What are you going with and why do u prefer? Just curious

We have always used 568a but have recently converted to 568b mostly because of the baluns that require that standard. Bottom line is it really doesn't matter which one you go with as long as you choose one.

I've always used b.
It seems to fit with all of the products I deal with.

With pots becoming a thing of the past in residential and B being a lot more common I'd say going with B perhaps is a better choice

I use B all the time, but recently installed some phone lines in a doctor's office where he uses a Panasonic non-KSU system using all four pairs, and after the third jack I realized I was using A.

Murphy's law actually came to the rescue this time, because when I went to punch down on the phone module, it turned out that the RJ45 jacks are wired for A. Imagine that!

Then there's the IT guy I spoke with recently who was a bit puzzled when I told him I use B. He was dissatisfied with that answer until I told him that when there's an existing system, I look to see what they used, and use that.

So maybe IT guys like A; phone modules do, too.

I use A as default so POTS work.
In multi cable runs/drops I will usually have 1 or 2 Bs.
It really doesn't matter for patch cables, as long as both sides are terminated the same.
If you're going to patch panel, pick A or B and stick with it.
If you're using 66 or 110 punch blocks, telco guys will try to pair lines 1 & 2 to 568A standards.

My cousin runs the IT dept. at a hospital...he uses b and said a is for phone guys!

As long as your consistent,either should work just fine.

If the house has an even number it's A, if it's an odd number then we go with B.


No, we switched to B a couple of years ago for no reason other than that's what the other guys around us tended to be using.

+1
that and the majority of IT guys I have run into perfer it as well

We do A at every job. Patch panel & wall plate are always A. Breakout cables/patch cables can be whatever we/you want.

I always use A. Only a hand full of times have I seen B used as that was commercial. All of the brokerage houses and hedge funds I have dealt with have been A. I've noticed that the union guys tend to use A for phone and B for data. And the IT guys want A. Ymmv

I switched to B several years ago as A is really an old standard that was for the phone guys. B is used in all proper IT installations and if you've ever checked the pre-built patch cords you will notice that they are wired as per the B standard. Therefore, why make life difficult for yourself

B - Working with VOIP companies connecting customer's commercial systems to residential and they always wanted B for everything.

Well as a practical matter the only thing that changed was the color of the wires.

Years ago a very large, well known, company was doing an huge install for the fed gov. They incorrectly wired every jack and cable to the color code now known as B.

When asked about the change they replied "Uh, it's not wrong', it's, uh, uh, a new standard - yea, that's it - a new standard."

And so here we are today - two otherwise identical schemes except for color.

That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

I like to use B. Especially since we started working with CAT6 more. It is just easier to terminate. :)