Would like some advice on home ethernet cables

mxtech1
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Edited Date/Time 2/23/2018 3:24am
We have Centurylink internet service in our house and we use their provided router for everything. I believe the internet package is rated up to 10 MBPS, but it typically can only pull 8.5 to low 9 MBPS due to the infrastructure in our city. The last time we had a Centurylink tech out to our house, we started talking and he said our neighborhood will never be able to pull much more than 10 MBPS until they improve the infrastructure

Anyways, we have the following internet devices in our home: Smart TV, PS4, XBOX 1, XBOX 360, Wireless printer, & various tablets/cell phones.

The worst conditions are when someone is playing an online game in one room, someone else is streaming TV in the other room, and then there may be 1 or 2 cell phones or tablets browsing the internet. It gets very laggy and everything is running through WiFi.

I am going to run ethernet lines throughout the house to get everything but the wireless printer and cell phones/tablet off the WiFi. How much will that help our issues? I am not 100% sure if it is a WiFi capacity issue, modem/router issue, or just plain slow internet speed.

I have a few questions though.

Are Cat6 cables worth the extra money based on our "10" MBPS service?
Our TV console has 3 devices that need an ethernet line. Do I have to run 3 individual lines or can I run 1 line and then use a tri-split wall plug?
I was going to upgrade the modem/router after I see what kind of improvement we could make from the ethernet lines. What would be a good upgrade for around the $100 price range?

Any other suggestions?
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TXDirt
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2/22/2018 8:26am
I would run cat6 because the price ins't much different.

On your tv console you can run 1 cat6 line to a router and then plug in each device to the router. The router should be a 1000mbps (1gbps) router. These are pretty cheap.

You also need to think about your home network, not just your internet.

From your console back to router, back to modem, can run much higher then 10Mbps. Likely it can run as high as 1000mbps, commonly just called a 100meg network (100Mbps)

So your internal home network will be much faster then what your Internet speeds can provide.

Is that going to solve your streaming problem? No. Because the fastest your internet can be is no more then 10. Even though your internal network can run at 100.

But you will see some slight improvements running everything through Ethernet cables then through wifi,
But you will still be limited on what you can collectively stream at the same time because collectively you are trying to consume more them 10 but your internet cannot provide more. So you will be constrained in that way.

But your home network will operate at 100 so you will see some improvements in different areas depending on what you do internally.
SKlein
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2/22/2018 9:04am
I would say Cat5e unless you plan on going to a Gigabit speeds, in which case Cat6 would be ideal.
2/22/2018 9:38am
Is your provider going to update the infrastructure ? what are they charging you a month for 10MB?

The Shop

mxtech1
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Galesburg, IL US
2/22/2018 10:20am
Is your provider going to update the infrastructure ? what are they charging you a month for 10MB?
I doubt it - not anytime soon anyways.

We pay about $60/month for the internet service and then another $20 or so in junk fees.
mxtech1
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2/22/2018 10:24am
CAT6 for sure...technology is advancing quickly and you want to size up for future bandwidth.
That was my reasoning as well. Especially since the overall price difference between 5 & 6 is not significant for our small house. I only need to run about 200' feet all together to do both bedrooms and living room.


Single story house on a slab foundation so all of the wiring will be done up above in the truss space with loose-fill insulation. That alone makes me not want to have to ever do it over again if I can do 6 right now and be good for many years to come.
2/22/2018 11:02am
Not sure where you are buying your cable but 1000' of cat6 should only cost about $150. I would suggest buying a spool and running it to several locations for potential future devices. You want wired devices, not wireless....here's a closet I'm working on under a stairwell...almost done.



2/22/2018 12:21pm
Jeebus! What the hell kinda operation are you running in your house ? thars a lot of wire.
TXDirt
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2/22/2018 12:34pm
@Diesel

Looks good. Organized cabling is more art then science.

What are all the white cables for? Blue looks like Ethernet obviously. White I can't really tell and seems like you have about 10x more of those then anything else.
2/22/2018 12:56pm
TXDirt wrote:
@Diesel Looks good. Organized cabling is more art then science. What are all the white cables for? Blue looks like Ethernet obviously. White I can't really...
@Diesel

Looks good. Organized cabling is more art then science.

What are all the white cables for? Blue looks like Ethernet obviously. White I can't really tell and seems like you have about 10x more of those then anything else.
This has been a huge PITA as you can imagine, especially without any help in that small closet. Trying to dress the spaghetti in above your head on the underside of cable tray is not fun, but I'm almost done. There is a ton of cat6 (blue and white), the green is cresnet, and then the white stuff hanging down is speaker wire for 86 channels of music Smile The large rack should be going in soon, can't wait until this thing is finally done.
2/22/2018 1:07pm
Here is what I started with...at this time I had already done a ton of work in there, but it doesn't look like it...


TXDirt
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2/22/2018 1:33pm
TXDirt wrote:
@Diesel Looks good. Organized cabling is more art then science. What are all the white cables for? Blue looks like Ethernet obviously. White I can't really...
@Diesel

Looks good. Organized cabling is more art then science.

What are all the white cables for? Blue looks like Ethernet obviously. White I can't really tell and seems like you have about 10x more of those then anything else.
This has been a huge PITA as you can imagine, especially without any help in that small closet. Trying to dress the spaghetti in above your...
This has been a huge PITA as you can imagine, especially without any help in that small closet. Trying to dress the spaghetti in above your head on the underside of cable tray is not fun, but I'm almost done. There is a ton of cat6 (blue and white), the green is cresnet, and then the white stuff hanging down is speaker wire for 86 channels of music Smile The large rack should be going in soon, can't wait until this thing is finally done.
I was going to guess speaker wire.

I've built-out/rebuilt many data-centers of various sizes for our company so I have seen good and bad cable jobs. Your is very nicely done.

I use a company here is Dallas that handles all of our cabling jobs around the country and it's pretty amazing to see them work. Folks might think oh yeah just tie up some cables and make it look nice. Not so easy when you have hundreds and thousands of cables coming down into cable racks with switches connected by fiber and all that going to server racks.

It costs a lot of money to have it done right. But it's worth it because you can see where shit goes and it's professionally done and not a big piece of shit spaghetti mess.

When we moved corporate offices a year and a half ago I had to convert a "nursing room" into a small data center. Just the cabling and cable rack work was just shy of 100k. And it's all 10gig (Cat6A) cables which are pretty thick and a bitch to work with. I make them label everything at the patch panel too.

harescrambled
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2/22/2018 2:10pm
mxtech1 wrote:
We have Centurylink internet service in our house and we use their provided router for everything. I believe the internet package is rated up to 10...
We have Centurylink internet service in our house and we use their provided router for everything. I believe the internet package is rated up to 10 MBPS, but it typically can only pull 8.5 to low 9 MBPS due to the infrastructure in our city. The last time we had a Centurylink tech out to our house, we started talking and he said our neighborhood will never be able to pull much more than 10 MBPS until they improve the infrastructure

Anyways, we have the following internet devices in our home: Smart TV, PS4, XBOX 1, XBOX 360, Wireless printer, & various tablets/cell phones.

The worst conditions are when someone is playing an online game in one room, someone else is streaming TV in the other room, and then there may be 1 or 2 cell phones or tablets browsing the internet. It gets very laggy and everything is running through WiFi.

I am going to run ethernet lines throughout the house to get everything but the wireless printer and cell phones/tablet off the WiFi. How much will that help our issues? I am not 100% sure if it is a WiFi capacity issue, modem/router issue, or just plain slow internet speed.

I have a few questions though.

Are Cat6 cables worth the extra money based on our "10" MBPS service?
Our TV console has 3 devices that need an ethernet line. Do I have to run 3 individual lines or can I run 1 line and then use a tri-split wall plug?
I was going to upgrade the modem/router after I see what kind of improvement we could make from the ethernet lines. What would be a good upgrade for around the $100 price range?

Any other suggestions?
Best thing you could do is get a cable modem. Much more bandwidth available that way. Also, the new cable modems tend to have gigabit ports. Then run Cat6 all over the house and get everything off the wifi that you can. I used to have DSL...6 megabit was the best they could do for me. Ran pretty consistent too, but it's no comparison to the 50 megabit service from my cable provider. I can get up to 100 megabit but don't need it. Also regarding your 3 TV console devices...every device you connect to a wired network must have its own dedicated line. You cannot run a splitter. The closest you could come to that would be to run those three devices to a hub, then run 1 line from hub to router.
TXDirt
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2/22/2018 4:22pm
mxtech1 wrote:
We have Centurylink internet service in our house and we use their provided router for everything. I believe the internet package is rated up to 10...
We have Centurylink internet service in our house and we use their provided router for everything. I believe the internet package is rated up to 10 MBPS, but it typically can only pull 8.5 to low 9 MBPS due to the infrastructure in our city. The last time we had a Centurylink tech out to our house, we started talking and he said our neighborhood will never be able to pull much more than 10 MBPS until they improve the infrastructure

Anyways, we have the following internet devices in our home: Smart TV, PS4, XBOX 1, XBOX 360, Wireless printer, & various tablets/cell phones.

The worst conditions are when someone is playing an online game in one room, someone else is streaming TV in the other room, and then there may be 1 or 2 cell phones or tablets browsing the internet. It gets very laggy and everything is running through WiFi.

I am going to run ethernet lines throughout the house to get everything but the wireless printer and cell phones/tablet off the WiFi. How much will that help our issues? I am not 100% sure if it is a WiFi capacity issue, modem/router issue, or just plain slow internet speed.

I have a few questions though.

Are Cat6 cables worth the extra money based on our "10" MBPS service?
Our TV console has 3 devices that need an ethernet line. Do I have to run 3 individual lines or can I run 1 line and then use a tri-split wall plug?
I was going to upgrade the modem/router after I see what kind of improvement we could make from the ethernet lines. What would be a good upgrade for around the $100 price range?

Any other suggestions?
Best thing you could do is get a cable modem. Much more bandwidth available that way. Also, the new cable modems tend to have gigabit ports...
Best thing you could do is get a cable modem. Much more bandwidth available that way. Also, the new cable modems tend to have gigabit ports. Then run Cat6 all over the house and get everything off the wifi that you can. I used to have DSL...6 megabit was the best they could do for me. Ran pretty consistent too, but it's no comparison to the 50 megabit service from my cable provider. I can get up to 100 megabit but don't need it. Also regarding your 3 TV console devices...every device you connect to a wired network must have its own dedicated line. You cannot run a splitter. The closest you could come to that would be to run those three devices to a hub, then run 1 line from hub to router.
You can run a single line to a router. Then plug in each device to the router. I’ve got s single cat6 line to my media console. Then I plug my Xbox, stereo, tv, PlayStation, amazon box, all into the router.

The router tracks back to another router. That router is a 24 port gig router that connects up all my rooms.

That router connects to my cable modem.

A cable modem will not make a difference if your internet service can only max out at 10Mbps.

harescrambled
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2/22/2018 6:06pm
TXDirt wrote:
You can run a single line to a router. Then plug in each device to the router. I’ve got s single cat6 line to my media...
You can run a single line to a router. Then plug in each device to the router. I’ve got s single cat6 line to my media console. Then I plug my Xbox, stereo, tv, PlayStation, amazon box, all into the router.

The router tracks back to another router. That router is a 24 port gig router that connects up all my rooms.

That router connects to my cable modem.

A cable modem will not make a difference if your internet service can only max out at 10Mbps.

The OP was asking if he could split one line to 3 devices...not happening without a hub...you know that as well as I do. I mentioned getting a different service provider since 10Mbps is about the max for DSL. He simply cannot get any more bandwidth from DSL. By the way...you can't use a cable modem on DSL...different tech
TXDirt
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2/22/2018 6:10pm Edited Date/Time 2/23/2018 3:12am
TXDirt wrote:
You can run a single line to a router. Then plug in each device to the router. I’ve got s single cat6 line to my media...
You can run a single line to a router. Then plug in each device to the router. I’ve got s single cat6 line to my media console. Then I plug my Xbox, stereo, tv, PlayStation, amazon box, all into the router.

The router tracks back to another router. That router is a 24 port gig router that connects up all my rooms.

That router connects to my cable modem.

A cable modem will not make a difference if your internet service can only max out at 10Mbps.

The OP was asking if he could split one line to 3 devices...not happening without a hub...you know that as well as I do. I mentioned...
The OP was asking if he could split one line to 3 devices...not happening without a hub...you know that as well as I do. I mentioned getting a different service provider since 10Mbps is about the max for DSL. He simply cannot get any more bandwidth from DSL. By the way...you can't use a cable modem on DSL...different tech
We may be saying the same thing? I guess I don’t know what a “hub” is because in my profession it’s called a switch. Weather it’s a 4 Port switch or a 48 Port Cisco switch with multiple gig fiber points.

Yes I know DSL different then a cable modem.

//edit

I realize what you mean now and I edited my post. I interchange router and switch constantly even though they are two totally different devices.

When you say hub you mean a switch. And so I agree with you.
mxtech1
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Galesburg, IL US
2/22/2018 7:18pm
Go to www.speedtest.net and run a test to see what speeds you are running: [img]https://p.vitalmx.com/photos/forums/2018/02/22/245539/s1200_Screen_Shot_2018_02_22_at_3.40.49_PM.jpg[/img]
Go to www.speedtest.net and run a test to see what speeds you are running:



Well this is rather eye opening....lol

Running the speed test over laptop, Xbox 1 streaming Hulu, and daughter watching a video on a Kindle. All running from wifi.



TXDirt
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2/23/2018 3:24am
Go to www.speedtest.net and run a test to see what speeds you are running: [img]https://p.vitalmx.com/photos/forums/2018/02/22/245539/s1200_Screen_Shot_2018_02_22_at_3.40.49_PM.jpg[/img]
Go to www.speedtest.net and run a test to see what speeds you are running:



mxtech1 wrote:
Well this is rather eye opening....lol Running the speed test over laptop, Xbox 1 streaming Hulu, and daughter watching a video on a Kindle. All running...
Well this is rather eye opening....lol

Running the speed test over laptop, Xbox 1 streaming Hulu, and daughter watching a video on a Kindle. All running from wifi.



Do a speed test off WiFi straight through your phone. See what you get. Wouldn’t be shocked to see faster speeds on LTE or 3g/4g.

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