Troubleshooting Wired Connection
Some of the common problems faced by users related to wire connection are discussed in the following section:
Attenuation: It is the amount of signal loss within a wire. Further, there are some factors which facilitate attenuation such as resistivity of the connectors and twisted-pair cable. In addition, when the frequency of cable increases, attenuation also increases due to the inductance and capacitance of the cable.
Latency: The delay caused when a user sends the data to a destination and the time it is delivered is called latency. For instance, when a user clicks a page and longer the time it takes to respond is due to a high latency.
Jitter: Jitter is the change in latency of a network and can affect the normal operation of a monitor which results in flickering of the screen. Jitter restricts processor to perform its intended operation and generates some unwanted effects in audio signals. It may also lead to data loss while transmitting data among network resources.
Crosstalk: Crosstalk is the disturbance caused by the EMI (Electromagnetic Interference). A disturbance occurs when a signal passing through a channel is affected by another signal passing through the adjacent channel and creates an undesirable effect. For example, during a telephonic conversation sometimes a user may hear the conversation from the other circuit. These conversations are known as crosstalk.
EMI: EMI (Electromagnetic Interference) occurs when electromagnetic field of a device affects the electromagnetic field of another device.
Open/short: This issue occurs when there is an open or short connection in a cable. it is a very common issue with patch cables such as cat 5, cat 5e etc. In addition, this type of issue also occurs in wall plates.
Incorrect pin out: A user can easily detect if the cable is connected to the right pin with the help of a wire map tester. It is a device which sends signals within a wire in a twisted-pair cable to check whether it is connected to the right pin or not.
Incorrect cable type: this type of error when a user employs Silver satin Gable to establish the: Internet connection on his computer system. These cables have stranded wires which are not twisted and results in signal loss and crosstalk. Further, due to the signal loss, the applications retransmit the data which further leads to slow network performance.
Bad Port: If an error message bad port is displayed on a screen, it means the port is damaged, and needs to be reinstalled.
Transceiver mismatch: Transceiver is a device used to transmit and receive analog and digital signals. If a transceiver mismatch occurs, the data transmission among multiple nodes within a network becomes difficult. Further, it also affects other functions such as data conversion from digital to analog and collision detection.
TX/RX Reverse: TX and RX stands for transmit and receive, respectively. It is one of the cabling issues which occur when the transmitting and receiving end of the wire is inversed.
Duplex/Speed mismatch: It can be defined as the condition in which two devices operate on two different duplex modes. For example, one device is operating in full duplex mode and another device is operating in half duplex mode. Generally, this type of condition is caused by manual configuration of the connected devices. Duplex mismatch affects the communication process.
Damaged Cables: Damaged and exposed cables may cause severe electrical problems such as irregular power supply and massive power cut. Excess power may cause heat damage to the network equipment. However, a cable tester can be used to identify the issues related to damage cables.
Bent Pins: A user needs to be extra cautious while troubleshooting a CPU. Bent pins may occur due to a sudden drop or failed attempt at mounting a CPU. Further, bent pins do not allow the CPU to function normally and generate hardware errors.
Bottlenecks: It can be defined as the condition in which the flow of data is restricted by the network resources. Network bottleneck occurs in case of transmission of a large amount of data which is beyond the capacity of a network.
Bottlenecks can be avoided by designing a system to support a specific level of data flow so that it can work without any interruption up to that level. Following are some of the factors responsible for network bottleneck:
- Lower capacity of hardware components such as CPU
- Less capacity of RAM (Random Access Memory)
- Less capacity of Graphical processing units
VLAN mismatch: This issue occurs when native VLAN numbers differ on switches which are connected. Cisco switches uses cisco discovery protocol (CDP) to detect VLAN mismatch between two connected ports. Further, it also uses VTP (VLAN Trunking Protocol) to easily manage multiple VLAN tasks.
Network connection LED status indicators: LED indicators indicate the state of the port, i.e. whether they are active or inactive. Most of the Ethernet ports contain two LEDs in which one represents the connection state and other represents the activity.
In addition, there are some switches which contain only one LED light. A continuous green light indicates that the port is active and working properly. If the fight is flashing, it means that the data is being transferred.
However; if there is no fight, or the lights are orange or red then there might be a possibility of the port not working properly. Further, it could also be the case of device not connected properly. In addition, there is a possibility that the port is not receiving any signal from the network.
