New Home With Cat5 Prewire

thisguy34 · Nov 20, 2016

This my first post I hope you are all can help out!

My parents just bought a new house that came with Cat5 in all the rooms that we want to turn on. The house is a nightmare for wifi so this might be the best option.

The modem and router are on one side of the house the box with all of the Cat5 is on the other side of the house. I know I can use a powerline adapter to bridge the connection but from what I have seen online it looks like I might need more than a switch to wire this up? Here are a few pics of what they are working with.

I would like to get better pics but this is the best my mom could do. I am trying to set this up for them when I am home for Thanksgiving. Any insight would be greatly appreciated

kanewolf · Nov 20, 2016

The home has Cat5 cabling, but it is setup for PHONE only. Notice the word "Telephone" in the first picture. You would have to disconnect the room(s) you want to have network connectivity and convert them to ethernet rather than phone.

jsmithepa · Nov 20, 2016

There are many, many posts just like yours, in fact there is another one scant 5 entry from yours and it's almost always the same, the CAT5 are wired for landline phones, and the topology is well, not as same as for computer ethernet. You have to know enough to ask members here the precise questions. We can UNSTUCK you but nobody can possible give you step-by-step from beginning to end, no offense but half of the time you won't understand the terminologies we use here.

One thing I can tell you is, modem/ISP entry at the other end of the house is not a deal breaker, AS LONG AS, there is at least ONE FULL CAT5 run (cable with all 4 pairs wires intact) between where the modem is, and this junction. At this junction, after the topology issue is resolved will be a ethernet switch which needs to be powered so there must be electricity nearby.

Your parents may need to bring in a contractor to take a looksy.

thisguy34 · Nov 20, 2016

Thanks for the replies. I posted this and then started doing a little bit more research. If you could atleast let me know if I am on the right track here I would appreciate it.

I should first make sure all of the jacks in each room are wired with RJ45 jacks. Once that is complete I would need a network patch panel to connect to the current wires. Then a patch cable from the panel to a switch that is connected to a powerline to get the data?

I know that it is more complicated than that but in theory am I at least on the right track?

bill001g · Nov 21, 2016

The patch panel is recommended but you could just terminate the wires with rj45 and plug them directly into the switch.

You of course need power for the switch which tends to be pain for many people because of the placement of these boxes in many houses.

I would avoid using powerline to connect the switch to the router. Best would be if you could place the router in the panel also. There are downside to that like wireless coverage but it tends to be simpler to get things working.

Mostly it will depend where the internet comes into the house. Be very careful if it is dsl because it may connect though this panel and you do not want to disrupt it.

So if the current connection is say in the living room and you have one of these ethernet cables going to the living room you can just hook it to the lan port on the router and it will connect back to the switch instead of using a powerline adapter.

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