Home Network setup

[ellisz]

Hi all,

I am do a little wiring and I need some real world experience. I ran cat5 cable to a living room and my office. I plan to set up a panel in my basement to serve as a junction.

My dilemma is this... I ran the wire already and have the jacks in the wall. I need to decide on whether to buy and RJ45 crimp tool and ends or Network distribution hub. If I do the hub, I assume I will use the push downs for my wire and then use my current ethernet cables to attach the hub to a 10/100 switch?

The crimp tool seems simpler but I don't know easy it will be to use?

These are what I am looking at:
http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/pshowdet...?&DID=7&Partnumber=182-812&rak=182-812
or
http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?DID=7&PartNumber=150-054

I wired my wall jacks using T568B standard. Seems like most pre-done cables are 568A. Does this matter?

M router and cable modem will bei n the office. I plan to use my switch in the basement where the cables terminate.

Any thoughts?

Thanks

 

[Genx87]

Yikes, why dont you just get a switch and crimp the cable with an RJ-45 connector and by pass the panel?

Do you really need the panel?

 

[Changlinn]

Patch Panels are really useful, but you don't really need them, but they are pretty cheap and you can get the punch down tools pretty cheap too.
The only reason I would go patch panel is if you were going to send telephony through the cat5, which is what I would do

 

[ellisz]

Originally posted by: Genx87
Yikes, why dont you just get a switch and crimp the cable with an RJ-45 connector and by pass the panel?

Do you really need the panel?

This would seem the most logical but I wondered how tedious adding the ends were? I have the switch already.

As for the panel, I already have it too. It came with the house. Is the tool from Parts Express decent? Anyone use it before?

 

[ellisz]

Originally posted by: Changlinn
Patch Panels are really useful, but you don't really need them, but they are pretty cheap and you can get the punch down tools pretty cheap too.
The only reason I would go patch panel is if you were going to send telephony through the cat5, which is what I would do

All the telephone wire is cat5 and each jack terminates in the panel. The builder did wire it right in that respect. Currently, all the cat5 lines except the 3 I ran(office and living room) are connected for phone. The electrician just connected 2 of the wires for a basic 1 line setup.

Is there a setup that would these lines to be switchable? If I connected an RJ45 end to all the cat5 lines, is there an add on that would let me pick which lines will be phone and which will be data? I have a PC upstairs that I might add to the network later on when my kids get bigger. Data would just be fed to the switch connected to my router but not sure how I would do the phone. Seems like a punch down block would be easiest.

The house will not have more than 1 phone line at this point so for now, the phone is ok the way it is. I like to plan ahead if possible though.

 

[Changlinn]

Ellisz - I am confused at what you want to do, if you are asking can telephony and network be run over the same cat5, then yes you can with a little hacking, as 100mb only uses 4 of the 8 wires, I had to make a could of cables to split this off for a customer. It is not the best solution though, you are better off having dedicated cables for each if simply for the bandwidth that future applications may need.
Cat5 should really be connected with an rj45 end or a keystone jack(female rj45), cat5 is backwards compatible and can carry phones cat3 signal.

 

[ellisz]

sorry about the confusion.

At this point, I think I justy want to know how hard it is to install RJ45 ends on a cat5 wire? I saw a kit on ebay that looks simple enough. It has a basic crimp tool, ends and boots. I only need to do 3 ends right now but if I finish out my basement, I might need to do more later.

 

[JackMDS]

May be this can Help.

Link to: Wiring - I would like to wire my Networked Computers (Home Wiring).

Link to: Using CAT5 for Telephone Lines, and other Media.

:sun:

 

[Changlinn]

it is very easy, cat5 is made for rj45, just gotta get the pairs setup etc, need a crimping tool, and a bit of practice, takes me about 5minutes for a network cable with the wiring diagram infront of me, but I know a guy who can do them in about a minute, from his head.
If you are laying a run that is going to be permenant and inside a wall, best to use solid core cat5e/cat6 as it reduces signal attenuation, of course if you are permenantly laying cable you may need to be licenced depending on your countries laws.

 

[ellisz]

Thanks! Those links were very informative. The one site said if you are not experienced crimping, then don't crimp!

Would the 8 port distribution hub(link above) be just as good as then. It would convert the cat5 to a RJ45 jack and then I could run a patch cable from there to the switch.

Also, I set the Keystone jacks to the 568B standard. All the patch cables I see are 568A. The one link Jack provided above said 568A would work with 568B. Did I read this right or do I need to re-do my wall jacks to 568A?

Thanks

 

[Changlinn]

An ethernet hub/switch has rj45 ports in it, so the cable that plugs in has to have an rj45 plug on it. The "hub" as they call it is actually a simple 8-port patch panel, up the top is the equivelent of a punchdown, you will still need a punchdown tool, and that is pretty expensive for an 8port patch panel. You can basically wire into the punchdown section the wires from the wall sockets around your home. Then using stranded core cat5e/6 patch through to either the switch or your telephony patch panel or if you don't have a pabx, you can patch them through to a specially hacked patch panel that basically splits your phone off into say 8ports so you can have up to 8 extensions, these will all be the same line however.
You should number your patch panel ports the same as the wall sockets are numbered so you will always know which is which, my recommendation, 2 runs of cable to each room minimum, better off running conduit to each room so you can upgrade later to better cabling as it comes available.
So even with a 3 bedroom house, with kitchen,dinning and tv room you will need 12 ports, more if you want to one day have a pabx etc. So get a 24port patch panel, one row for wall sockets the other for telephony and your set

 

[ellisz]

Most of the house is already finished. The builder did put in cat5 lines but very sparingly. I added 2 lines to the living room(1 for tivo, 1 for xbox) and 1 for the office. I can add to the office real easy if need be. I just want to get my tivo and xbox wired in to my router.

Where is a good place to find these patch panels? Home depot has a 6 port and it is more expensive than the 8 port in the link.

As for the punch down tool, manual ones are pretty cheap. Would this not work? The keystone jacks I have in the wall came with a simple tool to seat the wires. I have wondered why you would need a expensive punch down tool unless you were doing a ton of stuff.

Thanks