Examkin

Question

Difficulty: EasyTroubleshooting Physical Cabling and Connectors

A network technician needs to identify which port on a patch panel inside a wiring closet connects to an unlabelled wall outlet in a conference room. Which of the following tools is best suited to trace and locate this cable run?

  1. Tone generator and probeAnswer
  2. B
    Time-domain reflectometer (TDR)
  3. C
    Optical power meter
  4. D
    Loopback plug

Answer

The tone generator and probe is the appropriate tool for tracing and locating an unlabelled cable run.
A tone generator emits an analog audio tone onto copper conductors, while an inductive probe senses the signal without physical metal contact. This allows a technician to sweep the probe across patch panel ports to quickly pinpoint the matching cable end.

Step-by-Step Solution

1
Determine the troubleshooting requirement
The objective is to trace an unlabelled physical copper cable from a wall jack to its patch panel termination point.
Identifying unlabelled cable runs requires a tool designed for cable tracing rather than performance certification or fault distance measurement.
2
Select the correct physical diagnostic tool
Connecting the tone generator to the wall outlet sends an audible signal down the cable, which can then be detected at the patch panel using the inductive probe.
Tone generators and probes (often called fox and hound kits) are explicitly built to locate specific wires within bundles or unlabelled patch panels.

Key Concept

Cable Tracing and Location Tools
Rate this question

Topics

Troubleshooting Physical Cabling and Connectors

More questions from this topic