Ren64 Problem - Please help

[bonuts]

If I use a short, retail cat5 patch cable from my RenT to my Ren64 everything works fine 100% of the time. I have one ~ 13 ft homemade patch cable that I believe works 100% too. But a ~ 12 ft homemade cable and two homemade cables greater than 13 ft but less than 25ft do not work. I can sometimes make the ~ 12ft cable work by starting with the short retail cable and then switching but not always.

These homemade cables are solid core cat5. They are a little old. They were used last year for driving SSR's. I rolled them into balls to store them; maybe I shouldn't have done that. At least one of the >13 ft cables that never works between the RenT and Ren64 does work fine will a four channel SSR. I do not own a cable continuty tester.

My RenT is case 3 so I guess I'm using Rs485 protocol. Ren64 is option 1 powered by a PC power supply drive cable.

I would appreciate it if you have any ideas why I have little to no success with longer cables. Thanks.

[Macrosill]

Sounds like the problem is the homoemade cables. They could work fine for a 4 channel ssr unit but not the Renard data because they use different conductors in the cable. You might have a broken conductor that works sometimes depending on howw the cable is bent. It could be poor crimps as well.

[odskaggs2]

Oh yeah I'll hand out my 2 cent opinion.
I'm a network engineer and please be aware that different crimp on ends exist for solid and stranded cable. These ends look almost identical and are hard to tell apart. I've changed alot of them out over the years.

[bonuts]

Thanks guys. I've concluded it was the cables. I tested with an ~ 15 ft cable from our datacenter and it worked great.

So the take away for anyone who reads this, if you use solid core cat5 (most people probably do), be careful how you bend / store it.

[NanoWit]

For DIY cables, I'll echo what odskaggs2 said about ends, you have to get the right connector and even then they are kinda fragile.
You can buy a CAT5 cable tester on EBay for less than $10, including shipping. For anyone making up their own cables it is probably a good thing to have.

[holtm]

I would also say ends on the stranded cable generally stay put better.