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Future-Proof Your Network With Cisco IP Phone 8800 Series

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How Cisco IP Phone 8800 Series VoIP Phones Can Help You Future-Proof Your Network

The world of technology is constantly evolving and advancing, and the world of VoIP phones is no exception. VoIP technology has come a long way since it was first introduced in the 1990’s. This improved technology has led to increased popularity of VoIP phones and many businesses, small and large, are adopting VoIP phones as replacements for old analog phone technologies. If you are in the market for a VoIP phone, it’s critical that you maximize your investment by making a selection that will meet the needs of today as well as those of tomorrow. The Cisco IP Phone 8800 Series is Cisco’s next-generation advanced VoIP phone series and is an excellent option for anyone looking to future-proof their network. The 8800 portfolio is made up of 9 phones including desk, conference, and wireless phones. The models in this series boast a wide range of benefits and features that will make communication easier than ever before. This, in turn, will help you keep your business running more effectively and efficiently than ever. These phones are suited for businesses of all sizes, from small and mid-sized organizations all the way to large enterprises. Not only do these phones provide advanced features, but they offer an affordable entry into the VoIP market. These cost-effective phones allow you to future-proof your network now by offering these advanced features and benefits:

  1. Superb Sound Quality

Experience the best audio performance that any Cisco IP Phone has to offer. Whether you’re an audiophile or not you will experience a tremendous boost in audio quality when using these phones. The phones in the 8800 Series feature improved acoustics and full duplex wideband (G.722) audio performance to allow seamless communications. The desk phones are also hardware-enhanced to provide a higher level of echo cancellation. In addition, the speakers and microphones of these phones include vibration isolation. The sound quality of these phones meets the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) compliance. You simply can’t beat the sound quality provided by the Cisco 8800 Series!

  1. Functional and Ergonomic Design

The Cisco 8800 Series phones were designed with the user’s comfort in mind. These phones are equipped with rounded phone keys that give users a great tactile feel and help to lessen misdials. A widescreen HD resolution backlit display provides a great user experience both for viewing and navigation. Continuous software updates allow for system menus and notifications that are more engaging and easier to navigate. It also has Context-sensitive soft-label keys and a five-way navigation cluster that enhances the user productivity.

  1. Seamless Mobile Device Integration

Imagine you have to take an important phone call on your mobile phone while driving to the office but you would much prefer the enhanced audio your 8800 phone provides. Many of the phones in this series are equipped with the Cisco’s Intelligent Proximity technology that allows for a seamless integration from a personal mobile device to the IP Phone via Bluetooth. This means that you could easily transfer your call from your cell phone to your IP phone once you get to your office. Cisco Intelligent Proximity technology not only transfers audio calls but can also import call histories and contacts making it a perfect companion for those important messages. Users can also charge their mobile devices as select 8800 series models include a built in USB port.

  1. 720p High-Definition Video Support

Having a crystal-clear audio paired with a 720p HD video can make any video conference more enjoyable. With the Cisco WebEx and Jabber technology, employees can pair a laptop for video and use the desk phone for audio. It also supports long distance communications allowing remote employees to easily collaborate via video conference to increase their efficiency.

  1. Scalable Platform for Future-Proofing

This is where the system expandability comes into play as the 8800 series features some unique options for expanding and scaling your phone network. Select phones allow for the addition of Key Expansion Modules which provide you with 18 additional physical keys as well as additional soft keys. Further, the 8800 conference phones have the optional addition of wired or wireless microphones that expand the listening range of the conference phones. There is also a wireless phone option in this series which allows highly mobile workers within a wireless LAN network enabled campus to easily and clearly communicate while freely moving about the campus.

  1. Flexible Deployment Options for your Company

The 8800 Series was designed for all kinds of users and offers flexible deployment options for your organization. With its built-in Cisco Spark Phone OS, the 8800 series offers flexible deployment options, whether in Cisco on-premises, cloud or hybrid configurations.  Several 8800 Series models can also support third party hosted call control from certified providers. The Cisco Expressway technology also allows remote workers to securely connect to the network without having the need for a dedicated VPN client. This truly helps the collaboration between lost distances.

Future Proof Your Network with the Cisco IP Phone 8800 Series

The Cisco IP Phone 8800 Series portfolio brings superior connectivity paired with excellent performance. Having all the needed features for smooth and seamless communication, crystal-clear audio, HD quality video support, and a flexible and scalable platform, the Cisco IP Phone 8800 Series can ensure that your phone network remains relevant far into the future.

 

 

Introducing CablesAndKits’ New Premium Fiber Cables

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Innovation in Fiber Cable Product Development

CablesAndKits has long been known as being a leader in innovation and quality with both its products and service. One thing that has remained consistent over the years is the ability to continuously raise the bar in offering our customers top-notch network solutions and cabling. Our new CablesAndKits premium fiber cables are the next step in the evolution of producing great networking products for our customers. These cables have been introduced to the market specifically to make the day-to-day operations of your business easier, safer, and more reliable.

CablesAndKits Premium Fiber Cables

There were several factors that we thought of and wanted to incorporate into making a cable that was unlike any other:

Corning® Optical Fiber & Suncall® Connectors

Our new OS2, OM3, OM4 and OM5 cables share many qualities, including the fact they are all constructed out of pure Corning® glass fibers and top-of-the-line Suncall® connectors. This enables the cables to offer some of the greatest resilience and quality in the industry. You can be confident you will receive low signal loss in addition to low attenuation for the entire network. CablesAndKits remains firmly at the forefront of innovation, which is why we knew that adding the Corning and Suncall components would make these cables the best overall product offering for our customers.

Bend Insensitive Fibers

Every building is different, and as a result, some cables will need to make some challenging twists and turns to reach their destinations. With this in mind, we created these cables with bend insensitive fiber. The primary benefit of BIF is the fact it is capable of transmitting light with as little loss as possible even when twists and bends are present. The cables are built with refraction materials located around the glass that help the structure capture lost light and send it back to the core.

LSZH Jacket Material

LSZH cable jacketing offers the best solution for protecting your building. It is by far the safest cabling material in that it helps reduce the amount of corrosive and toxic gas emitted in the event of combustion or extreme heat. It is extremely useful in confined installations, and it has numerous benefits over PUR, PVDF, PE, and PVC. This material is highly recommended for installations in riser areas, which are channels, tubes and floor openings that run upward across several floors, but can just as easily be used for your normal fiber runs and connections.

Simple Polarity Reversible Function

When you are out in the field, you should not have to use any specialized tools to get the proper fiber mapping. Fortunately, these new fiber cables allow you to swiftly reverse polarity. This allows you to use fewer cables to create a high-density, high-speed data area.

Ultra Physical Contact Polish

When light moves one fiber to the next sometimes the light will bounce back, which is back reflection. Too much of this can shorten the life of the transceiver, and that can lead to intermittent service or downtime. With the Ultra Physical Contact polish, the polishing technique and the adjusted curvature of the ferrule in the cable lower the back reflection and as a result, you get to enjoy improved telephony, digital and data applications.

2.0 Diameter Unibody

Along with the unibody design of the new premium fiber cables, we offer a variety of streamlined, shorter boot types, including standard, uniboot, and uniboot push-pull tab. At only 2.0 millimeters, these cables will create a smaller footprint for your network equipment and cabling. This creates a more streamlined environment for the structures, aiding immensely with cable management, cooling, and airflow. This is a huge plus in a high-density data center environment.

CablesAndKits Premium Fiber Cables

Whether you want OS2, OM3, OM4 or OM5 fiber cables, you can rest assured knowing you are getting the highest quality and a first-class product. The signals in your building will never be better, which is CablesAndKits should be your fiber and network solutions provider. Give one of our Fiber Cabling Experts a call @ 888.597.5000 or chat today, or you can request a quote on our online form to get a sense of how much it will cost to outfit your building with the best cables in the marketplace.

What is the difference between LSZH and OFNR?

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With the many types of fiber cables and then the components that make each of them up, it can be very confusing to know what fiber cable is the best overall for your business. One of the biggest questions we get is what is the difference between OFNR fiber cables and LSZH fiber cables. While they seem like the same thing, they are really two very different and very important attributes of fiber cables, and the same fiber cable can be both. To understand these attributes better, we have to understand the construction of fiber cables and the different rating levels associated with fiber optic cabling.

Optical Fiber Construction

There are several parts that made up the fiber cable. Each part starting from the cladding, then the coating, strength member and lastly the outer jacket is covered at the top of each other to give protection and shielding especially the conductors and the fiber core. Above all of these, the outer jacket is the first layer of protection and adds strength to the fiber to withstand different conditions such as fire, moisture, chemical, and stress during installations and operations.

Fiber Cable Outer Jacket Material Types

Fiber cable outer jackets can be classified into several types in terms of different materials. These materials have different characteristics and use that depends on the application’s setting. The list below shows the most popular types of outer jacket materials and its uses.

Material Characteristics and Uses
PVC
(Polyvinylchloride)		 Most commonly used material for outer jacket. It is low cost, strong, flexible, fire resistant and can be used in many applications.
PE
(Polyethylene)		 Very good electrical properties while maintaining high insulation. PE cables may be firm and solid but are more flexible.
PVDF
(Polyvinyl Difluoride)		 Has more flame-resistant properties than the PE cable and primarily used for plenum areas.
PUR
(Polyurethane)		 PUR is very flexible and scratch resistant that is mainly used in low-temperature environments.
LSZH
(Low Smoke Zero Halogen)		 LSZH is less toxic than PVC. It has a flame-retardant outer cover that doesn’t produce halogen when heated. Mainly used in confined installations.

The National Electrical Code (NEC) has a classification system for optical fiber cables. These requirements specify how the fiber cables will behave in case of fire conditions and categorize depending on its application for these different areas.

What is the Plenum Area?
A plenum area is a space used to move air to workspaces for the purpose of [Read more…] about What is the difference between LSZH and OFNR?

The Importance of MPO Cables, MPO Cassettes, and Fiber Patch Panels

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The number of network connections and the quantity of data transmitted worldwide is rising rapidly and growing exponentially. And so is the importance of cable management. Not only does proper and efficient cable management help maintain basic network functionality, it also protects your equipment from clogged airflow as a result of having unorganized cables.

Three important components of a well-run network facility are MPO cables, MPO cassettes, and fiber patch panels. Let’s take a look at how they benefit your network and why they are now considered a necessity for a modern data center.

What Is MPO?

First, we have to understand what MPO is. MPO stands for Multiple Fiber Push-on/Pull-off, an innovative technology used for a multi-fiber application that is required by high-speed data transmission such as a 10G, 40G or 100g network connections. Introduced and brought into use for the first time several years ago, MPO connectors are now widely used all over the world. The technology was developed to lessen the amount of time it takes for splicing individual connectors together. By combining multiple fibers (hence the name Multiple Fiber) in just one connector, it not only reduces the time it takes to connect fibers but also saves an abundance of space.

MPO cable

MPO Cables

Traditional or legacy fiber cables can make the storage center crammed and quite hard to manage. To get over this challenge, data centers need to deploy ultra-high density network cables to accommodate all of the required cablings. This is where MPO cables come in. MPO cables are composed of fiber optic cables and MPO connectors. The assembly brings together 6 to 72 fibers, with 12-fiber and 24-fiber arrays being the most commonly used.

The heart of an MPO cable assembly lies in its connector. It’s available in a female version that has no pins and a male version with pins. These pins make sure that the connector fronts are precisely aligned on contact and that the fibers’ endfaces aren’t offset. The top side of the MPO connector has guide grooves or keys that ensure the adapter holds the connector with the right ends aligned with each other.

The push-and-pull design of MPO cable assemblies enables simple insertion and removal which allow for quick and easy installation, reducing installation time by around 75% when being compared to traditional field-termination.

MPO cables also allow for higher density connections between network equipment, in turn saving significant rack space. They are also usually modular in design, proven very feasible for future expansion and easier system reconfiguration. Additionally, since installation is very easy, using MPO cables also reduces the overall cost of deployment and maintenance of the network.

fiber-cassette

MPO Cassettes

An MPO cassette is generally a modular module that permits users to get hold of the fibers from a trunk cable and distribute them to a duplex cable.  An enclosed unit that houses 8, 12, or 24 fiber factory terminated fan-outs inside. They usually include connectors such as SC, LC, or LT plugged into adapters on the front side of the cassette and an MPO connector plugged into the rear. The interface of today’s most popular 10G optics is the LC connector and at present, the three most widely used cassettes are 8-Fiber to 4xLC duplex cassettes, 12-Fiber to 6xLC cassettes, and 24-Fiber to 24xLC duplex cassettes.

Aside from the MPO-LC, there is another type of MPO cassette that is being used today. The MPO-MPO Fiber Cassettes. MPO conversion cassettes house 8, 12, or 24 fibers and have MPO adapters on both the rear and front sides. The most common ones used in the market today are the 2x MPO-24 to 4x MPO-12 and the 3x MPO-8 to 2x MPO-12 MPO.

Using MPO cassettes ensures adaptability for the ever-changing data center and network environment. Network administrators face technology refresh frequencies every 12-18 months, and using plug and play MPO cassettes offer a great advantage. When requirements for connectors change in the future, all you have to do is simply swap out the cassettes all while leaving the existing backbone infrastructure intact.

Fiber Patch Panels

A fiber patch panel, which is also called a cross-connect patch panel, can be likened to the nerve center of your cabling network. It offers a brilliantly simple solution for blending manageability, flexibility, and scalability into high-density fiber channels. Simply put, it is where all the infrastructure’s horizontal cabling is consolidated. Fiber patch panels enable the transmitted data to smoothly arrive at its destination. Definitely an indispensable component in today’s network system.

Furthermore, a fiber patch panel or enclosure acts as a unit that allows administrators to terminate several cable elements while providing a secure and organized chamber for splice units and connectors. It also helps with limiting wire clutter during setup. With a fiber optic patch panel installed, installations and repairs will be accomplished in a much faster and efficient way.

There are currently two versions of a fiber patch panel: the rackmount and the wall mount. Rackmount patch panels are generally made for the standard 19-inch rack mounting. It’s often available with flat or angled design in 1U, 2U, or 4U configurations.  The wall mount patch panel has a low profile and compact design, perfect for data centers where space is at a premium. Additionally, it provides clear and intuitive paths for cable routing and can easily be installed on your wall.

Using a high-density fiber patch panel comes with many advantages. Along with saving precious space, it also simplifies cable deployment by not needing to run jumpers across the room or under the floor and instead by just simply running a short fiber patch from your network switch up to the panel enclosure. High-density fiber patch panels will give you the highest level of scalability and density. Offering a cost-effective solution and seamless distribution for bandwidth from 10G, 40G, to 100G.

CablesAndKits: Your Partner in IT Procurement

CablesAndKits is a fast growing and privately operated network equipment dealer in the United States. We offer a wide selection of MPO cables, MPO cassette module, and fiber patch panels to keep your network running smoothly and efficiently. As experts in awesome, we go above and beyond what’s expected to provide you with a trusted and reliable interaction every time. We have free shipping over $99 plus same-day shipping if you order by 8PM EST. Not only that, but all purchases are covered by a lifetime warranty.

We are CablesAndKits. Get more, spend less.

Migrating to a 40g Network: Now a Necessity

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As data centers rapidly grow and develop, the need for a faster network connection also increases.  With the ratification of the IEEE 802.3ab in 2010, 40G has displaced 10G as the next network speed evolution in the enterprise.

What drives the need for 40G today is the same force that drove the need for 10G just over 10 years ago: increasing bandwidth demand. In the modern enterprise, bandwidth demand is driven by the changing nature of applications and advances in server and storage technologies. Let’s look at some of the benefits of upgrading to a 40G network.

high speed 40gb network [Read more…] about Migrating to a 40g Network: Now a Necessity

40GB (OM4) Fiber Cabling, Connector Types, & the Future of Cable Management

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Your network solution must meet many demands. Future growth, reduce operational costs, improve energy efficiency, and optimize infrastructure utilization. In the present age of improving and expanding storage area network environments, density has never been more important.

It has been proven that using denser fiber optic cables always equates to better space saving capability as well as better performance. However, most people are often confused as to what type of cable they should be using. Let’s take a look at them. [Read more…] about 40GB (OM4) Fiber Cabling, Connector Types, & the Future of Cable Management