Eircom broadband, longer ethernet cabling?

bobwozhere

At the moment I have the modem that eircom provides set up so that my old computer downstairs is connected to the usb cable. The problem is I have another computer (mac mini) that I currently connect to the short ethernet cable and would like to move it upstairs. I presume I can just get a longer ethernet cable and run it upstairs without any hassle? Would anyone be able to suggest what type of cable I'd need and maybe where I could get one for a reasonable price?

Spear

bobwozhere wrote:

At the moment I have the modem that eircom provides set up so that my old computer downstairs is connected to the usb cable. The problem is I have another computer (mac mini) that I currently connect to the short ethernet cable and would like to move it upstairs. I presume I can just get a longer ethernet cable and run it upstairs without any hassle? Would anyone be able to suggest what type of cable I'd need and maybe where I could get one for a reasonable price?

A normal ethernet cable is cat 5 or 5e UTP(unshielded twisted pair) and can be up to 90 metres in length before a repeater is needed. The usual suspects i.e. Peats, Maplins, ITDirect etc. should have plenty to hand.

paulm17781

100m

Chalk

galwaydude sells it on the for sale forums.

much cheaper than peats/maplins aswell.

Berger

Woooah this is weird I was just about to post a similar thread! I need a much longer purple wire as my PC is miles away from the main phone socket thing as well as a longer ethernet cable. Do I have to ring up eircom about the purple one or can you buy really long ones in the shop? The thought of talking to their customer support is daunting.

Chalk

you can just buy a longer one in any diy/electerical shop,
its just a regular phone cable.

jonski

Chalk wrote:

you can just buy a longer one in any diy/electerical shop,
its just a regular phone cable.

Nope

He doesn't want to move the modem , he wants to connect another pc to it that resides up stairs , I am presuming one connects via usb the other via ethernet . As has been posted earlier Galwaydude sells them on the "for sale" forum and most people seem happy with them .

Sponge Bob

Berger wrote:

my PC is miles away from the main phone socket thing as well as a longer ethernet cable. .

Extend the Phone line to near the computer, not the Ethernet to near the phone.

1. Use 2 pair phone cable , simple to terminate , 10c metre electrical wholesalers
2. Ethernet cable 4 pair, complex to terminate with pair twists etc , 40c metre.
3. Ethernet works stably to 100M , DSL works stably (in Ireland) to 4500M , which is more extendable then ?
4. Easier to run phone cable on your own drilling and banging and going round with cable tacks , ethernet cable is bigger and uglier .

jonski

jonski wrote:

Nope

He doesn't want to move the modem , he wants to connect another pc to it that resides up stairs , I am presuming one connects via usb the other via ethernet . As has been posted earlier Galwaydude sells them on the "for sale" forum and most people seem happy with them .

Had i actually read the post above yours i would have seen that you were referring to him and not the original poster , my bad .

bobwozhere

thanks for the info, will contact galwaydude to get some.

paulm17781

paulm17781 wrote:

100m

Splitting hairs :rolleyes:

Its usually certified to go that distance but in practice you may get a good bit further.

We replaced broken fibre in work with a roughly 130 meter cat5 cable and it worked fine. Your milage may vary.

nutzboutstuff

if terminated properly and not run near any heavy machinery is tested up to 315 meters, thats where the standard states the maximum distance is reached, and unless you buy from wholesalers of network equipment its hard to find rolls of network cable longer than that... Knowing eircom i'd run the Cat5e instead of phone cable! or cat5e as phone cable, which eircom will actually do with their PRA's and FRA's...

juliuspret

The max length depends on the speed you want to get.

100Mbit - 100metres is max recommended length.
10Mbit - 300metres is max recommended length.

Though the above figures can be played around with a little as they were originally in imperial measurement(U.S. engineers).
You could potentailly increase the lengths by 30%...but data loss may occur if the crimping was a bit shoddy.

MrPudding

juliuspret wrote:

The max length depends on the speed you want to get.

100Mbit - 100metres is max recommended length.
10Mbit - 300metres is max recommended length.

Though the above figures can be played around with a little as they were originally in imperial measurement(U.S. engineers).
You could potentailly increase the lengths by 30%...but data loss may occur if the crimping was a bit shoddy.

To be pedantic, it is a 100m link length or a 90m channel. The link should comprise of a maximum of 10m of stranded or patch cable. So it should be 90m of solid cable and any combination of lengths of patch leads at each end as long as the total length doesn't exceed 10m. Of course this is only really an issue if you want to be in compliance with IEEE & be able to certify you cable as CAT5 or CAT5e compliant, unlikely in this case. TBH you can, as ronoc has done, go quite a bit further than 100 meters and will probably not have much trouble at all.

OP, Is there no way you can go wireless?

MrP

juliuspret

So it should be 90m of solid cable and any combination of lengths of patch leads at each end as long as the total length doesn't exceed 10m

I find what you have posted above difficult to follow MrPudding.

AdMMM

I think some of you have made this thread a bit over complicated!