atcomsystems.ca/forum Forums Wiring - Telecom Carriers - Trunks & Services Cabling Telephones Systems Wiring standards for color

White voice, blue data if plenum. Second data cable is yellow if needed.

Gray voice, blue data for non-plenum. Multiple data cables are still blue, just labeled properly.

That's been our norm for years. I think it actually has a lot to do with what our suppliers always had plenty of stock on, but we have now adopted it across the board.

Honestly, those silly jobs where the customer want's green for this, orange for that are usually just an IT guy spending other peoples' money wastefully. They can do that multi-colored thing with their patch cables if they want to. I doubt they would ever go into the ceiling or even take off a face plate for that matter. I hate when we get those jobs and get 75% done, then run out of purple cable. We got a good price buying all of the cable at once.

Coming back two weeks later looking for one roll of "purple" CAT6 shielded is like finding a car battery at McDonald's.

If you know what you are doing and care about it (which I am sure that we all do), it's not the color, it's the end result: A properly-labeled and functional wiring system.

Usually gray for voice, blue for data. Only had one job request multiple colors.

Plates & voice jacks beige, data jacks orange.

Green for voice and yellow for data. The important think is that you stay consistent, then there is no confusion when you go back.

For us it is generally blue for data and white for voice and the modules would be ivory for voice and orange for data. It is really the customer's call though. Just make every effort to not get in a situation like newtecky where the same color is used for both. It is a major pain in the a$$.
We did one job where the customer had us install 6 data modules in every faceplate. We did 6 different colors (cable and modules), each color went to a specific patch panel. It was actually a pretty cool looking job when all was said and done. Kinda like a skittles commercial!

Just do like the IBEW did on a recent job. 8 pin for voice and 8 pin for data. Both the same color as the plate and nothing marked. :scratch:

-Hal

In my years of running cable I have use white for voice and blue or gray for data, i did have a few clients that requested all white cat6 terminated on the same data panel (3 cables per loc.)In this situation as with all correct labeling before pulling is a must or it's a crazy man's job to id at the end.

You could always use different color patch cords, to differentiate between a printer, server or a work station

To be perfectly honest I don't see an advantage to having specific colors of cables for different applications. I like voyager "Its whatever you have the most of in the warehouse!" As long as everythiing is labled it really doesn't matter. Only the initial appearance of the backboard/rack would have any bearing and I say initial because within 2 years the cable bundle will look like a rainbow and no one really minds that either.
90% of the cble is in a bundle most of it's run. so identifing the voice data in the ceiling is fairly easy. (for this I would use white exclusively for the ease of poping a tile and seeing it easier in a dark ceiling) and since the cable is all but hidden except for the last 5-15 feet on the rack/backboard. it really is not seen at all.