'm a port whore.

May not load the entire switch up, but plan on pulling as much cat6 as I can.

 

Yes... You need a patch panel...

You are going already going big... Go all the way.

 

Yeah, if you're going to have a rack there's no real point not to.

If I could get some components for cheap, I would as well.

 

I'm still scratching my head over this....

So I have cat 6 coming into a closet... I run those cables to the patch panel. And that sits right in front of the switch, correct? Then I run a small cat 6 from the back of the patch panel to the switch?

Why not just go directly to the switch? What am I missing?

 

The cat6 comes into your closet and runs into the back of the patch panel and is hardwired to each respective port. Then you simply patch each port over to your switch with a short cable.

It looks nice and is a must in a enterprise infrastructure since you usually have more than one switch and function so you may move patches from time to time. In your environment it isnt a must.

 

For you, it wold mainly be a neatness thing. No other real benefit unless you plan on changing things around frequently, in which case it makes things easier.


EDIT: What JLat said...

 

ah. OK, now that my order of operations are straight...


I may do it. I absolutely hate doing network wiring, though... The connectors drive me ape shit.