Copyright Goodheart-Willcox Co., Inc. 65 Chapter 2 Network Media—Copper-Core Cable Cat 6 Cat 5 Figure 2-18 Category 5 and Category 6 cable. Goodheart-Willcox Publisher Category 7 Category 7 cable has a maximum frequency rating of 600 MHz. It uses a diff erent cable construction to achieve a high data rate. Category 7 is constructed of four pairs of twisted conductors with a protective foil or a conductive braid surrounding each pair. In addition to the individually covered pairs, there is an overall protective foil or conductive braid surrounding the complete assembly. In theory, it can achieve bandwidths of up to 10 Gbps. Category 7a Category 7a cable has a maximum frequency rating of 1000 MHz. In theory, it can achieve bandwidths of up to 10 Gbps. Category 8 Category 8 cable was released in late 2016. It has a maximum frequency rating of 2 GHz and can achieve bandwidths of 1800–2000 MHz. Th is category of cable only comes in a shielded version. Other Cable Types Th ese categories for unshielded twisted pair describe frequency and bandwidth. However, there are many variations. In addition to 100BaseTX, there is also 1000BaseLX and 1000BaseSX, among others. Like other deployment standards, the number indicated the bandwidth in megabits per second. Th e letters at the end de- scribe cable type. For example, the LX in 1000BaseLX refers to laser, and the SX in 1000BaseSX refers to fi ber. IEEE 802 Standard In Chapter 1, you learned that the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE) develops standards for the networking and communication industry. Th ese standards begin with an 802 prefi x, such as 802.1 for Internetworking and 802.2 for Tech Tip The IEEE specification for 802.3 is over 1000 pages long. You can download the complete specification from the IEEE website as an Adobe Acrobat file.