I am looking to get a portable label printer to label network cables and jacks. All of the ones I have found so far print labels that are either too big to fit on the Ethernet jack plates easily, or to stiff to be able to wrap around cables. For those of you who do label cables and jacks, what label maker do you prefer?

-Ryan Adams
http://ryanadams.blogsite.org

We use two different ones. Both are Brother products that have adjustable font sizes.

For faceplates we use a P-Touch (model PT-1800) with a 1/2" tape. We use a smaller font for this and make our labels similar to this:

WC1 PP1 P1 P2

where WC = wiring closet, PP = Patch panel and P = port number

Most of the time I cut the last port number off with scissors (or my side cutters) after trimming the ends and put the first portion over the appropriate port in the faceplate and P2 would then go directly over the second port. This label tells you at a glance, which wiring closet, which patch panel and which port on the PP the Keystone terminates to.

For labelling cables we use the Brother P-Touch Pro (model: PT-1650) with a 1" tape. Again, font size is adjustable. Rather than print lengthwise along this tape, we print down the tape.

ex:

RK-C2 P24 to
Net4sw01 P1
RK-C2 P24 to
Net4sw01 P1
RK-C2 P24 to
Net4sw01 P1

and wrap the tape around each end of the cable just above the RJ-45. (That's two labels per cable right)

RK = the rack number (we have multiple rows of racks in our data center with Cat6 running across overhead trays to PP's in every other rack in the rows) The rows of racks are numbered alphabetically so RK-C2 would be the second rack in the 3'd row etc etc.

P = port number in all cases

The label shows which port on which panel in which rack...which coincides exactly with the Patch Panel at the other end where our racks of switches and patch panels reside. The patch panels are labelled according to the rack they come from.

We include the switch name and port number the cable plugs into on that switch. This makes it a lot simpler to know where a cable goes should you (or someone else) unplug one for any reason and then not plug it back in.

Hey Curt - your method of labeling cables makes a lot of sense for standardization. Thanks for sharing the info with us. Happy Thanksgiving :-)

i_Xp/VistaUser

Always a pleasure to help out. As much as I'd like to take credit for it, my coworker actually came up with this scheme. We have multiple closets with multiple switches in each so this makes our lives a lot simpler when we can tell from a glance at the label on the faceplate all the pertinent info.

Originally he had done the documentation up in Access. One sheet per closet. I found this bulky so moved all the info over to an Excel spreadsheet with a separate worksheet (tab) for each closet. This allows us to centralize all closet documents in a single file yet print only the page(s) we need to.

We keep a hard copy of each closet's document in the closet along with a pad of sticky notes and a pen. Whenever we make changes, we immediately update the hard copy and the write the info on a sticky note to take back to the office and update the online document as quickly as possible.

Just FYI, with the Brother P-Touch Pro (model 1650). What I showed above is the output as seen on the label when it's done. When you're typing it in the LED window, you only actually see:

RK-C2 P24 to
Net4sw01 P1

The labeller itself does the 3 rows.

Should anybody opt for using the 1650, we've found the clear part of the label tends to want to lift off the white backing after a while. Personally, I think it's the air conditioning in the data center. We find a long enough piece of scotch tape over the label stops that from happening.

When Could you explain how you are labeling your cables. They way I read your explanation, it seems the label would wrap around on itself and cover up some of the info.

-Ryan Adams
http://ryanadams.blogsite.org

This is correct, the label does wrap around the cable. However, on a label that's say 1.5 inches long, the top half of it is blank and the lines of text occupy the bottom half. Start with the blank half and then wrap the label around and when you're done, you see nothing but the text.