Rev, what would you consider good cable for this? I'm trying to search, and to say there's a *lot* of what appears to be crap cable out there would be an understatement.
And let me rephrase the question - do you have a link to what you would consider acceptable? Searching using the parameters you laid out earlier lands me with lots of different result, none of which seems much better than what comes with the kit I bought.
Anything appropriately marked. Sorry if I seem like a wanker about this but bad wiring can be unsafe at worst and give you crap results at best. Anything marked riser and plenum should be fine. "In-wall" without being marked CMP or CMR should be viewed with suspicion. With CMR/CMP, tis fine.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00H89C81U - alleged CMP, probably good enough to be used as CMR. $155.00
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00FW6OIZA - About the lowest I'd go, $62.
You want 20 AWG for video, 18AWG Power for power. You can cheat a little there.
If you don't want to go with bulk purchase, long pre-terminated cables are available. Excellent reviews with lots of photos. I haven't installed them before (I term my own, cheaper) but I've seen other folks use them with good results.
https://www.amazon.com/Swann-Fire-Rated-Extension-Cable-SWPRO-60MFRC-GL/dp/B0076CLICY/https://www.amazon.com/Swann-Fire-Rated-Extension-Cable-SWPRO-30MFRC-GL/dp/B0076QH71Q/These are your best bet if you don't want to do terminations (putting on the ends) yourself. They have smaller lengths. They're CMR and UL rated. If there's a fire, even unrelated to your camera wiring, your insurance company can't yell about improper wiring.
You know, I have a thought - If the cable was really that bad, you'd think that it'd show up in the kit reviews, or there'd be numerous mentions of people upgrading the wiring.
On the power side - don't these cameras need in the range of 1 watt? You don't need to be pushing enough power to easily start a fire.
For that matter, I'm reminded that PoE is pushing a few watts over a Cat5/Cat6 cable - which isn't armored or particularly wear resistant(in most forms) either.
Strongly disagree. Most cat5/cat6 put in walls is either 'riser' (CMR) or 'plenum' (CMP) rated. If it's not, it's not to code. Which isn't particularly armored, but is wear resistant, meets fire code and meets building code. There is 'general purpose' cat5 for patch cables or desktop use. Honestly, always buy riser. Plenum is needed for plenum spaces, and is a good bit more expensive than riser. Riser is not significantly more expensive than general purpose.
I admit I could be wrong, hence why I recommended testing. Their website says 12VDC, 300 mA to 2.5 A. So up to 30watts. 30 watts is max of POE spec. Normal consumer POE is usually 15.40 W. POE is also supposed to turn itself off if things go hinky. On all but the dodgiest equipment, the POE injector or switch should be smart enough not to fry non-POE stuff on the other end. And if you plan on using POE, you should spec decent cable as well. Also, power is spread over two pairs. 7.7watt per pair. Normal ethernet is 2.2VDC to 3.15VDC, maybe 4VDC for gigabit.
As for people complaining about using the wrong cabling, I've had to put my foot down with facilities managers and IT people who should know better about appropriately using riser and plenum where necessary. People with decades of experience and education that
knew which wire they should be running.