Home Entertainment Wiring: Telecommunications
Telecommunications home entertainment wiring includes both conventional telephone and data transmission wiring for computers. On this page, discussion is limited to telephone wiring. Before you attempt to do any telephone wiring in your home, be sure to check with your state public service commission and local telephone company concerning rules and regulations that may apply to your work. National regulations, set by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), also define your responsibilities with regard to system maintenance and hookup. For example, the telephone company may be responsible for central wiring to your home, while you are responsible for all of the wiring beyond the point of entrance, commonly called the point of demarcation. A modular wiring jack must also be provided. It allows you to disconnect everything on your side of the demarcation point from everything on the other, public side of the telephone network. Telephone home entertainment wiring wiring is commonly available as four-conductor line cord and telephone station cable. Line cord is the flat cord that connects your telephone equipment to a telephone jack. It should not be used for anything else. Telephone station cable for residential use typically consists of D-station wire that is color-coded for easy identification.
Most home telephone systems require only four conducting wires (two-pair wire), with one pair for the phone and the remaining pair for a secondary line for a fax machine or modem. Color codes for telephone wire may consist of solid colors or two-color banding. The standard solid colors are red, green, yellow, and black. Banded colors are more varied. The telephone station cable variations shown in the phone-jack illustration below consist of alternating bands of green and white, orange and white, and blue and white. The diagram below shows how to wire two- or three-pair telephone jacks. Each pair includes a tip and a ring wire. The tip wire on a single-phone line is usual) green, while the ring wire is usually red. In any case, it is important to connect like-color wires together throughout any telephone home entertainment wiring system. Leave The Home Entertainment Wiring Page To Go To The Home Page |