What other tool might you have been able to use to identify matching ends for each Ethernet cable

Fluke makes some, they aren't cheap.  I used one at my last job, we had very advanced switches that the Fluke box would tell us the IP of the switch, switch name, what port the cable was plugged in.

One place I worked, when they were recarpeting, another tech and I marked each port with an identifying port information.  It took two of us, 2 days to mark 300 ports.  I'm glad we had radios, it made it much easier and faster.

Fluke network tools. I am not sure any of them will tell you want is on the other end and it will probably still be a largely manual process. I be lieve the Link Runners will tell you the switch that a device connected to. You can look this stuff up in the switches MAC address tables as well

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You've got to ask yourself why? what is the primary purpose?

Do you have managed switches? IF so you can get a list of every mac address connected to each port. Correlate this with asset inventory and you have a list of what device is on each switch port. Spiceworks will even do this for you.

If you want to know which actual patch panel connection is connected to each switch port - Basically there is little way of avoiding manual tracing.

I've lost count of the times I've done this in my career, typically if it's less than 500 devices I just get a notepad, pen and a lot of coffee. Walk round and write device info, wall/floor port etc. Then go to network cabinet, unpatch all those port references and pull the cables out and disconnect from switch. then work out what is left and audit those (usually network devices etc, maybe servers if not a separate server room). Then plug all the user devices etc back in doing a nice cabling job. Go home and feel satisfied. Weeks later be upset when someone has made a mess of the patching again.

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Fluke products made short work of a similar wiring mess on a production floor, had things sorted within a day.

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Thanks for the suggestions so far.  There is nothing labeled anywhere essentially.  All the switches are managed and either Cisco or Ubiquiti.  We have multiple VLANs for VOIP phones, network segmentation, etc.

Part of the drive for getting the cables traced and labeled is that one of the 16-port switches went out a couple weeks ago, but we didn't initially know that because the only evidence was that some devices dropped off and weren't accessible.  But there are 80-100 wires going into the closet in that building and we had no way to know which wire ran to those devices.  Had we known, we'd have spotted that they were all in one switch.  The lights were all still on and blinking, but it wasn't passing traffic....weird.

Anyway, that's one reason and we're also about to move the main server room about 20ft and would really like to know what's what as we migrate cabling, etc.

I realize that manual tracing and legwork could be involved.  I have people to help and walkie talkies, so that's not a big deal.  I know I can query the switch MAC/ARP tables to get info too, but it just seemed odd to me that there isn't some method to do this in a better way.  This problem is fairly common or there wouldn't already be so many answers.  I'm trying to figure out the best recommendation.  We don't mind spending money for the right tool if it makes sense and will be useful.

Thanks again.

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i just looked at pricing for linkrunner at. . . too rich for my blood.

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cynlis wrote:

i just looked at pricing for linkrunner at. . . too rich for my blood.

Look at the LinkSprinter 300 instead. It does a lot of what a LinkRunner does. I have both a LinkRunner AT-2000 and the LinkSprinter 300 that was included in the promo when I got the LinkRunner. You connect the LinkSprinter to your cell phone and it also sends reports to a Link-Live.com web site for later viewing, retrieval, and reports, etc.There are some other pocket-sized testers similar to the LinkSprinter 300.Here is an actual output from my 300:

Gregg

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I would suggest if you replace any other switches getting all the same type

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That Link Sprinter 300 looks like a nice option and very reasonably priced.  That would certainly work for all the offices, but wouldn't be viable for all the IP cameras.

I'm guessing I'm out of luck for a similar tool/software which I can plug in from the switch end that will query the client device on the other end?

As for the two kinds of switches, we originally had the Cisco switches, but are migrating to all Ubiquiti as we need to upgrade/replace.  As a county government agency, we can't just toss out good, working networking gear unless we have a specific need to.  Personally, I'd really love to be able to manage everything from one interface, so I love the Ubiquiti stuff, but I work with what I have.

Have a look at  Pockethernet

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The Pockethernet project was abandoned unless someone else picked up development. I use a LinkSprinter. You can log into the Link Sprinter website and as it receives testing information you can label what it was plugged into. Then go back to your switches, find the port and label accordingly. 

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We have a Fluke.  It works pretty well.  Couple hundred connections, unlabeled?  My first thought is get some feet on the ground and start pulling connections and making an inventory.  Getting feet on the ground also lets you physically inspect the "other end" as well.  Are the patch cables in good condition? are they neat? is the switch dusty?  Is it noisy? Mounted correctly?  Are the switches labeled?   Correct degree of aircon and airflow?  If you answered 'No' to any of the above, make a plan to correct it.  Now create your naming convention, label every end of every cable with what is connected at the 'other' end, this saves tracing a cable back later.  If you are looking at the switch, you should be able to see on that end of the cable what is on the other end.   Some places I use multiple labels:  Switch port, Service(DNS DHCP), NIC and nic Port.  We even label our power cables, which group, which UPS or Mains.

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We have a couple of LinkRunner AT 1000's that we purchased for that very reason.  We are very pleased with them.

I'll emphasize again that pulling MAC's from the switches at the port level is a non-intrusive way of gathering port to panel to drop information. I had a WIld West environment in 2012 when I came into my new shop, I got 75% of the drops documented that way. It was one of the motivations to build a usable WiFi infrastructure, in fact. 

I carried around a notebook with a putty session to each switch, went to a cubicle with a user and a workstation, interrupted them for 30 seconds to get the MAC address -OR- pulled it up from Spiceworks Desktop inventory, queried the four 52 port Cisco small business switches for the MAC address, wrote it down on a hardcopy of an Excel sheet. Rationalizing the patch panel ports to the switch ports was a pre-requisite to get this to work well.

Tedious and time consuming, but it all worked out and I found out where the other dozen switches were scattered around (except the one above the t-bar).

Needless to say, we have excellent documentation for the hundreds of office drops we've added since, and I even give as-builts to my CAD Manager for his documentation. Also I switched to Bitvise from putty 😎.

I had a LinkRunner 2000 AT, it was spendy but super useful. Went to a jobsite with one of our Electricians, never made it home. I replaced it with a LinkRunner G2, which was a significant DOWNGRADE in my book. SLOW and very disappointing. The LinkSprinters that came with it are OK, I wouldn't buy them separately, it is cumbersome to access the built-in webserver to get diagnostic data out via your phone (have to connect to the WiFi AP in the device).

I found Platinum Tools and bought the whole enchilada Net Prowler kit, SUPER useful for about $2K. Way more info when testing a port than the LinkRunner has for HALF the money.

For $400 you can get a LinkSprinter, for $500 you can get a Platinum Cable Prowler which is a much better deal. https://www.homedepot.com/p/Platinum-Tools-Cable-Prowler-Cable-Tester-TCB300/301547463

I've bought a couple of those for my more technical Electricians, it was very helpful for connecting the 800A of solar panels on the roof of our main facility, for example. The controllers use Ethernet to connect to the 16 panels they each manage, then the controllers connect back to the equipment room master controller. They don't need to borrow my high dollar gear any more.

I get why it's frustrating to have to go through this process, plugging something inline at the switchport to tell you all this would be great, but think about how much hassle it would cause during the day. You'd have to interrupt someone for MINUTES. An Ethernet tap like that wouldn't be cheap, either. So, the switch will tell you what's connected to a hot port, including AP's and security cameras, and an open port will tell you what switch it is connected to with a good network tester. 

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Sir William​ - I am in exactly the same boat. The network closet is a mess, and I don't know what's plugged in to what. This is an issue since several of my switches are well past their EOL. If I replace a switch, how do I know I'm not unplugging something important?? Sadly, if I want any kind of spiffy device, I'll have to purchase it out of my own pocket because my bosses do not understand the benefits of knowing what's plugged in to where. 

Some of the tools I have been using are LDWin, PDQ Inventory, and Managed Switch Port Mapper. LDWin doesn't work well if the cable passes through a switch or bridge (like a VOIP phone), but its very useful for empty wall jacks that may or may not be plugged in to a switch port. It does require walking around to each wall jack to figure that out though. PDQ Inventory is useful for getting the MAC of each computer on the network as well as who logs into it. EG,I may not know where computer D4GAU0R9 is, but I know Joe logs in to it and I know where he sits. Switch Port Mapper is awesome at telling me the MACs and maybe the IPs of the devices that communicate through a port. I can then match this up with PDQ Inventory. One big caveat is that the switch must support SNMP...remember I mentioned some switches well past their EOL? Yep, no SNMP. The other down side is its only a 15 day free trial.

Looking forward to reading what everyone else says. My way is not the best, but its been working so far. Hopefully someone posts a link to a magic bullet for us. :)

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Sir William wrote:

The lights were all still on and blinking, but it wasn't passing traffic....weird.

Always troubleshoot from the common denominator, but your above example? It gets ever weirder than THAT sometimes! ;)

One thing that would concern me is, if your central room is too noisy to use a standard tone-generator/detector, how much interference is affecting the cables?

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Disclosure: Not associated with the software, but I did purchase it and continue to use daily.  

A very low-cost ($30 usd) and useful tool for device discovery on managed/SNMP enabled switches is LanTopoLog.

The only catch is the license is "bound" to the MAC of switches you select.  I think it's three or five of them, and it only needs to see one to activate.  So it's not a good solution to hop from client to client, but at that price you could just roll the cost into your charge.  

It does a pretty good job of figuring out the layout on it's own, but isn't always 100% so you can manually adjust it with a config file if needed.  There's a trial to download to see how it works in your plant, although it doesn't show you the complete picture as a demo limit.

Just a great value tool with an active Dev.  He's already made one feature add I requested.

https://www.lantopolog.com/ 

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" What I'd REALLY love is to be able to pull a line from a switch, plug it in to a laptop or standalone device and it tell me what's on the other end. The IP, the host/device info, network name, etc. "

In you shoes (which I was when I took my present job - maybe not a couple hundred cables, but a lot of mystery patches, anyway), I wouldn't buy more equipment; I'd use the info I know I already have.

 - map MAC addresses to ports (that's "show mac-address" on an HP switch; can't remember the exact Cisco command).  Don't need to plug in anything - it's all there in the switch

 - use DHCP logs to map MAC addresses to IP address and hostname

 - combine the two outputs.  Port --->MAC address ---> IP address, name

the quote above seems to indicate that info could tell you location.  Then, you'll be walking around with a floor plan (if a facilities department can get you one) or blank paper on which you draw office outlines, a labeler or sharpie to label wall ports, and a spreadsheet on which you document it all as you go.

Then you walk into the office of the guy who hired you and say "I produced all this info for you without charging for an expensive piece of tracing hardware, just by using my brain.  You want to keep hiring me, right?  Anyone can buy a piece of hardware.  I know what the hardware is trying to do."

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I don't know if it would help your situation, but have you looked at Observium?

https://www.observium.org/

It can poll your switch and network and give you some idea as to what is connected where if you have SNMP access.

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+1 for the Fluke LinkSprinter. Not as robust as some of the tools, but has saved me a bunch of time troubleshooting wiring on many occassions. It would be time consuming to trace out a whole network this way, but easier than with a tone generator I would think.

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Definitely going to have to follow this thread.

I feel your pain Sir William.  I have been in the same boat on more than one occasion.  For identifying physical cabling, testing continuity, distance, etc. I use a LAN Scout from Klein Tools.  They aren't too expensive ($90 and up depending on options) and you can buy the extra remote locators, carrying cases, etc. as you need them.  The locators really make life easier when you're identifying unlabeled drops.

https://www.kleintools.com/catalog/voice-data-video-testers 

I have used the Switch Port Mapper from Solarwinds in the past and found that it worked very well.  It's pricey since you have to purchase their Engineer's Toolset to get it, but it may be worth considering until you get the environment where you want it.

It sounds like you may need a good label maker for this too.  If you are in the market for one, the Dymo Rhino 4200 has been my go-to.

https://www.dymo.com/en-US/rhino-industrial-4200-qwy-label-maker 

It's not very expensive and it can do wire flags, wire-wraps, etc. I've found that the flexible nylon labels from Dymo work the best for labeling individual cables.

I hope this help.  Good luck with your project!

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Unplug 1 cable at a time.  Wait until someone screams.  Then you know where that cable goes.

If nobody screams, it's probably not an important cable :)

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Sir William wrote:

The lights were all still on and blinking, but it wasn't passing traffic....weird.

We've got a switch that just started failing.  When it goes into "switch-from-hell" mode, the barcode scanners, whose access points connect to this switch, get IP addresses from the DHCP server, but their other traffic is not passed.  Since it appears the layer 2 traffic works, but not the layer 3, I'm guessing the MAC tables are corrupting.

Since the scanners were able to get IP addresses, it took me a minute to figure out the switch was issue.

Fluke LRAT-1000 or LRAT-2000

I have used Netool for a few years now.  I bought one of the first versions of it, and still use it today.  Not super expensive either.

It will tell you which switch a cable goes to and even what port and vlan it is on.  It has a lot more information than that, but those are the ones I use the most.

https://netool.io/

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This little guy might be worth looking at. Seems intriguing.

https://pockethernet.com/store/

Kendell wrote:

Unplug 1 cable at a time.  Wait until someone screams.  Then you know where that cable goes.

If nobody screams, it's probably not an important cable :)

Unless it is the CEO's computer. Then it is VERY important.

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Question on the fox and hound units: We have one that my retired supervisor used when tracing phone lines. Will that work on ethernet cables also?

Thankfully, I've not had to deal with that yet, as all of our switches and ports and everything were neatly labeled about 8 years ago by an intern. However, I have also learned working here that anything is possible, especially on our network.

Sir William wrote:

That Link Sprinter 300 looks like a nice option and very reasonably priced.  That would certainly work for all the offices, but wouldn't be viable for all the IP cameras.

I'm guessing your IP cameras go to the same centralized interface. It's an assumption, but with that assumption, you'll likely be able to get the MAC addresses of the connected switches. Another big assumption: If your switches are managed switches, you should be able to remote in and find out which MAC addresses match the ones reported from your DVR/NVR interface. You can then cable label the appropriate connections to your switch all from the closet.

RitaF wrote:

Question on the fox and hound units: We have one that my retired supervisor used when tracing phone lines. Will that work on ethernet cables also?

Thankfully, I've not had to deal with that yet, as all of our switches and ports and everything were neatly labeled about 8 years ago by an intern. However, I have also learned working here that anything is possible, especially on our network.

It can if it has an RJ45 adapter. Below is an example of one that does. There are many alternatives out there as well.
https://www.triplett.com/products/3399

https://netool.io

Netool is a small ,relatively inexpensive device that does much of what the Fluke does and works great .

I have used one for the last 2 years and it is very handy and easy to carry .

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In the big corporate site I used to work at they had a full time on site cabling techs who used Fluke OneTouch devices that would find the switch port you were connected to, among other useful stuff and a multiline label maker that would tell you what what was at both end of any given cable. If, and it's a big if you have decent wall jack to patch panel labeling the ability to identify the MAC of the switchport should solve most of your trouble. 

Sir William wrote:

What I'd REALLY love is to be able to pull a line from a switch, plug it in to a laptop or standalone device and it tell me what's on the other end.  The IP, the host/device info, network name, etc.  That would make life MUCH easier and I wouldn't have to have a gopher running all over the place plugging and unplugging things.  But I have no idea if that sort of thing exists.

Thanks!

Bill

In the IP realm, you can't really see what the next device is.  For example, if you tracert -h 1 8.8.8.8 (1 hop on the way to Google DNS) you don't see the switches in between you and the gateway, you just get the gateway. To find out where the wires are going from the end of the wire your tools will have to work at layer 2 by MAC address.

You may be better off (assuming you have managed switches) using that interface to identify what is on each port and go from there. 

I don't know if anyone has made the suggestion of a toner or not, I haven't read all the replies. I saw lots of mentions of the expensive Fluke unit, but there's a much cheaper pair of devices that are sold as a set (you can get them for $50-60 new), the Progressive Electronics 700 C toner kit. I've seen other similar sets for less, but it's been a while since I've looked - I've owned mine for decades, but I just looked it up to get you a price range. Make sure that the cables are unplugged from the switch - this can damage some switches if you send tone into them, and sending PoE into the tool may damage it. You also want to avoid sending tone into the NIC on any devices. 

Once the cable's disconnected at both ends, plug the unit with the cables coming out of it (called the tone generator) into the remote end of the cable (the PC/printer/etc. end) and set the switch to "tone". I've cut a network cable off so one end has the RJ45 on it and the other end is just a pigtail of wires to put the tone generator alligator clips on. With the tone generator on, go to the switch end and use the wand (also called the receiver) by holding the button on it down and putting the tip on the ends of each cable, one at a time. When you hear the tone the loudest (it alternates between high and low pitches in a sort of "doodle-oodle" fashion on most models), you've found the cable the generator is plugged into. Be aware that the tone is strong enough to inductively "bleed" onto other, nearby cables, which is why you look for the loudest signal. I know this might sound a bit complicated, but it really is easy. You'll get the hang of it quickly.

Here's what the set looks like:

The tone generator is stored in the right side of the case and the receiver is stored in the left side. The case has a belt loop if you want to carry the set on your belt.

0 of 1 found this helpful thumb_up thumb_down

Sean Wolsey wrote:

I don't know if anyone has made the suggestion of a toner or not, I haven't read all the replies. I saw lots of mentions of the expensive Fluke unit, but there's a much cheaper pair of devices that are sold as a set (you can get them for $50-60 new), the Progressive Electronics 700 C toner kit. I've seen other similar sets for less, but it's been a while since I've looked - I've owned mine for decades, but I just looked it up to get you a price range. Make sure that the cables are unplugged from the switch - this can damage some switches if you send tone into them, and sending PoE into the tool may damage it. You also want to avoid sending tone into the NIC on any devices. 

Once the cable's disconnected at both ends, plug the unit with the cables coming out of it (called the tone generator) into the remote end of the cable (the PC/printer/etc. end) and set the switch to "tone". I've cut a network cable off so one end has the RJ45 on it and the other end is just a pigtail of wires to put the tone generator alligator clips on. With the tone generator on, go to the switch end and use the wand (also called the receiver) by holding the button on it down and putting the tip on the ends of each cable, one at a time. When you hear the tone the loudest (it alternates between high and low pitches in a sort of "doodle-oodle" fashion on most models), you've found the cable the generator is plugged into. Be aware that the tone is strong enough to inductively "bleed" onto other, nearby cables, which is why you look for the loudest signal. I know this might sound a bit complicated, but it really is easy. You'll get the hang of it quickly.

Here's what the set looks like:

The tone generator is stored in the right side of the case and the receiver is stored in the left side. The case has a belt loop if you want to carry the set on your belt.

"Make sure that the cables are unplugged from the switch - this can damage some switches if you send tone into them, and sending PoE into the tool may damage it. You also want to avoid sending tone into the NIC on any devices."

"Make sure that the cables are unplugged..." makes it pretty much useless for the OP's needs to identify live cabling.  Also, in 21 years of network support, I have never seen a toner damage a connected switch. I had the one you pictured and a Fluke kit. Regarding "sending PoE into the tool may damage it", if the switch is 802.3af/at compliant, it WON'T send power to the tool because the connected device has to REQUEST power.

Regarding your "Once the cable's disconnected at both ends..." comment, THAT is the whole problem...the cables are not labeled and he doesn't know one end from the other. If you already have a cable you just disconnected at both ends, you already know which cable it is and there is no need to identify it with a toner!

Gregg

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I'm a huge fan of the Tripplite Fox and Hound 3388 model. The headset port really came in handy to isolate the noise and allowed me to trace cable during the day without annoying anyone else. This unit also allowed me to adjust the sensitivity to pinpoint in the middle of a rats nest cables and when turned all the way up even find buried cables which were covered up over a tiled wall.  

https://www.amazon.com/Triplett-HotWire-3388-Circuit-Generator/dp/B001ULPREW/ref=sr_1_6?dchild=1&...

Hope this gives you another option and good luck.

I spent a weekend rewiring a mess like yours.  Would never have finished by start of business Monday without my Fluke.  They give you back tons of information.

Fluke network tools.

I second all the Fluke comments. We had one at a place, plug one end of the network cable in and it would tell you the port, switch, etc all the information you needed. Wish I could remember the model, it was a nice device to have.

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Sir William wrote:

What I'd REALLY love is to be able to pull a line from a switch, plug it in to a laptop or standalone device and it tell me what's on the other end.  The IP, the host/device info, network name, etc. 

You want to unplug the cable from the switch, plug that end into your computer, and get the IP address of the computer at the other end? How would the computer be getting an IP at that point?

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This is a situation where it might actually make sense to hire an outside cabling company to the job.  Have them trace and label everything.

been using Fluke Intellitone Pro 200 for years , can't say one bad thing about it . 

I have a floorplan map of the building taped to the wall in the server room, with each drop listed and labeled to the corresponding patch panel port. This way I never have to pull up a spreadsheet and can instantly tell where a port is located.

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That's a standard feature in a structured cabling environment. That's what gets forgotten when someone organically builds a network in fits and starts, and doesn't realize the technical debt of not documenting anything. 

It's what you think you know, that ain't so, that gets you in trouble!

"I'll remember these drops in five years, no problemo!"

redrumrudy wrote:

I have a floorplan map of the building taped to the wall in the server room, with each drop listed and labeled to the corresponding patch panel port. This way I never have to pull up a spreadsheet and can instantly tell where a port is located.

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We have a Pockethernet and it does a pretty good job for the price. It had very fast shipping too. I like being able to email reports if I need proof of what the tests results were. (never needed it so far though). I have seen Netool.io and those look interesting also. For the price, it might be a good place to start.

techsupport7 wrote:

Just a great value tool with an active Dev.  He's already made one feature add I requested.

https://www.lantopolog.com/ 

Lantopolog is an awesome piece of software.  Simply amazing.  I can see my entire switch topography from an easy to navigate screen.  Digging down into switches to see port details - most importantly what is plugged into a port.  And I can search for mac addresses, computer names, or ip addresses. 

Free version works fine - but worth the money to remove a few limits. The dev has spent a few hours with me over the years on different issues including a feature request. 

Can't recommend it enough.

just to add, you COULD also just replace your switches first (since you mentioned you wanted UBNT so i assume UbiFi) - they usually show in the controller whats on the other end of the line (NAME, IP, MAC)

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If the switches have a web interface you can connect 1 known laptop into it and then trace the naming within the switch. that will make it quick but like the others say, go for fluke networks!