The 100-meter limit on network cables is one of those things you always learn on-site, with the camera already mounted on the pole and the connection flickering in and out. The Ethernet standard is clear: beyond 100 meters of copper, between switch and device, there is no guarantee. But gates, warehouses, and the driveways of country villas haven't read the standard.
There are four viable paths, and you choose based on how far away you are and what you need to transmit.
1. Switch extended mode
Several switches designed for video surveillance have a mode — you'll find it as extend or "CCTV mode" — that stretches the distance up to 250 meters by lowering the port speed to 10 Mbps. It is activated via a button or in the settings, and it applies port by port.
Ten megabits might seem low, but they are almost always enough: a 4-megapixel camera in H.265 with a well-adjusted main stream travels between 3 and 5 Mbps. You connect one camera to that port, not three, and you don't connect an access point that handles guest traffic. It's the cheapest solution in existence, because you don't buy anything: you use a feature you have already paid for.
2. The PoE extender
This is a small box placed halfway: it receives data and power from the incoming line, regenerates them, and retransmits them for another 100 meters, powered by the PoE itself. They can be daisy-chained (usually up to three, so 400 meters), but each jump eats up power, and the PoE budget that arrives at the end is what remains after powering the extenders. It's fine for an isolated point, bad for a backbone with six cameras.
3. Fiber optics
Above 250 meters, or when you need to cross a yard, a warehouse, or a stretch with potential differences between two buildings, the answer is fiber. You need a pair of media converters or a switch with an SFP port at each end, plus a compatible optical module. With single-mode fiber, you can go for kilometers without issue, and there is an advantage you'll appreciate during the first storm: fiber does not conduct ground, so it does not carry lightning strikes from one building to another. In Sicily, with long lines and late-summer storms, that is a serious argument.
Note one thing: fiber carries data, not power. At the pole, you still need local power, and that is where the fourth path comes into play.
4. Outdoor switch at the pole
Instead of running four long cables from the central hub to the perimeter, you run a single backbone to the pole and install an outdoor switch there in a waterproof box, which powers the nearby cameras with short runs. On large systems, this is almost always the cleanest and least expensive solution in terms of man-hours. We discuss this at length in our dedicated guide to outdoor switches.
How to choose
Up to 100 meters, don't overthink it: use the right category cable and you're set. From 100 to 250 meters, with only one camera at the end, use extended mode. From 100 to 200 meters with multiple devices, or where you need full bandwidth, use an outdoor switch halfway. Over 250 meters, or between different buildings, use fiber. A radio link remains the card to play when you can't dig: it works well with a direct line of sight, much less so if there are trees in the way that sprout leaves in the summer.
You can find devices with extended mode among the managed switches, converters among the media converters, optical parts in the transceivers, and antennas in the radio links. If you tell us the distance and how many cameras are at the end, we will tell you which of the four paths is best: info@elettricity.com, 351 969 5157.