I'd go CAT6A for a new build - 300m roll generally around $230 now or even a bit less, probably $40 or $50 more than CAT6? A very small extra cost in the big scheme of things. Even the CAT6A keystones etc are a lot cheaper than they used to be, but going CAT6 keystones and patch is fine as they are a simple upgrade later. It's a bit trickier to work with in the patch panel and keystones but not terribly so. 

Means you are future proofed for 10Gbps down the track. 

Based on the fact that in a house most runs are under 30m and cat6 if installed correctly will do 10G then clearly cat6 is fine, however as wratterus points out the cost of 6a cable is not that great these days, and I would suggest terminated on just cat6 keystones/panels will result in perfectly fine 10G service as most of the performance issue is with the crosstalk in the cable itself not so much the terminations

Cyril

Cat6A is a waste of time in a home.

Plus people don't install the jacks and panels correctly, and get the earthing wrong, so has the potential to be even worse than a normal Cat6 link.

chevrolux:

 

Cat6A is a waste of time in a home.

 

Plus people don't install the jacks and panels correctly, and get the earthing wrong, so has the potential to be even worse than a normal Cat6 link.

 

I would only been looking at Cat6A U/UTP so that doesn't have an earth wire does it?

U/UTP does not have an earth to deal with, but does bring up another matter, 6 F/STP ie shielded cat6 will outperform UTP 6a with regards to 10G, as its the alien and inter pair cross talk that is the killer for 10G, so and UTP solution is limited to using pair spacing and pair rotation to combat these issues, where as a foil shielded cat6  acheives both far more readily. Also remember that cat6a UTP and cat6 have similar attenuation characteristics as they both use 23gauge wire, the big difference between UTP cat6 and cat6a is greater pair spacing via a larger spine and a spine that is twisted along its length to increase the randomness of alein coupling from other runs.

So if you want to achieve similar 6a performance but using 6 F/STP then you are probably better off, only catch is earthing, just earth it at the panel using a suitable shielded panel, and at the outlets just use normal isolated keystones and leave the drain unterminated and ideally insulated to prevent unintended contact.

But the real thing is in runs less than 50odd meters cat6 is going to be fine for 10G, in residential >50m is not very likely. Also you can help yourself by minimising the bunching of cables, this will reduce alien cross talk which is the big killer in large commercial installs.

If it was me, I would just go wtih cat6, but thats me.

Cyril

I bought CAT7 (debatable CAT6A) with each pair also shielded and ran that all over our new build. It was $800 for 800M delivered and it is a thick good quality cable and terminating it into keystone jacks bought off Amazon using a tool made for CAT6A/CAT7 keystones or field terminated plugs made the job very easy. The CAT6A/CAT7 keystones or field terminated plugs are not cheap (quality) so if you can afford CAT6A and the keystones or field terminated plug then go for it. CAT7 can transmit 40gbs up to 50meters so great for future use as well.

There is even less point in unshielded Cat6A IMO. Sure, the cable gets rated for a few more MHz, but the whole point of Cat6A was reducing alien crosstalk - as @cyril7 points out.

Also why make the job any harder than it needs to be haha. I don't care who you are, terminating 6A sucks!!