-----Original Message----- From: Scott McGrath [mailto:mcgrath@fas.harvard.edu] Sent: Wednesday, January 26, 2005 10:44 PM To: Hannigan, Martin Cc: nanog@merit.edu Subject: RE: High Density Multimode Runs BCP?

Hi, Martin

Yes indeed the ribbon cable. Tho' due to the damage factor I probably would not specify it again unless I could use innerduct to protect it as we had some machine room renovations done and the construction workers managed to kink the underfloor runs as well as setting off the Halon system several times...

The ribbon cables work well if they are adequately protected. If the people in the machine room environment are skilled at handling fiber there should be no problems. If however J. Random Laborer has access I would go with conventional armored runs.

Armored runs are for outside plant, or, inside plant that doesn't have adequate cable management. I've seen armored indoors as a "security" measure, but if you don't control your data center, you may as well save the money since armored cable is like locks, it keeps good people out. It may keep slack electricians from damaging it, but considering they are usually heavy industry, I wouldn't rely on it for that reason alone. :-) As I said earlier, ribbon isn't designed for data centers, nor is innerduct designed for ribbon. I'd love to see some photos of people using innerduct+ribbon cable. :-) YMMV. -M<