Home Network Advice

[Pickled]

Ok tech-heads, I could do with some advice...

I'm having my house rewired and a garden office built, so while all this is going on I thought it would be an idea to sort out a home network, one problem I'm not sure what I need!

Current Items I have are

2 x Macbook Pros
1 x Mac Mini
1 x 27 iMac
1 x Win 7 desktop (hardly gets any use)
1 x Apple TV
1 X Chromecast
2 x iPads
3 x Andriod tablets
4 x iPhones
1x Xbox 360

Ideally I'd like a central storage/backup/streaming system for Films/Music/Photos/Files.

I don't have a fixed budget, so all ideas welcome, preferably something I can do myself as I like to tinker.

TIA

ETA my BBand is via Virgin Media, and the garden office will be 150ft from the house if it makes any difference.

[nyt]

See other threads on PH - Synology NAS devices generally form a good basis for sharing/streaming.

If you are rewiring than I'd have plenty of CAT5 laid to every room. It'll always come in handy.

[GlenMH]

nyt said:

See other threads on PH - Synology NAS devices generally form a good basis for sharing/streaming.

If you are rewiring than I'd have plenty of CAT5 laid to every room. It'll always come in handy.

Yup - Synology or QNAP for sharing/streaming.

Get at least 2 bits of CAT5 in to every room and fed back to where the streaming box is going to live.

Put the Virgin Superhub in modem mode and put a decent wireless router on the back of it - preferably close to the centre of the house.

Put 2 Cat5 cables down to the office too.

[Pickled]

Cheers guys, I shall get shopping!

With the hardwiring do I need to add a switch?

[nyt]

I'd recommend the virgin 'super'hub be separated from the rest of your network using a switch - it doesn't seem to like traffic very much.

Once I installed the switch my network became much more reliable. No more stuttering video etc.

I used:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Netgear-GS208-100UKS-Gigab...

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Netgear-GS308-100UKS-Gigab...

[Don]

Since you have Apple kit I'd recommend the Airport Time Capsule for backup/wifi/routing. It looks expensive until you work out it's doing three things for you! It will also take care of "Back to My Mac" for you - if you can actually make that work!

For streaming stuff a Synology NAS is excellent. I have one and I use it for backup (along with the Time Capsule) but also as a BitTorrent client and for remote access to my LAN.

[nyt]

Do look back at the PH threads. There are good and less good synologys.

[schmunk]

I'd you're in the least bit techy, have a look at the option of buying an HP N54L microserver, hard drives off your choice and installing xpenology, which allows you to use the Synology software on third-party hardware.

It can work out a lot cheaper and more flexible than buying a dedicated NAS box.

[clockworks]

HP Microserver for media sharing/playing
Apple Time Capsule for backups
A decent 16 (or more) port switch
Plenty of cat5 cables (buy a 305metre reel, some RJ45 plugs, and a crimp tool)

[mrdemon]

CAT 5E remember not CAT 5 like every one is saying, it's quite important.

Does my head in why people say CAT 5 when you should be buying CAT 5e !!!!

Synology is a great NAS and Sonos with spotify is miles better than Apple stuff imo.