How To: Terminate Cat6/6A Shielded Direct Burial Ethernet Cable

In this week’s video we revisit an old subject: terminating shielded Ethernet cable with shielded RJ45 connectors. Our Technical Manager, Don Schultz, revisits this process and goes through it step-by step, shares some updated best practices, and leaves you feeling confident in trying it yourself!

If you found this video helpful let us know in the comments and subscribe for more!

Video Time Codes:
[0:00-0:24] - Intro
[0:25-0:58] - Overview
[0:59-3:16] - Required Tools & Hardware
[3:17-4:31] - Shielded vs Unshielded RJ45 Connectors
[4:32-5:35] - Cutting & Stripping Ethernet Cable
[5:36-6:37] - Securing Drain Wire & Finalizing Cable Prep
[6:38-8:34] - Straightening Your Conductors
[8:35-9:39] - Putting Conductors Into Correct Sequence
[9:40-12:07] - Putting RJ45 Connector Onto Ethernet Cable
[12:08-13:14] - Termination
[13:15-13:36] - Outro

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[VarkaTheDragon]

THANK YOU for actually explaining and outlining the specific connectors and how to deal with the thicker CAT6 outdoor/direct burial cables; I thought I was going mad with how I could never seem to make the jacket fit into the regular CAT6 crimp terminals. This explains exactly why - thank you!

[ecospider]

This was a fantastic detailed overview of a shielded rj45 end crimp. I have done a couple thousand cat 5 ends over the years and was trying to decide if I should do cat 6 or cat 6a for a new run at my house. Looks like I can do cat 6a with the old ends with a little finagling and the cat 6a will be there incase I need it.

[nlay]

Helpful video! Thanks for creating the content.

[Firemedic]

Very helpful, but something maybe I'm just dumb and didn't understand it would be helpful to add, are you saying we should put the Keystone jack on both ends? In my case I'm running a cable from in my house out to a barn a couple hundred feet away. Are you saying I should use the keystone jack on both ends and then like a patch cable from there to the router? (I'm running from my router inside out to another router it will be in the barn)

And if you happen to actually get this to answer me, what specific cable of yours would you recommend for that? It will be direct burial about 250 feet. And I would like to semi future proof it so I don't have to redo it again 10 or 15 years from now.

I appreciate any help you can give me!

[GrahamWerle]

does the external grounded connector need to be connected to anything else?

[farisfahmi]

sorry to ask, it is universal crimping tools can be use for crimping the Shielded RJ45 connector ?

[VrajeshR]

Can i use a Cat6A cable on a Cat6 Keystone & Connector ?

[NicolasTheondine]

Thanks a lot! ;-)
Another dummy (you know youtube people...) question : what about Toolless (without tools) RJ45 (6a-7) ? For a oneshot use.