Sanity Check: Is my CAT5e cable probably bad, or do I just need different connectors?

Solution 1:

If you just cut one end off a manufacture cable and then aligned the wires as you noted (brown, brown/white, green, green/white, blue, blue/white, orange, orange/white) you likely have a problem with the wire order.

There are two standards for cabling:

• T568A: green/white, green, orange/white, blue, blue/white, orange, brown/white, brown
• T568B: orange/white, orange, green/white, blue, blue/white, green, brown/white, brown

I would double check your manufactured end to ensure what the order is, and match that pattern on your re-terminated end.

As others mentioned, you can check your termination and cable with a cable tester. This should tell you if you have miss-wired or have a fault.

Also, if the cable you bought isn't using one of those standards... I wouldn't buy from them again.

Quick Edit

After seeing your comment, I realized that you transcribed the order you put them in, in reverse. Generally, you should read from the side without the clip from left to right.
Doing this would have read (orange/white orange, blue/white, blue, green/white, green, brown/white, brown). Compare to the T568B, and yes it's clear that your problem was with the wiring order.

Solution 2:

1. You purchased a manufactured cable and then cut the ends off so that you could fit it through the hole you drilled. Why didn't you drill a hole large enough to fit the connector through?

2. Get a cable tester and test the cable after you crimp new connectors onto it.

3. Take the wireless router to where your MAC is and plug the MAC into it with a different manufactured cable. If it works then you can be pretty confident that your "home made" cable or connectors are the problem. If it doesn't work then you've been chasing a red herring.

Solution 3:

It is probably the connectors, particularly the one which you cut and re-terminated. Cables themselves rarely fail unless the cable has been damaged or cut on a snag, etc. Connectors are much more likely to fail-- a gap of less then 1mm can cause a failure.

Get a cable tester. I can almost guarantee you that one of the 8 connections will show up bad.