The marketing department of a firm has tasked the organization to design a structured cabling system allowing them to support either 10GBaseT or HDBASE-T. The budget requires that only one cable…

Question

Options

• ACategory 5e
• BCategory 6
• CCategory 6A
• DCategory 7

• A
  5% (2)
• B
  14% (5)
• C
  73% (27)
• D
  8% (3)

Explanation

Category 6A is the minimum cable standard that satisfies both 10GBase-T and HDBaseT requirements at their full 100-meter channel distance - it operates at 500 MHz and is specifically ratified to support 10 Gbps over 100m, which is the defining certification for both technologies.

Why the distractors fail:

• Cat 5e (A) maxes out at 1 Gbps (1000Base-T) and 100 MHz - it cannot support 10GBase-T at all.
• Cat 6 (B) can carry 10GBase-T, but only up to ~55 meters due to alien crosstalk limitations, not the full 100m - making it non-compliant for a standard deployment.
• Cat 7 (D) would work (600 MHz, 10 Gbps at 100m), but it exceeds the minimum requirement, costs more, and the question explicitly asks for the minimum solution.

Memory tip: Think "6A = 10G All the way" - Cat 6A is the first category certified to run 10 Gbps for the full 100-meter distance. Anything below falls short on distance or speed; anything above is more than the minimum needed.

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