[OT] Networking woes.....

[Mercury]

I was wondering if someone could possibl give me some tips to help set up my families network. We finally got highspeed cable internet, and I am trying to figure out if it is possible to run it through our exisiting wiring. The wires that run to all of the phone wall jacks have 8 wires, 4 of which are used, the other four are just crying out to be used to hook up to a RJ45 jack and than just change the wall template. Does anyone know if this will work, and possilby a site with directions for this type of undertaking. Thanks much.

Mercury

 

[RingXero]

traditionally normal household phone lines are Cat3, to have an operational network at 100Mbs you need wire rated at Cat5.

you can try it, it may only run at 10Mbs, and there is a small chance that you may also get noise bleeding through from each pair to the other reducing performance even more, or causing sound degradation to be heard over the phone lines.


that said, there are other ways to network the home, wireless, phone line networking, and powerline networking.

phone line networking can be ok, but it cannot be used if you have DSL as they use the same bandwidth on the line.

Powerline networking can work ok, but it depends entirely upon the quality of the wiring in the home, and how the different zones are wired.

Wireless is good, but it depends upon distance, how many walls between you and the antennae, and what kind of equipment used.

EDIT: did you already buy the NIC cards? and the router.switch/hub? Definately recommend a router/switch sharing device, instead of using internet sharing through a computer

RX

 

[gariig]

Ok, as the person before stated normally wiring in the home is Category 3(Telephone lines) and not Category 5 (traditional networking cable). Ways to get around it is:

You can buy a network kit that uses Cat 3 but all the disadvantages are above and Yahoo/Google search on telephone networking will get you some information, same with http://www.dslreports.com/ is another good site.

Wireless networking works OK, but your throughput is way down and if you have secure information on your network this can be very bad as wireless is very insecure medium.

I don't have any experience with using electrical wiring.

The other option is to just run Cat5 through the walls you can call someone to do this. Then have your Cable/DSL modem in a closet some place where all the wiring meets at and have a router. I highly suggest getting a router/switch because you won't have to pay for IP addresses. The upside is that you don't have to pay for additional IP addresses and you are a little more secure from hackers because the router acts as a very basic firewall(but if someone wants in, they will, it just blocks basic probing which is what most hackers do anyway). The downside is that some programs don't work very well. Some examples are file transfers over AIM, ICQ, etc won't work behind a firewall. Netmeeting won't work either(at least voice and video). These you can get around with a GOOD router, but is probably beyond your expertise(it is mine).

Or you can go cheaper and just run Cat5 on the ceiling and/or baseboards and just secure it there. Depends on the asthetics.

Post other questions if you have them.

Gariig

 

[thatdarncat]

If you're looking for a switch/router, I'd suggest something from the linksys line of products. I've got a BEFSR41 that has worked great for two years now.

http://www.linksys.com

 

[RingXero]

I won't say that wireless is a perfect solution, or a great one, as it depends entirely upon the environment, but I will say that the security of the system depends upon the user to set it up correctly.

almost every setup procedure/install for wireless routers/nics informs you how to set up WEP. It's extremely easy to do, and there is plenty of info out there on how to do so, wireless (802.11b) got a bad rep mostly from the majority of buisness and people who set it up did not set up wep.

Then again, if you don't monitor your network, someone could set themselves up on your front yard and as long as your signal is strong try and break the WEP encryption. But you will either (a) notice man holding a 'Pringles' can antennae pointed at your house and shoo them away, or (b) say 'cool' and make a longer WEP key.

I prefer wired, and if possible go with CAT6 (which is rated to 1000Mbs) Granted you won't be going that fast unless you get the rather expensive nics, but it does set you up for the future if you need it. The Linksys routers are nice for price/performance and ease of setup.


RX

 

[Jeremy Ackerman-Yost]

I was wondering if someone could possibl give me some tips to help set up my families network. We finally got highspeed cable internet, and I am trying to figure out if it is possible to run it through our exisiting wiring. The wires that run to all of the phone wall jacks have 8 wires, 4 of which are used, the other four are just crying out to be used to hook up to a RJ45 jack and than just change the wall template. Does anyone know if this will work, and possilby a site with directions for this type of undertaking. Thanks much.

Mercury

I've got a site bookmarked at home that gives tons of this kind of info. I'll post it when I get a chance tonight. At any rate, what's the exact set-up of this wiring? And how old is it? Are the four free wires bundled with the four that are in use? If they are, forget it. You're going to have to run new wiring, which should be easy since you can just follow the existing lines. If the four free ones are bundled separately from the phone line, you may be OK. I have seen newer homes wired up with cat5 instead of cat3, so you might be good to go. If the wiring is fairly new, it could be worth comparing your extant lines to a length of cat5 to see if they match up. If so, get yourself a router and a switch box (or a router/switch) and you're golden. If not, you're back to running new wire.

 

[Mercury]

I am not very experienced with this sort of thing so please bear with me. I went and checked and our house does use Cat5 wiring. We also already have a 10/100 5 port Workgroup Switch by Linksys. Both the Cable and the Cat 5 wiring comes into a room in the basement. What I am tring to do is to plugin the cable modem in the basement, than attach that to the Switch. From there, I am looking to run an RJ45 wire from the Switch and hook that into the Cat 5 Wiring, which summarily runs throughout the house. Than where the Cat 5 wiring enters each room, I am hoping to replace the wall plate with a telephone and an RJ45 jack, and hook the RJ45 jack up to the wires that are not in use on the Cat5. Does this make sense or help in any way?
The old way were were running the net was just with dialup. None of the computers were networked at all. Thanks again for your help.

Mercury

 

[Jeremy Ackerman-Yost]

Do you have separate lines of cat5 coming into the basement for each room?

 

[Kibo]

Firewall

You really should get a router with a hardware firewall.. They're more expensive, but you will likely regret not having done so. Another option is to make an older semi-obsolete system into a firewall, maybe with smoothwall bsd or something, that sits between the cable/dsl modem and the switch. Someone who's particularly agressive with preventative measures would likely do that in addition to a hardware firewall router.

And, for Goodness sakes, change the default password on your hardwear firewall to something obscure. I would even say feel free to write that on a sticker and stick it to the bottom of it if you're worried about forgetting it, but change it, and change it to something not easily guessed.

 

[Mercury]

Canis-

I do have seperate lines of Cat 5 for each room.