Patch Cord Certification with DSX-PCxxS Adapters
This is required reading material for anyone who is certifying patch cords to ANSI/TIA and ISO/IEC standards:
DSX-PCxx Patch Cord Adapters Users Manual
There are three DSX Patch Cord Adapter sets available:
DSX-PC5ES – Two DSX-PC5E Cat 5e Patch Cord adapters (for certifying Cat 5e Patch Cords to TIA Cat 5e Patch Cord Limits)
DSX-PC6S -- Two DSX-PC6S Patch Cord Adapters (for certifying Cat 6 Patch Cords to TIA Cat 6 Patch Cord Limits)
DSX-PC6AS – Two DSX-PC6A Patch Cord Adapters (for certifying Cat 6A Patch Cords to TIA Cat 6A Patch Cord Limits)
The DSX patch cord adapters are tuned specifically to the capabilities/ratings of the jacks and cables used on the patch cords. In other words, you should not expect to be able to use the DSX-PC6AS or the DSX-PC6S to be able to successfully certify Cat 5e Patch Cords. If that is your requirement, you should buy DSX-PC5ES.
The Appendix of the Users Manual details a process for How to Characterize the Adapters. We recommend you perform this process, and also the steps for How to Verify the Adapters’ Performance. This ensures that the adapters are working properly, the replaceable jacks are installed correctly, and that the adapters are not damaged.
Read through the section How to Set Up the Tester and configure your test set.
Make sure to set Store Plot Data: ON
The most common questions we receive in TAC about patch cord certification are as follows:
Why is NEXT failing?
- Is it the cable or the connector?
Why is Return Loss failing?
- Is it the cable or the connector?
If you need additional help determining the cause of failure, open a support case with Technical Support. We would need to see the LinkWare (.flw) file to interpret the results.
