Home Network Setup Question

[Torey316]

My house has Cat5e running to 4-5 rooms and have some questions.

In the middle of my house is a control panel type deal where I have my router and all the cat5e cables that connect to the rooms meet, (at the walls) they are all connected normally to the jacks, the 8 individiual wires crimped or w.e into the jack. Now where they all meet in the control panel, they are only using 2 wires from each cable which are connected to a tiny green pcb which also has one phone cable connected to it. I'm curious as to why who ever built the house did this? and could i simply rewire rj45's on the cables and simply use a switch and or just plug them into the router? In my house their is only 1 phone jack and 4-5 ethernet jacks. If this helps at all.

Also to my knowledge phones use 4 of the 8 wires anyway so I don't know why only 2 are connected to this board from each cable.

I could just use something like this http://www.discount-low-voltage.com/Connectivity/Category-5e-Kwik-Jack
and then run short cables to the router outside the control panel?

 

[PP Mguire]

Phone lines only use 2 wires. Yes, technically all you would need to do is follow a guide and recrimp the ends to ethernet specs and also make sure that the wall outlets are wired properly too. What I would do is just put ends on the wires at the control panel then plug them in to your router.
Thing is, it depends on your internet. That control panel could be your DSL connection.

Edit: You can use this guide to help you wire if you don't know how.
http://www.ertyu.org/steven_nikkel/ethernetcables.html

 

[Torey316]

Phone lines only use 2 wires. Yes, technically all you would need to do is follow a guide and recrimp the ends to ethernet specs and also make sure that the wall outlets are wired properly too. What I would do is just put ends on the wires at the control panel then plug them in to your router.
Thing is, it depends on your internet. That control panel could be your DSL connection.

Edit: You can use this guide to help you wire if you don't know how.
How to wire Ethernet Cables

Yeah I thought I could do this but we have cable internet and we all only use wifi atm which sucks. Dish comes through all of our cable outlets through the house so the modem got installed near the control panel with a seperate line running outside for cable internet and just haven't gotten around to wiring the cat5e properly. We don't use home phones so this works perfect. I want to just put a rj45 on the cable but they are coming in from the wall and I'm not 100% sure if after cutting them stripping etc I will have enough length to reach outside the CP and to the router so either I'm going to just install a switch inside the CP or just put the jacks as i Posted above on. Did alot of research on the wiring and to make sure it was Cat5e incase I want to install a gigabit cabable router and switch. Thanks again for your help.

 

[PP Mguire]

Just put your router inside your CP and run the cable modem to that.

 

[Torey316]

Just put your router inside your CP and run the cable modem to that.

The CP has a metal panel that you screw on after your done with things, it (sits) in the wall or w.e and I think that would just interfere with the wireless signal. It's in the laundry room and its directly in the middle of the upstairs of the house which is nice. But just think that metal door would weaken the signal.

Why are you against putting in the jacks or a switch?

 

[PP Mguire]

Too much unecessary work really. If that panel door is like a regular power box door then it isn't big enough to interfere with the wifi signal.

If all the wall ethernet ports go to that particular area then it just makes it easier for you to add ends to the cables in that junction and directly hook them to your router and your cable modem to the WAN port. Makes a simple network.

 

[Torey316]

Too much unecessary work really. If that panel door is like a regular power box door then it isn't big enough to interfere with the wifi signal.

If all the wall ethernet ports go to that particular area then it just makes it easier for you to add ends to the cables in that junction and directly hook them to your router and your cable modem to the WAN port. Makes a simple network.

Yeah just found out my mom is starting to work from home and needs 2 ports to the phone and computer so, What Im planning is like this for now.

basically buying rj45's like you said for the CP and plug wut needs to be plugged in into the router. then getting a switch or do they make a wallplate that takes 1 cat5e cable and turns it into 2 walljack plates or would I need a switch in that room? so my mom can have the 2 ethernet connections she needs.

 

[Torey316]

What I'm thinking and I need some help on whether or not this would work is.

The control panel has 6 Ethernet Cables running to different rooms throughout the house.

I'm worried about 2 rooms only right now. My room and My moms.

She needs 2 cables to herself. I just need one.

What I need to do is buy rj45's for all the ethernet cables in the CP and crimp then, ok no problem there. But I somehow need to make the ONE ethernet jack in my moms room split into two so she can have a solid connection. One goes to her phone and the other to her pc for working at home.

 

[PP Mguire]

Well, how does she currently have it hooked up?

 

[I am confused2]

From the sounds of the setup here, you have a Levintion Telcom panel. I install these every other day. I am a telcom contractor.

The way you describe the wiring, you are wired as a phone system only, and just because the wired with cat 5/6, the phone only uses 2 wires.

It also sounds like you do not have the ablity to run another cat 5/6, correct?

Depending on what sixe the panal box is, you can put a data switch inside and it will be out of the way.

Can you post a picture of the panel box?

As for the wall jacks, I bet you will find that 4 to 6 contact plugs where installed and those are only used for the phone also. Either use's 8 contact plugs.

If you do things right, there is a way to use a standand cat 5/6 cable to allow both phone and either, but you have to be very careful on the configureation.