Extension - Coax or Ethernet??

brettjbuckley · 19-06-2005, 11:10

My broadband point exists in the lounge...my 4 PC's exist upstairs at the other side of the house. NTL would not install the cable point on the back of the house (where I wanted) and so I used a wireless router, set up in the lounge, to access the web from the back bedrooms.

My wireless networks prove very prone to interference (microwaves, phones, etc.) and so I have decided to take the opportunity of having our house rewired to run a decent wired connection from the lounge to the back bedroom where I keep the PC's.

Question: Should I keep the cable modem in the lounge and simply pipe its output into a wall RJ45 socket which then comes out as a wall RJ45 socket in the back bedroom (and then into a wired hub). Or...should I instead have my electrcian run a satellite quality coaxial extension from the lounge to the back bedroom and then have the cable modem connect from that?

Both methods should probably give the same results, but which would work best - a long coax or a long ethernet?

Paul K · 19-06-2005, 11:14

Quote:

Originally Posted by brettjbuckley

My broadband point exists in the lounge...my 4 PC's exist upstairs at the other side of the house. NTL would not install the cable point on the back of the house (where I wanted) and so I used a wireless router, set up in the lounge, to access the web from the back bedrooms.

My wireless networks prove very prone to interference (microwaves, phones, etc.) and so I have decided to take the opportunity of having our house rewired to run a decent wired connection from the lounge to the back bedroom where I keep the PC's.

Question: Should I keep the cable modem in the lounge and simply pipe its output into a wall RJ45 socket which then comes out as a wall RJ45 socket in the back bedroom (and then into a wired hub). Or...should I instead have my electrcian run a satellite quality coaxial extension from the lounge to the back bedroom and then have the cable modem connect from that?

Both methods should probably give the same results, but which would work best - a long coax or a long ethernet?

I take it you tried changing channels on the router?

brettjbuckley · 19-06-2005, 11:16

I have tried changing channels - yes - to no effect.
I also suffer a weak signal strength most of the time which does not help and I suspect that my neighbour has devices that also interfere...

Paul K · 19-06-2005, 11:17

Where are you thinking of running a coax from? What would the source point be?

Stuartbe · 19-06-2005, 11:17

Personaly I would go with the ethernet route. If you extend the length of the cable or introduce couplers ect on the line then you may start to have power level problems.

If your power levels are right on the edge of working correctly then this could knock your connection out.

If the power level needs increasing or decreasing then it has to be an NTL engineer that does it, Your electrician will be unable to.

HTH

Paul K · 19-06-2005, 11:20

I'd agree with Stuart to be honest, the reason why I asked about your source point is to see if you were going to be interfering with any NTL equipment in a way that could lead to problems in future if you needed an engineer out. What sort of distance will you need to cover with ethernet? It's probably the easiest way to go and you could in theory prep any rooms you think you might want to network into in the future.

SLM · 19-06-2005, 11:27

just an idea what about getting your sparky to wire all the 4 pc's back to the sacm and place your hub with it, like paul said if you cat5 your house you can use it for tv, telephones, music etc, not just internet.

MovedGoalPosts · 19-06-2005, 11:59

Extending using ethernet is the safest option. You won't be accused ot tampering with ntl's network cables, and effectively anything on the external side of the cable modem is ntl's network.

On the other hand I can see the attraction of having the cable modem in the same room as your computers, saving you running around the house when something odd is happeningjust to check the little lights are flashing.

brettjbuckley · 19-06-2005, 15:12

Thanks folks - some good answers there.
I will go with the ethernet cable solution.

Halcyon · 19-06-2005, 16:29

Good idea. Extending the coax cable can cause power level problems and it is generally not advised to touch this without an engineer first checking the cables signals. (And you'd be charged for a call out).

Your best bet is using the Ethernet. That distance should be fine and you shouldnt have any problems doing it yourself.

jonifen · 21-06-2005, 13:17

Quote:

Originally Posted by MovedGoalPosts

On the other hand I can see the attraction of having the cable modem in the same room as your computers, saving you running around the house when something odd is happeningjust to check the little lights are flashing.

a little camera in front of the modem??

I would go the ethernet route.
We get our BB through a STB (which is in the front room) and our router is in the back room. I have ran an ethernet cable round from the STB to the router and all works fine. It's only about 10m in length... you should in theory be able to get up to 25m on ethernet without the signal quality suffering. Power cabling and the like on the same run can cause noise though, depends on the cat5 quality really and what type of shielding is inside the wire.

SMHarman · 21-06-2005, 13:41

Quote:

Originally Posted by jonifen

you should in theory be able to get up to 25m on ethernet without the signal quality suffering.

Nearer 100m on a solid core cable, slightly less on a stranded cable (patch cable).