Spec my network cable
Discussion
gavsdavs said:
eliot said:
gavsdavs said:
Am I missing something here.
What's the point of running mulitple ethernet cables into each room when you can use a hub/switch IN each room instead ?
Because thats a bodge job mate. What's the point of running mulitple ethernet cables into each room when you can use a hub/switch IN each room instead ?
A 5 port gigabit switch is cheap as chips which does a living/bedroom just fine.
If you're actually piping video from room to room i have to ask you why? Surely you'd want the box delivering your video to your display in the same room (so you can use the remote control, etc) ?
Everything can be delivered over IP that way and you don't really have to have more than 1 ethernet port per room, so long as it supports gig.
If you think it's a bodge job i have a very simple question for you.
Explain the difference between a switch and a hub.
ATG said:
eliot said:
gavsdavs said:
Am I missing something here.
What's the point of running mulitple ethernet cables into each room when you can use a hub/switch IN each room instead ?
?
Because thats a bodge job mate. What's the point of running mulitple ethernet cables into each room when you can use a hub/switch IN each room instead ?
?
I myself have a Cisco switch in my back room because I only have two runs, one of which is used for a 1-wire temperature sensor - the other is the switch with loads of tv related devices plugged in.
It's just masking the fact I should of run more cables in the first place. I could run more, but the lazy bodgy cisco does the job for now - So the advice is always run more than think or at least make it so you can add more later.
WinstonWolf said:
gavsdavs said:
eliot said:
gavsdavs said:
Am I missing something here.
What's the point of running mulitple ethernet cables into each room when you can use a hub/switch IN each room instead ?
Because thats a bodge job mate. What's the point of running mulitple ethernet cables into each room when you can use a hub/switch IN each room instead ?
A 5 port gigabit switch is cheap as chips which does a living/bedroom just fine.
If you're actually piping video from room to room i have to ask you why? Surely you'd want the box delivering your video to your display in the same room (so you can use the remote control, etc) ?
Everything can be delivered over IP that way and you don't really have to have more than 1 ethernet port per room, so long as it supports gig.
If you think it's a bodge job i have a very simple question for you.
Explain the difference between a switch and a hub.
eliot said:
ATG said:
eliot said:
gavsdavs said:
Am I missing something here.
What's the point of running mulitple ethernet cables into each room when you can use a hub/switch IN each room instead ?
?
Because thats a bodge job mate. What's the point of running mulitple ethernet cables into each room when you can use a hub/switch IN each room instead ?
?
I myself have a Cisco switch in my back room because I only have two runs, one of which is used for a 1-wire temperature sensor - the other is the switch with loads of tv related devices plugged in.
It's just masking the fact I should of run more cables in the first place. I could run more, but the lazy bodgy cisco does the job for now - So the advice is always run more than think or at least make it so you can add more later.
Do you really have video from a box/device in one room being shown on a screen in a different room ? Do you have to go back to the room where the box is to change channels
??gavsdavs said:
WinstonWolf said:
gavsdavs said:
eliot said:
gavsdavs said:
Am I missing something here.
What's the point of running mulitple ethernet cables into each room when you can use a hub/switch IN each room instead ?
Because thats a bodge job mate. What's the point of running mulitple ethernet cables into each room when you can use a hub/switch IN each room instead ?
A 5 port gigabit switch is cheap as chips which does a living/bedroom just fine.
If you're actually piping video from room to room i have to ask you why? Surely you'd want the box delivering your video to your display in the same room (so you can use the remote control, etc) ?
Everything can be delivered over IP that way and you don't really have to have more than 1 ethernet port per room, so long as it supports gig.
If you think it's a bodge job i have a very simple question for you.
Explain the difference between a switch and a hub.
The first switch I installed cost about £10K installed, it had AUI ports and formed the backbone of a hospital. Total throughput was 70 Mbps
It was, however, a high speed switching bridge and not a mere repeater.
WinstonWolf said:
You can get L3 switches...
The first switch I installed cost about £10K installed, it had AUI ports and formed the backbone of a hospital. Total throughput was 70 Mbps
It was, however, a high speed switching bridge and not a mere repeater.
An "L3 switch" is by definition a router if it's making routing decisions. It may also be switching, but the routing element makes it a cleverer device.The first switch I installed cost about £10K installed, it had AUI ports and formed the backbone of a hospital. Total throughput was 70 Mbps
It was, however, a high speed switching bridge and not a mere repeater.
Back to the original question about switches and hubs.
A hub is a "collapsed bunch of repeaters". It is isn't smart enough to know anything about the mac layer and therefore sends everything everywhere. As you know this is bad for ethernet performance.
A switch is smarter because it knows what mac addresses it can see on its ports. It can then send traffic only to ports that are participating in a dialog. Therefore you get less collisions and closer to linespeed (or at least switching backplane speed).
I guess this is why i question the merits of 'multiple' ethernet links to a room *in the home*. If you can, why not, but its' generally just not required.
anonymous said:
[redacted]
Because I put all my 'always-on' 'high bandwidth' devices in a central location next to a main central switch on a UPS. A smart-tv or STB and a PC is not exactly a high bandwidth requirement is it. I'm asking a pretty simple question about if people carry television/video signals over ethernet cables between different rooms in the same house (as opposed to over IP). If you DO show video on a screen in a seperate room from the device that's producing that video, do you have to go to the other room to change channel ?
(That shouldn't be too hard to understand, why are people not answering it) ?
With regards to your so-called 's
t architecture' - you know - what If (and I know this would never happen because you've thought ahead) - a mate comes round to your house and wants you to fix his PC. it needs a network connection. with your "only one central switch" approach you're stuffed. You have to patch a new cable through the walls back to the central location. What if (get this) you had a switch in the room with a spare port on it. you could immediately give this guest device a network patch immediately. Amazing - i know. I'm trying to encourage people to consider real world thinking. Even if I'd dropped two patches into each of my rooms I'd still bung a gig switch on the end because they are tiny it gives me more ports. Like duh.
Do you only have one mains socket in each room and a bunch of trailing four gang power blocks with loads of wires everywhere to all the things that need power?
No, thought not.
Similar principle for CatN cable runs for those who are doing a renovation/rewire. I'm in the "run more than you think you need" camp. Handy to have ethernet ports near beds/sofas/tvs/music systems etc. as well as in the ceiling to give you the option of wired alarm, coming in to the back of light switches and so on and so on.
Of course switches are handy if you run out of capacity at a particular outlet in a room (my desk in the office-cum-dining room has a 4 port wall socket next to the power sockets but with computer, NAS, printer and telephone plugged in I can't have a wired connection for a laptop so I have a switch under my desk to give me additional ad-hoc capacity - but the room still has wired runs network runs to the wall with the TV on it and the wall with the sideboard that houses the amp/sky box etc.). When I did the renovation, I wish I'd taken others advice and put runs in to the light switches and left something in the ceiling for CCTV/alarm system.
But of course, all this technowk from the nerds is probably not helping the OP because in his particular case it sounds like he won't have much control over what the builders do on his house as they will be working to a price and a fixed plan from the developer.
No, thought not.
Similar principle for CatN cable runs for those who are doing a renovation/rewire. I'm in the "run more than you think you need" camp. Handy to have ethernet ports near beds/sofas/tvs/music systems etc. as well as in the ceiling to give you the option of wired alarm, coming in to the back of light switches and so on and so on.
Of course switches are handy if you run out of capacity at a particular outlet in a room (my desk in the office-cum-dining room has a 4 port wall socket next to the power sockets but with computer, NAS, printer and telephone plugged in I can't have a wired connection for a laptop so I have a switch under my desk to give me additional ad-hoc capacity - but the room still has wired runs network runs to the wall with the TV on it and the wall with the sideboard that houses the amp/sky box etc.). When I did the renovation, I wish I'd taken others advice and put runs in to the light switches and left something in the ceiling for CCTV/alarm system.
But of course, all this technow
k from the nerds is probably not helping the OP because in his particular case it sounds like he won't have much control over what the builders do on his house as they will be working to a price and a fixed plan from the developer. gavsdavs said:
I'm asking a pretty simple question about if people carry television/video signals over ethernet cables between different rooms in the same house (as opposed to over IP). If you DO show video on a screen in a seperate room from the device that's producing that video, do you have to go to the other room to change channel ?
(That shouldn't be too hard to understand, why are people not answering it) ?.
AFAIK pretty well any HD over CAT matrix allows for remote signals to be communicated back to the source. Typical use case would be something like below (off of google images), where someone wants to be able to access any source from any room.(That shouldn't be too hard to understand, why are people not answering it) ?.
I better not mention that my node 0 room (where all my it kit is) has a two hour UPS, small standby generator and a transfer switch and sms alerting etc....
The advice is always run more cable than you think. The cost of the cable compared to retrofit costs is low. When I initially installed mine many of the wall ports were just blanked over - i only fitted sockets when i needed them - but over the last 4 years they are almost all populated now.
Here's and example; The kitchen has 6 runs - two pairs high level where you might fit a tv on the wall and one pair low down - i was hedging my bets in case I decided to make the kitchen into an office.
As of today, I have ethernet into the tv, one for a temperature sensor and another for analogue phone.
The low level pair are used to automate my heated floor - on pair is for an additional temperature sensor i embedded into the floor and the other drives a relay that I use to trick the OEM floor sensor into thinking the floor is hot thereby turning the heated floor off.
So i view cat6 as a universal wiring system rather than ethernet alone. But I accept i'm the exception for home use due to home automation.
But I avoid wireless for anything other than mobile devices, everything is hard wired ethernet and the amount of entertainment gadgets that require network connections seems to be increasing.
The advice is always run more cable than you think. The cost of the cable compared to retrofit costs is low. When I initially installed mine many of the wall ports were just blanked over - i only fitted sockets when i needed them - but over the last 4 years they are almost all populated now.
Here's and example; The kitchen has 6 runs - two pairs high level where you might fit a tv on the wall and one pair low down - i was hedging my bets in case I decided to make the kitchen into an office.
As of today, I have ethernet into the tv, one for a temperature sensor and another for analogue phone.
The low level pair are used to automate my heated floor - on pair is for an additional temperature sensor i embedded into the floor and the other drives a relay that I use to trick the OEM floor sensor into thinking the floor is hot thereby turning the heated floor off.
So i view cat6 as a universal wiring system rather than ethernet alone. But I accept i'm the exception for home use due to home automation.
But I avoid wireless for anything other than mobile devices, everything is hard wired ethernet and the amount of entertainment gadgets that require network connections seems to be increasing.
gavsdavs said:
WinstonWolf said:
You can get L3 switches...
The first switch I installed cost about £10K installed, it had AUI ports and formed the backbone of a hospital. Total throughput was 70 Mbps
It was, however, a high speed switching bridge and not a mere repeater.
An "L3 switch" is by definition a router if it's making routing decisions. It may also be switching, but the routing element makes it a cleverer device.The first switch I installed cost about £10K installed, it had AUI ports and formed the backbone of a hospital. Total throughput was 70 Mbps
It was, however, a high speed switching bridge and not a mere repeater.
Back to the original question about switches and hubs.
A hub is a "collapsed bunch of repeaters". It is isn't smart enough to know anything about the mac layer and therefore sends everything everywhere. As you know this is bad for ethernet performance.
A switch is smarter because it knows what mac addresses it can see on its ports. It can then send traffic only to ports that are participating in a dialog. Therefore you get less collisions and closer to linespeed (or at least switching backplane speed).
I guess this is why i question the merits of 'multiple' ethernet links to a room *in the home*. If you can, why not, but its' generally just not required.
If you want to future proof your home (that £10K switch was future proofing a hospital) the best way is to make sure your trunking/conduit can be reused that way you can upgrade as technology moves on apace. Running a single cable doesn't seem to make much sense, cable is cheap, you can pull ten cables just as easily as you can pull one and you're going to have a single backbox there anyway which will take two outlets.
My point is single cables are pretty inflexible and it's always better to have spare runs than not enough...
PeteB0 said:
gavsdavs said:
I'm asking a pretty simple question about if people carry television/video signals over ethernet cables between different rooms in the same house (as opposed to over IP). If you DO show video on a screen in a seperate room from the device that's producing that video, do you have to go to the other room to change channel ?
(That shouldn't be too hard to understand, why are people not answering it) ?.
AFAIK pretty well any HD over CAT matrix allows for remote signals to be communicated back to the source. Typical use case would be something like below (off of google images), where someone wants to be able to access any source from any room.(That shouldn't be too hard to understand, why are people not answering it) ?.
One that needs its own independent cabling, of which there are many generic extender options. The industry standard is HDbaseT. As in the pic.
IP based systems are now becoming more popular, they use an existing 'Gigabit' network and switches etc. There is no standard, it's often referred to as HDbitT, but different manufacturers have different ways of doing it. There is an alliance forming to get a standardised protocol. Unfortunately this method uses a lot of compression and a lot of the network bandwidth, so can compromise other traffic. I expect, once there is a standard, it will take over for home instals. It's a cheaper option and easier too implement.
Edited by megaphone on Thursday 2nd March 08:57
chasingracecars said:
Poorly installed or kinked Cat5 is quite likely to break.
Cat6 is thicker and equally should not be bent if you terminate correctly and use correctly then is far better to run.
To me cost difference is nothing for the added future usability.
If you treat Cat5 in the same way you describe poorly installed Cat6 I very much doubt the Cat5 would work at all.
I respectfully disagree, I've seen a lot of very badly mistreated cat5 and its very rare to see them fail. Not seen a huge ammount if cat6 mistreated as it's usually not on display. I have one client where they had cat6 put in about 8 or 9 years ago by a cabling company and had nothing but trouble with it. Even for cat6 it's the stiffest, hardest to handle cable I've seen, and almost every few months I end up having to re-terminate a point somewhere. The building does vibrate a bit to be fair.Cat6 is thicker and equally should not be bent if you terminate correctly and use correctly then is far better to run.
To me cost difference is nothing for the added future usability.
If you treat Cat5 in the same way you describe poorly installed Cat6 I very much doubt the Cat5 would work at all.
Craikeybaby said:
I'd also make sure you get one network point (2 cables) to where you BT/Virgin line will come into the house, so that your internet connection can be sent to your switch in the loft.
Forgot to add, this cost me one of my CAT6 cables in the lounge - I needed it to connect the modem by the telephone socket to the router in the cupboard under the stairs!! Didn't take this into account when I originally specced the cables per room.Ive run Cat5 around my house. Its running under the floorboards in a steel flexi pipe so I can pull through more cable if needed.
BUT...
Where the cable comes up from the floorboards it will be behind the plasterboard which im guessing will stop me from being able to pull the cable out/new cable through in the future?
BUT...
Where the cable comes up from the floorboards it will be behind the plasterboard which im guessing will stop me from being able to pull the cable out/new cable through in the future?
gavsdavs said:
Explain the difference between a switch and a hub.
Mate I've been in IT for 30 years - Man and Boy. So far I'm the only person on this thread to have given the o/p the best advice which is to ensure that he buys cable made of copper - because regardless of CAT5/6/etc and regardless of the quantity of drops and regardless if you put a switch on the end of your single run, if you use cheap CCA cable you will have problems.
Cheap-o cable:
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/BRAND-NEW-ROLL-OF-305M-U...
And why it's cheapo:
http://www.twistedpairtech.co.uk/caution-using-coo...
http://www.cetecglobal.com/technologies/cabling/cc...
Edited by eliot on Thursday 2nd March 12:58
WinstonWolf said:
gavsdavs said:
WinstonWolf said:
You can get L3 switches...
The first switch I installed cost about £10K installed, it had AUI ports and formed the backbone of a hospital. Total throughput was 70 Mbps
It was, however, a high speed switching bridge and not a mere repeater.
An "L3 switch" is by definition a router if it's making routing decisions. It may also be switching, but the routing element makes it a cleverer device.The first switch I installed cost about £10K installed, it had AUI ports and formed the backbone of a hospital. Total throughput was 70 Mbps
It was, however, a high speed switching bridge and not a mere repeater.
Back to the original question about switches and hubs.
A hub is a "collapsed bunch of repeaters". It is isn't smart enough to know anything about the mac layer and therefore sends everything everywhere. As you know this is bad for ethernet performance.
A switch is smarter because it knows what mac addresses it can see on its ports. It can then send traffic only to ports that are participating in a dialog. Therefore you get less collisions and closer to linespeed (or at least switching backplane speed).
I guess this is why i question the merits of 'multiple' ethernet links to a room *in the home*. If you can, why not, but its' generally just not required.
If you want to future proof your home (that £10K switch was future proofing a hospital) the best way is to make sure your trunking/conduit can be reused that way you can upgrade as technology moves on apace. Running a single cable doesn't seem to make much sense, cable is cheap, you can pull ten cables just as easily as you can pull one and you're going to have a single backbox there anyway which will take two outlets.
My point is single cables are pretty inflexible and it's always better to have spare runs than not enough...
In a new build, I would have done proper conduit throughout. We ran conduit in the new build bits (e.g. loft) as it's easy in a new build with stud walls. In the old part of the house, cable was run along/through the suspended wood floors and up into rooms with minimal chasing.
Frankly, most of what we need runs happily on wifi, as our broadband speed is good (London) and there are only two of us in the house: this was more about cheap ethernet infrastructure while there was an opportunity to do it. Streaming HDTV on wifi is fine.
LeadFarmer said:
Ive run Cat5 around my house. Its running under the floorboards in a steel flexi pipe so I can pull through more cable if needed.
BUT...
Where the cable comes up from the floorboards it will be behind the plasterboard which im guessing will stop me from being able to pull the cable out/new cable through in the future?
Run it in conduit behind the skirting boards if you can.BUT...
Where the cable comes up from the floorboards it will be behind the plasterboard which im guessing will stop me from being able to pull the cable out/new cable through in the future?
Harry Flashman said:
WinstonWolf said:
gavsdavs said:
WinstonWolf said:
You can get L3 switches...
The first switch I installed cost about £10K installed, it had AUI ports and formed the backbone of a hospital. Total throughput was 70 Mbps
It was, however, a high speed switching bridge and not a mere repeater.
An "L3 switch" is by definition a router if it's making routing decisions. It may also be switching, but the routing element makes it a cleverer device.The first switch I installed cost about £10K installed, it had AUI ports and formed the backbone of a hospital. Total throughput was 70 Mbps
It was, however, a high speed switching bridge and not a mere repeater.
Back to the original question about switches and hubs.
A hub is a "collapsed bunch of repeaters". It is isn't smart enough to know anything about the mac layer and therefore sends everything everywhere. As you know this is bad for ethernet performance.
A switch is smarter because it knows what mac addresses it can see on its ports. It can then send traffic only to ports that are participating in a dialog. Therefore you get less collisions and closer to linespeed (or at least switching backplane speed).
I guess this is why i question the merits of 'multiple' ethernet links to a room *in the home*. If you can, why not, but its' generally just not required.
If you want to future proof your home (that £10K switch was future proofing a hospital) the best way is to make sure your trunking/conduit can be reused that way you can upgrade as technology moves on apace. Running a single cable doesn't seem to make much sense, cable is cheap, you can pull ten cables just as easily as you can pull one and you're going to have a single backbox there anyway which will take two outlets.
My point is single cables are pretty inflexible and it's always better to have spare runs than not enough...
In a new build, I would have done proper conduit throughout. We ran conduit in the new build bits (e.g. loft) as it's easy in a new build with stud walls. In the old part of the house, cable was run along/through the suspended wood floors and up into rooms with minimal chasing.
Frankly, most of what we need runs happily on wifi, as our broadband speed is good (London) and there are only two of us in the house: this was more about cheap ethernet infrastructure while there was an opportunity to do it. Streaming HDTV on wifi is fine.
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