Basically, I’m building a home and getting it wired with Ethernet cabling. I didn’t want to get too much into the technical details, so I just provided the builders with locations where I want RJ45 ports, along with one spot where I just said “24-port patch panel” (the number of ports located elsewhere being 22.
I did some Googling and figured the patch panel should cost at most $150 in hardware costs (I found plenty of sub-$100 options, but a couple of more expensive ones and would not have been . I didn’t mention anything about needing a rack because I thought it would be something that could just go directly in the wall. (And then I could buy a switch and use it to connect pretty much all the ports from the patch panel to the router.)
The builder came back to me with an estimated cost of:
- $465 for a server cabinet: SEVCBN -6RU – 66WM
- $567 for a patch panel: NCO760242563
- $148 install charge
They gave me specific model numbers for the patch panel and server cabinet, but I can’t find information about whether that’s the actual cost of them, because the costs are locked behind having an account with the B2B retailers.
Does their proposed patch panel costing about 4x what I was expecting actually seem likely to give any value? Is there are explanation for that cost?
Secondary question: is having a wall-mounted cabinet worthwhile? How will it work in terms of installing a switch and connecting from the patch panel to the switch?
Thanks!
You can probably ask them to pull the wires there but not install or terminate them for a patch panel.
Because you specified a patch panel, they probably quoted for the installation of the rack and the patch panel, as it’s not there and therefore they need it to complete the task completely.
You’ll end up with loose unterminated wires you can then just put an RJ45 plug on and wire directly to a switch or whatever.
I’d just manage the actual patching with VLANs on the switch. Unless you plan a more complex setup with some jacks going directly to a server or other routers/switches, it should be plentiful to just have 24 live ports you can plug devices into. Fair amount of switches can be simply wall mounted without a rack.
I’m actually not looking to do anything very complicated at all. Just connect the internet box directly to the router (via the patch panel). Router itself connected to a switch, and then all my other devices connected to the switch (with every connection to the switch going via the patch panel). I don’t have any plans to do anything with different networks, just the one local network.
The reason for having the patch panel is so I have a simple plug-and-play way of connecting everything up. I didn’t think it would be any different to having a standard walk jack, but with 24 ports instead of 1–4.