A straight-through cable is a normal four-pair cable with the same order of pin configuration on both ends. These are usually used to connect a computer to the switch or hub's Ethernet ports.

A rollover cable, also known as rolled cable or Cisco console cable, is used to connect a computer terminal to the console port of a router. The cable pin order at one end of the cable is the reverse of the order at another end. Pin 1 is connected to pin 8, pin 2 to pin 7, and so on.

A crossover cable is used to connect two similar devices such as a computer to computer or a switch to a switch, and a computer to a router's Ethernet port. A serial cable is used on a router's wide area network (WAN) interface to connect to the serial ports. Cisco serial cables generally have a male DB-25 connector on one end and a female DB-25 connector on the other.