Networking a new home - How should I build a well wired house?
Jeffrey G. Backes
In article <george-weiner-1...@weinerg.int-med.uiowa.edu>,
george...@uiowa.edu wrote:
> I am in the process of building a new home, and would like to wire it so I
> can network Macs in 3 bedrooms, the den and the kitchen. What sort of
> wiring should I use that won't become obsolete in 5 years, and what extra
> hardware will I need (I have an LC and am buying a powermac 7100)?
>
I guess I'd run four maybe six pair of standard phone wire to each room.
This will allow up to 100 megabits today and probably faster some day.
Remember that large buidings in the US only have twisted pair and that's
the standard that most networking companies are still chasing.
Don't forget to bring all of the wires into a closet that you can rewire
when you need to. Put in a nice sized punch block with a 10 base T hub
and you're off to the races.
You could go with coax also, but twisted pair will work well for years and
the connectors are cheap and good looking.
So one pair for POTS and one pair for 10 base T in every room, that leaves
3 or 4 pairs for "extras" some day.
Have fun,
Jeff
George Berger
> In article <george-weiner-1...@weinerg.int-med.uiowa.edu>,
> george...@uiowa.edu wrote:
>
> > I am in the process of building a new home, and would like to wire it so I
> > can network Macs in 3 bedrooms, the den and the kitchen. What sort of
> > wiring should I use that won't become obsolete in 5 years, and what extra
> > hardware will I need (I have an LC and am buying a powermac 7100)?
Hi George -
In addition, I'd also wire two co-ax cable (TV/Cable type) into every
room, as you'll never know what will be available several years from now.
Place an oversized junction box where the co-ax cables come together and
where your current landline cable feed as well as DSP lines can enter.
Provide one or two 20 amp circuits at this point. This way, you can shoot
DSP to one room, regular TV cable to another, and whatever your local
cable company has in the way of Internet access to your computer location.
Wiring (ahead of time) is cheap! Tearing out walls ain't cheap! Leave room
for the converter boxes. Your POTS wiring will take care of the rest,
provided you have Class 5 wiring and put outlets for jack into every room.
Just my two cents.
--
George Berger
gbe...@his.com
george...@uiowa.edu
I am in the process of building a new home, and would like to wire it so I
can network Macs in 3 bedrooms, the den and the kitchen. What sort of
wiring should I use that won't become obsolete in 5 years, and what extra
hardware will I need (I have an LC and am buying a powermac 7100)?
Thanks
Michael W. Fleming
I'll give you two answers, sort of.
1) My main recommendation is the "sort of" answer because it is only
indirectly related to wiring. Put an 1 1/4" EMT conduit into a double
gang box (2 outlets wide) right next to EVERY power outlet in your house
and garage. The conduit can stub out above the ceiling anywhere that is
accessible. The materials are cheap and should only add a few hundred
dollars to the overall cost. Also, have the contractor put a pull string
Why? Because then you can do anything you want, any time you want, any
where you want. Run a new phone line on this wall. Run a new cable TV
line on this wall. Run a new network line on that wall. Go up into your
"attic" and tie the cable to the pull string pull it into the box. No
holes in the wall, no visible cables running down the outside of the wall.
I recommend the double gang because that allows you to have a phone line
on the top left, a network line on the bottom left and a cable TV coax
line in the upper right and whatever you want in the lower right (maybe
speaker cables to your stereo or home theater), all in the same outlet.
If that's too big you can put in a single gang (regular outlet size) and
check out various vendors' outlet offerings and see what's available.
The biggies are AT&T, AMP, ModTap. (My apologies to the many I'm
unintentionally leaving out.)
2) If you follow 1) above then you can put in whatever cabling you want
in now and not worry about 5 years from now because it will be easy to
replace. Tie the new onto the old and pull it through the conduit.
If your going to use ethernet, then you can pick up a small 4 or 8 port
10BaseT hub for a few hundred dollars. You'll need an ethernet card for
the LC which should cost you $75 - $100 and a 10BaseT AAUI adapter for the
powermac for around $50. There are lots of vendors, I have had no
problems with Data Comm Warehouse, 1-800-328-2261 (I have no affiliation
with them).
You'll need the outlets I mentioned in 1) and RJ45 plugs if you're going
to do your own wiring (no offense but building/electrical contractors know
absolutely nothing about network wiring).
You might be able to hire some of the network techs on your campus to do
the wiring for you (many of them do this kind of thing on the side all the
time). Recommended if you don't have the experience. If the conduit and
boxes are in place they can buy the cable, outlets, and connectors and use
their own tools and get you set up. Make sure all the pieces are rated
Category 5.
If you're going to use local talk then you can use phone wire from Radio
Shack with regular RJ11 connectors (what you use to plug your phone into
the wall outlet). You'll need a phone net adapter for each machine which
you can get for about $15 each.
If you've got the bucks, go with ethernet. It's 10 megabits whereas local
talk is 230 kilobits.
My 2 cents.
Michael
--
Michael W. Fleming, Network Systems, Computer Services
California State University, 9001 Stockdale Hwy, Bakersfield, Ca. 93311-1099
Voice/mail:(805)664-2118 (24hrs) Fax:(805)664-2099 (24hrs)
<mailto:mfle...@csubak.edu> Disclaim: I directly represent only myself and
my family; indirectly, I represent God and all His creation.
nickerr
Jeffrey G. Backes (jba...@pop.diamondmm.com) wrote:
: Don't forget to bring all of the wires into a closet that you can rewire
: when you need to. Put in a nice sized punch block with a 10 base T hub
: and you're off to the races.
: You could go with coax also, but twisted pair will work well for years and
: the connectors are cheap and good looking.
: So one pair for POTS and one pair for 10 base T in every room, that leaves
: 3 or 4 pairs for "extras" some day.
I agree... Make sure you use Cat5 for the data lines (a friend of my
swears by Cat5 for voice lines, but I haven't noticed a difference yet).
Coax is a bad idea, considering you don't know your future plans and it
has a definite limit (100 meters?). The cable is inexpensive enough that
you could run four pairs per room (5 rooms you say) and have at least 1
voice line, 1 data line, with the possability of up to 4 voice and no
data or 1 voice and 3 data. In any case, Cat5 Twisted Pair will permit
100mbps+ speeds.
--
<------------------>
nic...@netcom.com
<------------------>
Michael Ayotte
Just a slight correction. 10BaseT uses 2 Pairs not one. 100BaseT which may
someday become common (then again maybe not) requires 4 pair.
In my computer room, I installed a 12 "port" mudular wall plate, which
allows me to connect BNC (10Base2 or Video), F-Connectors (Cable), RJ45s
(Phone or Ethernet) and others. To this wall plate I ran:
Ä 12 - Cat5 lines to RJ-45 connectors. These are used for the four phone
lines (ISDN, B1 Analog, B2 Analog and regular Analog), and several
Ethernet lines.
Ä 1 - 10Base2 Line (50á) to a BNC connector, just in case.
Ä 4 - RG-6 75á Coax. This is for cable and video.
Some wires are not connected. They are just run through the quadbox in
such a way that I can easily get at it at a later time.
Everything is "Home Runned" to a wiring closet on the ground floor. As
opposed to in the attich or basement crawl-way (never again!). The wiring
closet has my hub and ISDN router both of which are connected to a U.P.S.
All the Cat-5 lines go to my five Seimens 66 punch down blocks, which has
already made it simple to do rewiring as my needs change.
I went a little extreem, mostly because I ended up frequently replacing
sections of 30 yr old wiring that was failing, crawling on my stomach in
my basement crawl-way. Not to mention all the re-wiring I did when I got
new toys. I finally got fed up with it so I replaced it all.
I highly recomend this sort of system, but I think you could prabably
stick with a 6 "port" modular wall plates.
FYI, if you run 6 cat-5 lines to the wall plate, you will need 1 Seimons
S66 block.
by the way some details of my setup (including a picture of my Seimons
blocks) is online at:
<http://www.ayotte.com/personal/ayotte/net.html>
Eric Reis
In article <jbackes-1607...@10.1.1.211>,
jba...@pop.diamondmm.com (Jeffrey G. Backes) wrote:
>So one pair for POTS and one pair for 10 base T in every room, that leaves
>3 or 4 pairs for "extras" some day.
Actually, 10baseT requires *2* pairs per Ethernet jack. I almost got
burned on this myself, thinking one pair was enough. I thought I was
going to have extra pairs for future use, but it turns out that I cut
things finer than I thought.
Eric Reis
-------------------------------------------------------
e-mail: Eric...@mail.utexas.edu
U.S. mail: 3401 Red River St. #101 / Austin, TX 78705
-------------------------------------------------------
Jeffrey A. Hawkins
>I am in the process of building a new home, and would like to wire it so I
>can network Macs in 3 bedrooms, the den and the kitchen. What sort of
>wiring should I use that won't become obsolete in 5 years, and what extra
>hardware will I need (I have an LC and am buying a powermac 7100)?
>
>Thanks
Why not just run some tubing... pvc pipe maybe with a string in it. Put
whatever current wiring you need there, then if you need more later you can
tie to the string and pull it through.
Good Day.
--
Please consider this address and web site terminated. My new snail-mail address is:
Jeffrey A. Hawkins, c/o Tsuruta Town Office
200-1 Hayase, Tsuruta
Aomori 038-35, Japan
E-mail, web site, and home telephone to be determined.