That's why I always try to get the cabling that has the harder plastic ``insulation'' (usually plenum cabling). In my experience, you can just score the plastic and bend it and it'll snap off, kind of like how cutting glass works. This way, you don't run the risk of what you just described. Of course, it usually costs quite a bit more, but it's real cheap when you just use the leftover spools for the stuff you bought for work.

I also like to use solid cable instead of stranded cable becuse it's so much easier to work with. And how often am I really going to move those cables anyway?

Oh -- and make sure you use connectors (that is, the actual plastic RJ-45 ends or heads) appropriate to the type of wire in your cable. Solid wire connectors are different from stranded wire connectors. There are some that do double-duty though. Even better, they're often unlabelled (or you've stored them without labelling them), so you need to learn to recognize them by their physical features. Solid wire connectors will have the spikes that dig into the wire offset from each other, so that they can wrap around the solid core. Stranded wire connectors will have spikes that just point straight down into the wire, embedding themselves. The double-duty ones usually have three spikes, one on the left, one in the middle, and one on the right, working like a bastard, combined version of the other two.

Anyone else have any thoughts or tips on network cabling?