Extended cabling question

[gloriousglenn]

Not really hardware...But I couldn't figure out where else to post it!

 

I'm trying to sort out my grandfathers PC and part of the problem is that the telephone socket is 'miles' away (60(ish) feet) from where his PC is and he has a multitude of extension cables dangling from everywhere!

 

So....Would I be better off having a telephone extension cable running through the house to the room where the PC is, then attach the router to this and have just a short Cat5 cable from the router to the PC?

 

...OR...

 

Attach the router to the telephone socket at its current location and run Cat5 cable all the way to the PC?

 

Basically I would like to know which is going to the best out of his internet connection.

 

Cheers

Glenn

 

P.S. I hope you all had a Merry Christmas and are building up to a Happy New Year.

[tech_guy]

Plan B I think as you can sometimes have problems with telephone extensions unless you use a high quality cable, etc.

[gloriousglenn]

Cheers tech_guy, I was kinda hoping that was gonna be the answer as I can get my hands on cat5 cable easier than telephone cable!!

[Ric_]

I agree... you need to keep your telephone line as short as possible and as high-a-quality as possible (i.e. high quality cable and minimal number of joints).

 

Of course, you don't always have the option of not moving the socket.

[torledo]

Cheers tech_guy, I was kinda hoping that was gonna be the answer as I can get my hands on cat5 cable easier than telephone cable!!

 

telephone cable is not at all hard to get hold of - maplins for instance, but I wouldn't go with either of the options mentioned...

 

Just connect his router to one of the new draft-n access point with a good antenna and wack a PCI wifi card in his PC. I know connectivity may be an issue if the signal has to travel through a brick wall but the experience should be more than adequate for a silver surfer.

[Andrew_C]

Plan B I think as you can sometimes have problems with telephone extensions unless you use a high quality cable, etc.

Huh?? Phone cable is "as cheap as chips" and is much less critical in its installation and termination than CAT5. I'd extend the phone line myself (you may not want to, depending on your bolshi-ness towards the phone company) especially if you have the two-part master socket designed for customer extension wiring. Cable and sockets from CPC or Maplin.

 

This way, not only do you get broadband at the PC, but you can have a phone point too!

[webman]

Depending on the quality of the phone line, extending it any further will more than likely lead to a poorer broadband signal. That's one reason why it is recommended to connect ADSL modems to the master socket.

[tech_guy]

Depending on the quality of the phone line, extending it any further will more than likely lead to a poorer broadband signal. That's one reason why it is recommended to connect ADSL modems to the master socket.

 

Exactly.

[maniac]

Another vote for option B. You want the ADSL modem as close as possible to the master socket.

 

Worth noting thou that you can use cat5 cable as telephone cable, infact most modern telephone installations will do this. Even BT now appear to, as my parents recently had the cable replaced on their phoneline from their master box to the road, and BT used cat5 cable for the job!

 

Mike.

[tech_guy]

Another vote for option B. You want the ADSL modem as close as possible to the master socket.

 

Worth noting thou that you can use cat5 cable as telephone cable, infact most modern telephone installations will do this. Even BT now appear to, as my parents recently had the cable replaced on their phoneline from their master box to the road, and BT used cat5 cable for the job!

 

Mike.

 

Yes, I've seen that done by BT too. And I've done it in my own house when I wanted a phone extension in the shed.

[john]

Must admit I don't own any drums of phone cable anymore, when they ran out that was it, I just use CAT5e for it, its cheaper than phone cable and TBH a better product, also means if for some reason you want to change it to a network socket you still have all 4 pairs to go at

[m25man]

I would opt for a plan C,

 

Use a pair of powerline adapters to provide ethernet connectivity from the router to any where in the house, no rewiring.

 

or Plan d,

 

Simply make it wireless!

 

It's so cheap nowadays is it really worth the hassle of running Cat5 around your home?

[SimpleSi]

Any extra, reasonable, cabling within your house will have only the slightest impact on your ADSL connection.

 

If you think about it, the cable has traveled miles to get to your house so an extra 100ft isn't going to make much difference

 

But always remember that you need £30/metre, oxygen free cables for speakers

 

regards

 

Simon

[webman]

If you already have a weak broadband signal, extra length of cable and breaks/joins may make it bad enough to be unusable. Also remember phone extension cable isn't shielded (or twisted) and may be running next to all sorts of interference sources in your home which can again, degrade the already-low broadband signal.

[kestrel1]

I would go wireless or run the CAT5e from the router & have a short telephone cable. I think 60ft of CAT5e would have less impact on the signal than 60ft of telephone cable, but as said previously, you could use the CAT5e as telephone cable. Telephone cable is still twisted pair, but I think it is slightly thinner.

[K.C.Leblanc]

Option B,

 

I've tryed using an ADSL modem on the end of 20 meters of telephone extensions and it didn;t work (the extension was fine with a normal phone or old school modem).

 

Another option is to try wireless or one of these home plug doofers.

[torledo]

I would opt for a plan C,

 

Use a pair of powerline adapters to provide ethernet connectivity from the router to any where in the house, no rewiring.

 

or Plan d,

 

Simply make it wireless!

 

It's so cheap nowadays is it really worth the hassle of running Cat5 around your home?

 

Great minds think alike, was about to suggest Powerline after being reminded of it in a pcmag article...

 

main sticking point with powerline would be if the room his PC is in and the room where the router is located aren't on the same ring....if they're on the same floor that shouldn't be an issue, but it could be an issue if on different floors in the house as the rooms could potentially be on seperate circuits.

[Andrew_C]

Also remember phone extension cable isn't shielded (or twisted) and may be running next to all sorts of interference sources in your home which can again, degrade the already-low broadband signal.

so UTP is? and some phone cable is twisted! If BT's system is SO poor that adding 60' of cable to the 1000s in the street is going to kill broadband, I'm really glad I'm with NTL, who use proper coax screened type cable.

 

What do you have in your house to cause "all sorts of interference"? Very little I'd guess that is on anything other than 50Hz or harmonics, and again, the system MUST have been designed to survive that!

 

main sticking point with powerline would be if the room his PC is in and the room where the router is located aren't on the same ring....if they're on the same floor that shouldn't be an issue, but it could be an issue if on different floors in the house as the rooms could potentially be on seperate circuits.

Only an issue if they are on different phases; very unlikely in a domestic setting. Different circuits isn't an issue.

[webman]

Also remember phone extension cable isn't shielded (or twisted) and may be running next to all sorts of interference sources in your home which can again, degrade the already-low broadband signal.

so UTP is? and some phone cable is twisted! If BT's system is SO poor that adding 60' of cable to the 1000s in the street is going to kill broadband, I'm really glad I'm with NTL, who use proper coax screened type cable.

 

Yes, I agree some phone cable is twisted which will help.

 

The point I am trying to make is that boradband signal is much lower than the signals used with ethernet and are much more susceptible to interference and less resilient than ethernet. Any length of wire acts as an antenna - the longer this runs in the house, the more the broband signal is exposed to possible interference and thus degredation in signal.

 

Connecting the modem as close to the master socket as possible ensures you get the best from the connection and has less chance of being degraded from interference picked up on a 10-mile extension within the home.

 

What do you have in your house to cause "all sorts of interference"? Very little I'd guess that is on anything other than 50Hz or harmonics, and again, the system MUST have been designed to survive that!

 

Just read the broadband forums and you will see. Mains electrics to some extent, wireless devices (including cordless phones), thermostats, and this time of year - christmas lights.

 

The BT phone network was designed to carry only, and to my knowledge, only gurantees, voice data. The fact some of us (living next door to an exchange) can get upto 8Meg over a pair of BT's copper wire is a minor miracle.

[torledo]

Also remember phone extension cable isn't shielded (or twisted) and may be running next to all sorts of interference sources in your home which can again, degrade the already-low broadband signal.

so UTP is? and some phone cable is twisted! If BT's system is SO poor that adding 60' of cable to the 1000s in the street is going to kill broadband, I'm really glad I'm with NTL, who use proper coax screened type cable.

 

What do you have in your house to cause "all sorts of interference"? Very little I'd guess that is on anything other than 50Hz or harmonics, and again, the system MUST have been designed to survive that!

 

main sticking point with powerline would be if the room his PC is in and the room where the router is located aren't on the same ring....if they're on the same floor that shouldn't be an issue, but it could be an issue if on different floors in the house as the rooms could potentially be on seperate circuits.

Only an issue if they are on different phases; very unlikely in a domestic setting. Different circuits isn't an issue.

 

Now I'm confused, i thought being on different circuits meant they'd be isolated from each other - therefore no end-to-end connectivity. How does Powerline work around this, i've read that you need some sort of coupler to connect seperate circuits for a powerline install. Is that what you mean by different circuits not being an issue.

[maniac]

The signals on those can travel through normal circuit breakers, but as far as I remember, not RCD devices. Most common household fuseboxes use only normal circuit breakers, (although to complicate matters there is normally an RCD splitting the box in half that's used to protect circuits such as cookers and electric showers.) However most ring mains are run on the part of the box before this RCD, so therefore it should be able to work across different ringmains.

 

If you have a circa 1960's fusebox like my ancient inneedofsomeinvestment house does, then you won't have a problem either.

 

Blimy, that's a mouthful of text to make a simple point!

 

Mike.

[john]

eer wrong way round, powersockets are RCD Protected for safety, lighting and cookers are not. But mine run fine through them as I have tried them no problems.

[maniac]

Ok, got that wrong! sorry, my limited elecrical knowledge coming out there, although that means my parents box is wired wrong as their sockets are all on the side of the box that's not protected by the RCD. Might get that looked into!

 

Mike.

[SimpleSi]

Please stop the pseudo-science/googled arguments - i can't get off the floor

 

Any signal over mains wiring will only start to run into difficulties if the circuits are on different mains phases - which doesn't occur in normal homes

 

Other than that, wire, fuses and RCDs will pass a signal quite well and the main consideration will be actual distance the signal has to travel

 

regards

 

Simon

[torledo]

Please stop the pseudo-science/googled arguments - i can't get off the floor

 

Any signal over mains wiring will only start to run into difficulties if the circuits are on different mains phases - which doesn't occur in normal homes

 

Other than that, wire, fuses and RCDs will pass a signal quite well and the main consideration will be actual distance the signal has to travel

 

regards

 

Simon

 

Thanks Simon, can I add that *sorry googled this one* another issue form what i've read is the type of devices you've got plugged into the power sockets, laptop power bricks seem to affect the signal..don't ask me how or why, i switched off when the thread i was reading started talking about signals and impedance.

 

Out of interest, what are the market leading products in the EoP field, and is they're a difference with the homeplug standard. Any success stories appreciated.