Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!columbia!cs!benderly
From: benderly@cs.columbia.edu (Dan Benderly)
Newsgroups: comp.dcom.lans
Subject: Re: Cable testers
Message-ID: <242@cs.columbia.edu>
Date: 13 Jun 89 13:00:03 GMT
References: <2021@wasatch.utah.edu>
Reply-To: benderly@cs.columbia.edu (Dan Benderly)
Followup-To: comp.dcom.lans
Organization: Columbia University Department of Computer Science
Lines: 31

In article <2021@wasatch.utah.edu> haas@wasatch.utah.edu (Walt Haas) writes:
>I'm shopping for a good way to test coax and twisted pair cables used in
>Ethernet, Arcnet and broadband.  One way would be to spend a lot of money for
>a large, heavy TDR that would give me lots of information.  But there are now
>on the market units that send a pulse down the cable and tell you on a little
>display whether a reflection came back and whether it represents a short or
>open.  This gives you some information, less than a TDR would give you but
>maybe enough to solve most problems.  In particular I'm looking at a thing
>called a Cable Scanner built by a company called M-Test.  Does anybody in
>netland have one of these?  Who are their competitors?  What percentage of
>problems can be solved this way, vs. what percentage need the full TDR
>treatment?
>
>Thanks in advance for any beta -- Walt Haas  haas@cs.utah.edu  utah-cs!haas

I have used both a full-blown TDR and, more recently, a product called the
Hand Scanner (I don't remember off-hand who the manufacturer is.  If there
is interest I will lokk it up & post it).  I was very happy with the hand
scanner.  It costs ~$1200, and did everything I needed it to do.  It will detectan open or a close, and tell you how far away the condition is.  It is *very*
easy to use.  If you have an old oscilloscope (or a new one, I suppose), the
product will let you attach it & function as a full-blown TDR (I haven't tried
this function, but that's what the manual says).  You can hook up a printer or
PC to it, obtaining a record similar to that produced by the Tektronix strip-
printer output.  All in all, I am a very happy customer.

Disclaimer:  I have only used the product on coax.  While they claim that it
can help with TP, I haven't tried it.  I have no vested interest in this companyother than their survival so that they can provide support :-)

Dan

benderly@cs.columbia.edu