Question about wiring in-wall CAT6

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snappie

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Question about wiring in-wall CAT6

#1

Post by snappie » Tue Dec 10, 2013 1:10 am

Hi,

I hope this is the right forum for my question. I did some searching, but couldn't find my answer.

I'm trying to run CAT6 cables for the first time in an old home. I'm still an amateur when it comes to cabling and networking. From my research, I came across most people suggested running this method:
[CABLE MODEM] > patch cable > [ROUTER] > patch cable > [GIGABIT SWITCH] > patch cable > [PATCH PANEL] > CAT6 solid cable (in-wall) > [KEYSTONE JACK] > patch cable > [NETWORKED DEVICE]


However, I only need to run 2 CAT6 cables from room to room. So I was wondering if I can do away without a patch panel, with the following design:

Code: Select all

3rd Floor:       [CABLE MODEM + WIRELESS ROUTER]                       [COMPUTER] 
                                           |                               |
                                     patch cable                     patch cable
                                           |                               |
                                  [KEYSTONE JACK]                [KEYSTONE JACK]
                                           |                               |
                             CAT6 solid cable (in-wall)       CAT6 solid cable (in-wall)
                                           |                               |
2nd Floor:                       [KEYSTONE JACK]                           |
                                           |                               | 
                                [GIGABIT SWITCH]                    [KEYSTONE JACK]
                                     /         \___________________________|
                           patch cable           
                                   |
                        [XBOX + HDhomerun Prime]


Basically, I've already a modem and wireless router set up on the 3rd floor office. I want to run an in-wall ethernet cable down to the living room on 2nd floor, which will connect to XBOX and HDhomerun from a gigabit switch. I also need my 3rd floor master bedroom HTPC wired, so I want to run another in-wall ethernet cable from the 2nd floor living room gigabit switch to 3rd floor master bedroom.

The reason why I want to do it this way is because I will most likely have to pay extra to have my ISP tech to relocate my modem, and move all the wirings from 3rd floor to the basement. Plus I have no plan on adding any entertainment devices to the basement in the near future, so I don't want to invest in something I won't take advantage of in many years.

Thanks in advance

barnabas1969

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#2

Post by barnabas1969 » Tue Dec 10, 2013 2:05 am

Yes, you can skip the patch panel. Patch panels make it easier to move connections around when you have lots of them. If you will only have a few (or if you just want to do it as inexpensively as possible), you can skip the patch panel. You can even skip the keystone jacks at one end or both ends. However, I do recommend installing the keystone jacks at one end (the one near the computer or other device).

My modem, router and switch (and a bunch of other stuff) are all located in a closet. I don't have a patch panel nor keystone jacks in the closet. I simply terminated the cables with RJ-45 connectors and plugged them into the switch. It's not the prettiest way to do it, but it's in a closet where it is never seen anyway. It saved money this way.

There are 10 cables running from other rooms in the house back to the closet. There are a bunch of networked devices in the closet too, and the 16 port switch is full.

dgeezer

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#3

Post by dgeezer » Tue Dec 10, 2013 10:38 am

I agree that you don't really need a patchpanel. In my old house I used a couple electrical boxes with keystones to make my connections. However, when I wired my new house I used patch panels and it does make for a much more professional looking install. It may actually be cheaper to use a patch panel if you make very many connections. This is similar to what I used http://www.monoprice.com/Product?c_id=1 ... 1&format=2.

I would also reccoment that you run more than one cable to each location. I only ran two cables to each TV location. We already have an extender and a Roku at each location.

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#4

Post by kingwr » Tue Dec 10, 2013 2:29 pm

+1 for skipping the keystones in the second floor closet/cabinet. A patch panel makes sense if you have lots of connections, but for these two, just crimp on some connectors and plug into the switch. Also, if your going to pull one cable to a location, I would suggest pulling at least two. The pull itself is way more resource intensive than the cable.

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#5

Post by IownFIVEechos » Tue Dec 10, 2013 3:09 pm

One way I was able to get all my rooms wired with Cat-5e was I replaced all the POT's connections by taping the Cat cable to the old phone line and then pulled them through the walls very carefully. Was a big job, and looking back at it I do not know how I had the energy to do it (or the time). But now all rooms are CAT-5e. Maybe you have that option?

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#6

Post by machausta » Tue Dec 10, 2013 5:50 pm

I'm going to agree with the sentiment here...anything less than 5-6 cables and I would just crimp them. Those stupid cable ends for CAT5e/6 are so expensive that it is probably cheaper to go to monoprice and pick up a patch panel at that point. The benefit of a patch panel is that you can't/won't break your cable ends -- just mount it somewhere and forget about it. The cables that are in the wall take no more abuse and will theoretically last forever -- but it sounds like overkill for your setup.

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#7

Post by IownFIVEechos » Tue Dec 10, 2013 5:57 pm

machausta wrote:I'm going to agree with the sentiment here...anything less than 5-6 cables and I would just crimp them. Those stupid cable ends for CAT5e/6 are so expensive that it is probably cheaper to go to monoprice and pick up a patch panel at that point. The benefit of a patch panel is that you can't/won't break your cable ends -- just mount it somewhere and forget about it. The cables that are in the wall take no more abuse and will theoretically last forever -- but it sounds like overkill for your setup.
http://www.amazon.com/CableWholesale-CN ... at+5e+ends

What would you consider cheap?

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#8

Post by barnabas1969 » Tue Dec 10, 2013 5:58 pm

In response to post #5, your telephone wiring will usually be stapled to the wall studs, if the wiring was installed when the house was built, so using the old wires to pull new ones may not be an option. A "fish tape" (used to pull cables through walls and other spaces) can be purchased inexpensively at your local Home Depot or Lowe's.

I forgot to mention that if you're only doing a few crimp connectors on the ends of the cables, then the crimping tool may cost more than a few keystone jacks. In my case, I got the cable and connectors for free from work (our networking department had a bunch of scraps of cable laying around that were the right lengths for my purposes), and they let me borrow a crimping tool too... so it only cost me money for the keystone jacks.

The keystone jacks come with a cheap plastic tool that works good enough to punch the wires down, and some of the patch panels might come with one too... and even if you have to buy a type 110 punch tool, they can be found for less than ten bucks.

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#9

Post by barnabas1969 » Tue Dec 10, 2013 6:03 pm

If you decide to crimp the connectors on the ends of the cables, make sure you get the right kind of connectors. The ones for solid wire are different from the ones for stranded wire, and they are not interchangeable.

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#10

Post by IownFIVEechos » Tue Dec 10, 2013 6:05 pm

barnabas1969 wrote:If you decide to crimp the connectors on the ends of the cables, make sure you get the right kind of connectors. The ones for solid wire are different from the ones for stranded wire, and they are not interchangeable.
I think when you go to a patch panel you want solid? But I could be wrong. I must be lucky again since my phone wire came through pretty easy. Perhaps I popped the staples along the way? But the ends are not expensive no matter what wiring is used. You probably want a mod tap as well to test the connections you make?

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#11

Post by barnabas1969 » Tue Dec 10, 2013 6:08 pm

kingwr wrote:if your going to pull one cable to a location, I would suggest pulling at least two. The pull itself is way more resource intensive than the cable.
I agree with kingwr. When I wired my house (a long time ago), I had no idea that I would have so many devices in the future. I actually only ran one cable to each of the kids' bedrooms, but I ended up splitting them so that I could wire more than one device in each room. This means that the kids rooms are limited to 100Mbps, because there are only 2 pairs of wire for each connection (gigabit requires all 4 pairs).

And... I have an 8-port switch in my living room. In the living room, I ran one cable to one side of the room, and another cable to the other side of the room. The PC is sitting under the TV, and I needed to keep it running at gigabit speed to handle all the networked tuners and extenders. So, the "smart" TV, the AVR, the PC, and a couple of other networked devices (for home automation) are all plugged in to the 8-port switch behind the PC. If I felt like running new wiring, I'd pull at least 5 cables to the TV.

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#12

Post by snappie » Wed Dec 11, 2013 12:30 am

Thanks for all the wonderful responses.

I didn't plan on buying a bulk of 1000ft cat6. The cable I'm thinking of buying is this http://www.amazon.com/Tripp-Lite-N202-0 ... cr_pr_pb_t. And it already come with RJ connectors attached. I was going to cut them off and attach to the keystones.

In response to the post that suggested fishing through telephone line, that will be impossible in my home unfortunately. I only have 2 telephone jacks, and they are both on the same side of the house.

Here are a few things I get confused after reading the responses:
1. As for not using keystones at the living room, do I just pull the cables through and leave the hole opened? Or do I just buy a punch down wall plate but not use keystones? The switch won't be stored in the closet. The XBOX, HDhomerun etc are out in the open, right below the TV.
2. I was always under the impression that solid ethernet cable should not be connected to devices. In this case, my switch.
3. By pulling an extra cable or two to the living room, wouldn't that defeat the purpose of having a switch there? So if I decide to invest in a Roku in the future, I could just use my switch, right?

Two more questions I just came across today:
1. After doing some measuring today, I just found out the spot I'm planning on drilling is where the water lines and drain pipes are (right behind the bathtub). My local hardware store has no idea if that's safe to drill a hole between the two water lines or not. What do you guys think? I will have to find a local builder tomorrow, maybe they will know.
2. What kind of drill bit do you guys use? Would a 7/8inch suffice for two ethernet cables? My floor is about 1.5ft deep, should I be buying a 2ft long drill bit?

Thanks again.

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#13

Post by dgeezer » Wed Dec 11, 2013 11:00 am

I would try to avoid drilling into the stud bay at the tub. Do you know where the main water shutoff for the house is located? :shock:
Not only is there a chance of drilling into a water line or a drain line, there are more obstacles in the way there. Typically the plumber would have installed 2x4 blocks between the studs to support the shower valve and the shower head. I would think that it would be almost impossible to fish a wire down this bay. If you can go one stud bay to the right or left there shouldn't be anything in the way.

Use a sheetrock saw to cut your holes for the boxes in the wall. I've seen people cut right thru electrical wiring and water pipes with a sawzall.

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#14

Post by bmblank » Wed Dec 11, 2013 3:22 pm

The oscillating tools work great for drywall also. And lots of times you can cut through the drywall and if you hit a wire it won't cut that.

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#15

Post by mdavej » Wed Dec 11, 2013 3:36 pm

If there is any existing coax in your house already, you could just use that and save yourself a lot of trouble.

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#16

Post by IownFIVEechos » Wed Dec 11, 2013 5:41 pm

I personally would never go near pipes. But that's because I don't know much!

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#17

Post by barnabas1969 » Wed Dec 11, 2013 6:01 pm

If you're not familiar with running wires through walls, cutting drywall/plaster (or whatever your walls are made of), and general stuff like that, then I wouldn't recommend doing this job yourself. When cutting drywall, I typically use a handheld drywall saw like this one:
download.jpg
download.jpg (3.3 KiB) Viewed 3594 times
You can't do too much damage with a manual saw like that one, and it doesn't require a drill to start the hole in the drywall. However, if your walls are lath and plaster, that type of saw won't work and you'll have to resort to power tools. Using power tools around plumbing or 120/240 volt wiring is dangerous, and should only be done if you know what you're doing.

Since you're planning to pull these wires from one floor of the house to another, you need to figure out if there's a way to route the cables between the floors. I usually try to use a closet for doing that.

You don't need to buy a 1000 foot spool of wire. You can go to your local home improvement store (Lowe's, Home Depot, and the like) and buy Cat-5e/Cat-6 wire in whatever length you desire. They will cut it for you to whatever length you want to buy.

There's nothing wrong with connecting solid cable directly to a device. The only danger in doing so is if you move the device around a lot, it might break the copper conductors in the wire. But you'd have to move it VERY FREQUENTLY.

As for pulling extra cables defeating the purpose of the switch in the living room... that all depends on your needs. You need to design the network so that the traffic between the HTPC, extenders, and network-connected tuners go through the least number of switches/routers/etc. as possible.

Based on your questions, and apparent lack of experience with general handyman stuff... I'd recommend using MoCA adapters as suggested by mdavej. If you have a cable/antenna coax near the three locations where you want to connect networked stuff, you can just install a MoCA adapter in those three locations and be done with the job. No cutting/drilling/wire-pulling necessary.

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#18

Post by blueiedgod » Wed Dec 11, 2013 6:17 pm

snappie wrote:Thanks for all the wonderful responses.

I didn't plan on buying a bulk of 1000ft cat6. The cable I'm thinking of buying is this http://www.amazon.com/Tripp-Lite-N202-0 ... cr_pr_pb_t. And it already come with RJ connectors attached. I was going to cut them off and attach to the keystones.

In response to the post that suggested fishing through telephone line, that will be impossible in my home unfortunately. I only have 2 telephone jacks, and they are both on the same side of the house.

Here are a few things I get confused after reading the responses:
1. As for not using keystones at the living room, do I just pull the cables through and leave the hole opened? Or do I just buy a punch down wall plate but not use keystones? The switch won't be stored in the closet. The XBOX, HDhomerun etc are out in the open, right below the TV.
2. I was always under the impression that solid ethernet cable should not be connected to devices. In this case, my switch.
3. By pulling an extra cable or two to the living room, wouldn't that defeat the purpose of having a switch there? So if I decide to invest in a Roku in the future, I could just use my switch, right?

Two more questions I just came across today:
1. After doing some measuring today, I just found out the spot I'm planning on drilling is where the water lines and drain pipes are (right behind the bathtub). My local hardware store has no idea if that's safe to drill a hole between the two water lines or not. What do you guys think? I will have to find a local builder tomorrow, maybe they will know.
2. What kind of drill bit do you guys use? Would a 7/8inch suffice for two ethernet cables? My floor is about 1.5ft deep, should I be buying a 2ft long drill bit?

Thanks again.
If you know for sure that the pipes are going up and down, then you can fish the wire along the pipes. Builders usually make the holes around pipes much bigger than the pipe it self, which will give you plenty of room to get the wire between them, as long as it is not terminated wire.

Running terminated patch cables through walls is just going to add another level of complexity that you don't want to deal with.

Place the low voltage box (they have no backs, just flat piece with tabs and screws) against the wall, between the pipes, mark with pencil. Poke a hole with the hand saw in the corner of the rectangular pencil drawing, and carefully cut the sheet rock. If you encounter resistance assume it is pipe, or wire. STOP!

Push the wire between the pipes, and repeat the box installation directly under this one on the lower level. Grab the cable in the holes.

Install low voltage boxes.

Terminate cables with keystones, and install wall plates.

Done. 15-30 minute job.

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#19

Post by barnabas1969 » Wed Dec 11, 2013 6:28 pm

Post #18 above assumes that the OP wants to run wires straight down the same wall, and that the walls are made with drywall. If that's the case, then it should be very easy to do as described by blueiedgod. If not, then it won't be so simple.

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#20

Post by snappie » Wed Dec 11, 2013 11:50 pm

Sorry for the confusion, I should have been a little bit more specific.

I'm only dealing with sheetrock in my home, and I've put up a few drywalls myself in the past so I've some experience as far as cutting sheetrock. The only thing I'm afraid is water line and AC lines (I just don't want to drill into something I shouldn't), and I've never drilled bewteen floors before.

There is only one coaxial line running from the basement to the living room. My living room is directly below my office. Which means even if I run MoCA, I still need to drill a hole from the living room onto my 3rd floor office in order to reach bedroom via fishing up the cable into the attic.

Here is a picture that hopefully can give you an idea of what I'm talking about.
Image

This is a picture of an opening what's behind the bathtub. studs are on both edges of this picture. Toilette is to the left of this picture. An empty stud bay to the right, and after that there's a chimney pipe from the basement. So my plan B would be using that empty stud bay, but I thought it would look silly having the wall plate so close to the chimney pipe.

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