With four new ISO/IEC and TIA cabling projects under development, it is more confusing than ever to cross reference the two groups’ cabling and component specifications. This short primer should help.
In ISO/IEC Standards, structured cabling components (e.g. cables, connecting hardware, and patch cords) are characterized by a performance “category” and are mated to form a permanent link or channel that is described by a performance “class”. In TIA Standards, components and cabling are both characterized by a performance “category”. ISO/IEC and TIA equivalent grades of cabling, arranged in order of increasingly more stringent transmission performance, are shown below.
| ISO (cabling) |
ISO (components) |
corresponds to | TIA (cabling and components) |
| Class D | Category 5e | → | Category 5e |
| Class E | Category 6 | → | Category 6 |
| Class EA | Category 6A | → | Category 6A |
| Class I | Category 8.1 | → | Category 8 |
| Class FA | Category 7A | No equivalent | - |
| Class II | Category 8.2 | → | Class II* |
| * TIA has substantial component-related work that needs to be done related to the specification of class II channels and the naming convention for components is unknown at this time. | |||
Note that ISO/IEC class I/category 8.1 and TIA category 8 will not be electrical supersets of ISO/IEC class FA/category 7A.