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Cat 5 or Cat 6 wiring in house

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  • 19-06-2014 11:51pm
    #1
    lnos1
    Registered Users Posts: 28 ✭


    Hi all,

    I would be grateful for any help in my current dilemma.
    Our house is plastered and painted at this stage but we are still waiting for stairs, kitchen, etc. yet.
    My problem is that I have heard from a few people that we should have wired for cat 5 cabling throughout the house. What can cat 5 cable do for me? Should I just put them with tv points?
    I am annoyed my builder didn't suggest it if it is important.
    How could I put around at this stage? One person told me to put it behind the skirting and route the skirting to allow for it. The skirting isn't on yet.
    Any suggestions on what I should do?

    Thanks very much.
    Tagged:


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    #2
    micosoft
    Registered Users Posts: 2,359 ✭✭✭micosoft


    It really depends on what you want to do.

    Basically CAT5/6 (CAT6 is the standard now - improved over CAT5, best to get CAT6 as little or no price difference) lets you connect your computers together.

    The simple option is to forego wires and use WiFi (which you may already have). So the question really is - what can CAT6 give me over Wireless

    The benefit of having the house wired for CAT6 are:
    - It can go much faster then Wireless - 1 to 10Gb, real world 10 times the speed of WiFi at least. Why would speed be important? Streaming high definition movies from a central computer that stores your movies to your TV sets.

    - Home automation. Huge area - look here to see what you could do: http://smarthomes.ie/ (not recommending them or anything, they just list what can be done)

    You could put it behind skirting but tbh unless you are technically minded and big into home automation I would not bothered. Have my place wired for it and it's handy but would not blow money on it after the house has been plastered.


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    #3
    Stoner
    Moderators, Home & Garden Moderators, Technology & Internet Moderators Posts: 10,952 Mod ✭✭✭✭Stoner


    first of all, Cat 5 is gone, so its Cat 5e or Cat 6 or better.

    I'd go with cat 6 very little in the cost difference. They should all go back to the one place, you should have one from this one place (have power here) out to wherever you internet is coming into the house too.

    Beside the TV is good, as is a central location in the house for a wifi point (have power here too). After that anywhere where computers or TVs are is good. Most TVs are wifi enabled so that central wifi access point is important.


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    #4
    lnos1
    Registered Users Posts: 28 ✭lnos1


    Thanks very much for your replies. I have concrete blocks as internal walls throughout with precast 1st floor. Will this make wifi useless?


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    #5
    Stoner
    Moderators, Home & Garden Moderators, Technology & Internet Moderators Posts: 10,952 Mod ✭✭✭✭Stoner


    lnos1 wrote: »
    Thanks very much for your replies. I have concrete blocks as internal walls throughout with precast 1st floor. Will this make wifi useless?

    not useless, but all the more reason to have a wifi point on each floor. I have a regular house but I had to have a wifi access point in the hall to pick up every room in these house, I also have a lot of concrete in my house.

    If you have a home office, I'd really advise a dedicated wired point.


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    #6
    Sir Arthur Daley
    Closed Accounts Posts: 6,720 ✭✭✭Sir Arthur Daley


    With more and more electronics having wifi surely one can depend less now on wired connections.


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    #7
    Stoner
    Moderators, Home & Garden Moderators, Technology & Internet Moderators Posts: 10,952 Mod ✭✭✭✭Stoner


    well i depends.


    For streaming HD movies from my central storage I can just about get a 720p HD movie over wifi, note that everyone usually shares a Wifi channel, there might be two, but usually there is only one cannel, and one slow connected device can bring it all down to a slow speed.

    I operate two channels in my house so that slow devices and be on the same channel and faster devices on the the other.

    all that said the PC I'm on now has a dedicate connection to my server that is considerably faster than my wifi connection, If i want to download something quickly wired is the way to go.

    Big things down the road with wireless AC http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IEEE_802.11ac

    this will help catch up on a wired cable

    So correct wireless is getting better, but i doubt many people have a wireless ac enabled router or device. Wired keeps getting better too.

    So at the very least get some cables into the wireless access points.


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    #8
    chrismon
    Registered Users Posts: 1,115 ✭✭✭chrismon


    lnos1 wrote: »
    Thanks very much for your replies. I have concrete blocks as internal walls throughout with precast 1st floor. Will this make wifi useless?

    It won't make it useless but it will mams it harder for the wireless signal to be sent around the house.
    If you can get a few dedicated points around the house then it is a major advantage.
    Now is the time to do it if decide!


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    #9
    DublinDilbert
    Registered Users Posts: 5,366 ✭✭✭DublinDilbert


    If you have to ask "do I need CAT5/CAT6", then you probably don't need it. If your place is plastered / painted it will make a fair mess adding it now. Although it may be still possible to add CAT5 to some "special" locations with little effort, but you need to know what you want/where, which i'm guessing your still not sure of.

    A the end of the day if you need a wired ethernet link in your house for streaming data or printers, you can just use a couple of home plugs that will send the data over the power wiring.


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    #10
    jester77
    Registered Users Posts: 11,262 ✭✭✭✭jester77


    It would probably be difficult to wire it now, especially getting the wires between floors. What way are your TV connections wired? In my house there is conduit feeding the cables to all the rooms. If this was an option you could feed the CAT cables down the same conduit and you would not have too much work to do to terminate them. I have CAT 7 duplex cables wired around my house, which brings two terminations at each point with just the one cable, this would be easier than trying to get 2 cables down the conduit if it is tight.

    Wifi can be hit and miss and I would not rely on this, especially if you are a gamer or watch HD video content. I would try the home plug solution first before going that route if you have no other option.


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