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OT:. Mesh network or run a bunch of Cat6?

SeaOfRed75

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Dec 5, 2010
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In the process of finishing basement. So have access to floor joists and can see where most of the power cables are running up into the wall voids. So I could run a bunch of network cable to the spots I need them and add a low voltage single gang box to the existing box. Would need to buy a new switch (probably 16 port). And all the cable to run probably two lines to each room.

Or I just get a mesh router with maybe 3 units? I know not as fast and likely more expensive. But a hell of a lot easier.

Thoughts from the tech crowd?
 
In the process of finishing basement. So have access to floor joists and can see where most of the power cables are running up into the wall voids. So I could run a bunch of network cable to the spots I need them and add a low voltage single gang box to the existing box. Would need to buy a new switch (probably 16 port). And all the cable to run probably two lines to each room.

Or I just get a mesh router with maybe 3 units? I know not as fast and likely more expensive. But a hell of a lot easier.

Thoughts from the tech crowd?

My thoughts. Wired is always preferred. It's more reliable. It's more secure. If you have everything torn up, you may as well run the cabling now. But I'd also recommend a good wireless network. Wired for your TV, desktop computers. Wireless for tablets, smartphones and laptops. So, invest in it now.
 
My thoughts. Wired is always preferred. It's more reliable. It's more secure. If you have everything torn up, you may as well run the cabling now. But I'd also recommend a good wireless network. Wired for your TV, desktop computers. Wireless for tablets, smartphones and laptops. So, invest in it now.
Yeah I know it's preferred. Just trying to talk myself out of running all that damn cable. Lol.
 
you could try some power line adapters.. running through the existing electric lines in your house.. I've had good luck with mine and enough bandwidth for video.
 
Yeah I know it's preferred. Just trying to talk myself out of running all that damn cable. Lol.

Don't talk yourself out of it. Do it right the first time. You asked for an opinion. You got it. I've had Cat6 cabling for over 15 years. I've got a great router with great throughput, but wireless can be flakey at times. I also have WiFi calling enabled. Plus, if you are going with any streaming services, do you really want your show to be buffering when the wireless starts intermittently having connectivity issues?
 
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In the process of finishing basement. So have access to floor joists and can see where most of the power cables are running up into the wall voids. So I could run a bunch of network cable to the spots I need them and add a low voltage single gang box to the existing box. Would need to buy a new switch (probably 16 port). And all the cable to run probably two lines to each room.

Or I just get a mesh router with maybe 3 units? I know not as fast and likely more expensive. But a hell of a lot easier.

Thoughts from the tech crowd?

If you're doing it youself and are going to punch down your own terminations, just go with cat 5e. Cat 6 is better but unless you're experienced in putting the jacks together its a pain and you lose a lot of the gains in speed for the cost. I'm sure that will set off the techies here, but for a home user/installer you're not going to get max speed anyway.
 
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If you're doing it youself and are going to punch down your own terminations, just go with cat 5e. Cat 6 is better but unless you're experienced in putting the jacks together its a pain and you lose a lot of the gains in speed for the cost. I'm sure that will set off the techies here, but for a home user/installer you're not going to get max speed anyway.
Nah, I think I would just buy premaid lengths that are long enough. Run them through the low voltage add on box. Have some brush inserts for cover to keep cable from sliding back in wall. Really don't think I'd want to put together jacks myself. Never done it before.
 
My thoughts. Wired is always preferred. It's more reliable. It's more secure. If you have everything torn up, you may as well run the cabling now. But I'd also recommend a good wireless network. Wired for your TV, desktop computers. Wireless for tablets, smartphones and laptops. So, invest in it now.
Couldnt agree more. Most of the time it isnt noticable, but wifi is just never as stable as wired.
 
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I ran Cat6 into every room of my house, and I also have a Nest WiFi mesh system as well.

Do it right the first time and go with both.
 
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We're usually streaming on 1-2 TV's, two PS4's running and surfing the net on 2-3 devices all at the same time and I never have buffering issues with our Deco mesh system. Never really thought about it, it just works.
 
If it were me in my current sitation, I'd just do the mesh. However, that's because we don't put the kind of demand on the system to justify more than that. We don't even have mesh currently, just our router and a range extender to get us some signal to the patio.

However, our basement is unfinished so if I really wanted to I could run them whenever I wanted if I needed to, so that probably affects my thought process
 
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Mesh. Everything is going wireless. Spend a little money on a good Wireless Mesh. I installed the Netgear Orbi and it's the best thing we ever did. Our house has Ethernet everywhere and we use one line for a desktop gaming computer. Don't waste your time or money on cable.
 
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In the process of finishing basement. So have access to floor joists and can see where most of the power cables are running up into the wall voids. So I could run a bunch of network cable to the spots I need them and add a low voltage single gang box to the existing box. Would need to buy a new switch (probably 16 port). And all the cable to run probably two lines to each room.

Or I just get a mesh router with maybe 3 units? I know not as fast and likely more expensive. But a hell of a lot easier.

Thoughts from the tech crowd?

Why would you need to run a line to each room?

Most devices are going to connect wirelessly, just run wires to where you want your access point.

You may not even need a switch depending on how many routers you have around. You could just link each router.
 
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I would run the wire. Much more reliable and It’s not that hard. You can run not just internet but video and sound through it as well. I own an electronics installation company in Omaha if you want some help or pointers just PM me.
 
It kind of depends on what you want to use it for. If it's mostly just streaming or surfing the internet, wireless is probably just fine. As long as you have a good router, they are plenty reliable enough to not have any issues.

The biggest issue wireless introduces is greater latency, which really only matters in certain applications, like gaming and a few other special use cases. For general video streaming and internet surfing, what most people use their internet for, the extra latency won't be noticable or an issue. I actually do my PC gaming wirelessly, because I don't have a good way to run ethernet to where my computer is located, and my latency is well within acceptable amounts, though having a fast fiber connection helps there.

Speed also decreases the further you get from an access point, although unless you have a truly massive house, a mesh network should keep you close enough to a given access point to keep speeds good.

If it were me, I would still run wire to each room, just because I would like the flexibility to move things around to where I need them, and while wireless is generally plenty reliable, wired is always going to be more reliable, as long as its done properly.

If you do a mesh network, one thing I would do at the very least is run ethernet cables to the rooms you plan on putting your access points in. The way mesh systems work is there is a main router connected to the modem, and the other bits are nodes of the mesh system. Any node has to communicate to the main router, which in turn communicates with the modem.

This is where reduced speed on mesh systems is introduced into the equation, if you have the nodes connected to the main router wirelessly. On a dual band router, if connected wirelessly, one of the bands is dedicated to "backhaul", basically communicating all the information back and forth to the main router. Because of this, this band basically has its speed halved for any devices connected to that band, because it has to spend half its time and bandwidth communiating with the main router, and half the time communicating with the device.

There are two ways to deal with this problem. One is to get a mesh system that has tri-band (one 2.4Ghz and two 5Ghz). Tri-band systems can dedicate one of the bands to backhaul, meaning the other two bands are freed up to solely communicate with devices connected to the router. The other, and I would say better and more reliable way, is to use ethernet backhaul. As long as the mesh system allows it (and I believe most do), you can connect the nodes to the main router by ethernet cable, leaving the communcation between node and router to be done over ethernet; and freeing up the wireless to solely communicate to connected devices.
 
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When we had our house built years ago, I went in and ran wires myself to each room, glad I did. Also when I finished my basement, due to some ductwork I needed to lower the ceiling in an area next to the stairs so I went ahead and carried that lowered area across the length of the basemant as a soffit with drop in panels. The rest of the ceiling is drywall, so it is nice to have access to the soffit/chase where most of the ducts, wiring and piping is located. Widened out the lowered area above the location of our wet bar for a nice look.
 
you all know x86 is going away fairly soon, and everything is moving to 5g too..

I can't believe anyone would invest so much in a wired network for 'home' use in 2020.

I can see running a dedicated power line from the modem to a TV, so you don't saturate your wifi with video going multiple directions, but running network cable is like Windows 95 days as far as I'm concerned.
 
you all know x86 is going away fairly soon, and everything is moving to 5g too..

I can't believe anyone would invest so much in a wired network for 'home' use in 2020.

I can see running a dedicated power line from the modem to a TV, so you don't saturate your wifi with video going multiple directions, but running network cable is like Windows 95 days as far as I'm concerned.

Depends on what you do with it. I mean, I'm an enthusiast in this area so I'll have both, but my general philosophy is that endpoints that I can get off wifi easily, I'll take off wifi.

My Xbox doesn't roam around the house, so I wire it. Frankly I have an 8 port switch behind my tv, and everything on that tv stand is wired to it. (Xbox, nintendo, roku etc).

That's just a whole bunch of data that's not riding on my wifi, which I keep the laptops/ipads/phones on.

Granted everything would work pretty well with it all on my two access points, but there are some noticeable differences to us. Buffering on any sort of high res streaming video will take a bit longer, wired its basically instantaneous. If I want to back up the gigs and gigs of data that comes off the phones or laptops to the file server, its way easier to use the extra wired port I left than just let the laptop run overnight with the lid open because wifi is isn't as fast.

Just depends like anything else. Some dudes don't care about cars and drive a Civic and other dudes have to have a Corvette.
 
I work with a bunch of uber nerds and most of them are egging me on to go to a 10Gig infrastructure at home. I'm not there yet :)

I do have a fair bit of processing power stashed in my basement tho for homelab and a mini-cloud.
 
Not sure if its still in the pipe but one reason to run cable is the potential aggregation of functions. One of the big consumer electronic giants a while back had a demo where they ran power, network, and audio/video stream through one cat6 cable into the back of the tv. Combining all those functions into one small cable would be nice.
 
I work with a bunch of uber nerds and most of them are egging me on to go to a 10Gig infrastructure at home. I'm not there yet :)

I do have a fair bit of processing power stashed in my basement tho for homelab and a mini-cloud.
I have seen some stuff about 10Gig but it's pretty expensive still isn't it?

My setup is kind of like yours mentioned above. In my basement I have a wireless router with 8 ethernet ports on it, I believe all ports are filled, maybe one left. I have my TV, PS4 Pro, home theater receiver, Chromecast Ultra, and a few other devices wired to it. I have ASUS routers with an AIMesh wireless setup, not something I would necessarily recommend unless you are willing to do some work, took me a bit to get everything working stable. My second router (node) is connected by Ethernet to the main router and is on the main floor of the house.

Speeds are really good. One of the main reasons I decided to add a second router is the upstairs bedroom had pretty good speeds, but saw occasional drops in stream quality and even occassional buffering, so I decided to put a second router on the main floor to give better signal strength. Since doing so, and ironing out the kinks, I have almost no issues with stream quality, though it helps having 500/500 fiber internet. I could have just done a range extender, and sometimes wish I would have, but since I've ironed out the kinks, it's mostly excellent, though an issue or two pops every once in a while, but not enough for me to change anything.
 
I have seen some stuff about 10Gig but it's pretty expensive still isn't it?

My setup is kind of like yours mentioned above. In my basement I have a wireless router with 8 ethernet ports on it, I believe all ports are filled, maybe one left. I have my TV, PS4 Pro, home theater receiver, Chromecast Ultra, and a few other devices wired to it. I have ASUS routers with an AIMesh wireless setup, not something I would necessarily recommend unless you are willing to do some work, took me a bit to get everything working stable. My second router (node) is connected by Ethernet to the main router and is on the main floor of the house.

Speeds are really good. One of the main reasons I decided to add a second router is the upstairs bedroom had pretty good speeds, but saw occasional drops in stream quality and even occassional buffering, so I decided to put a second router on the main floor to give better signal strength. Since doing so, and ironing out the kinks, I have almost no issues with stream quality, though it helps having 500/500 fiber internet. I could have just done a range extender, and sometimes wish I would have, but since I've ironed out the kinks, it's mostly excellent, though an issue or two pops every once in a while, but not enough for me to change anything.

Yah 10G is still expensive. And it would really only matter internally to the house, I have 1gig internet service, but 10G is not on offer for consumer yet. I do have terabytes of data I move around on occasion, but its not worth it to me yet to lay down the money to convert my big iron to faster network cards. My servers run 24x7 so its not a big deal to me if it takes 2 hours for them to transfer something vice an hour or whatever.

My wife mostly lives in the Apple ecosystem, but she's a "creative", ie seamstress/fashion design. Unless I'm playing games, pretty much everything I do is a flavor of the Unix world, BSD, Linux, Solaris etc. My laptop is a couple years old Apple, but I basically use the Terminal on it and Firefox. I just ssh into all my servers and VMs. I have three VLANs on my network, which is also overkill for home, but I just wanted to jack around with it.
 
you all know x86 is going away fairly soon, and everything is moving to 5g too..

I can't believe anyone would invest so much in a wired network for 'home' use in 2020.

I can see running a dedicated power line from the modem to a TV, so you don't saturate your wifi with video going multiple directions, but running network cable is like Windows 95 days as far as I'm concerned.

Where is x86 going? Unless of course you mean it's already gone and replaced by amd64 which is backwards compatible with x86.

As for wireless, it's just hard to go all-in on it after being conditioned for so many years that it is slower, less secure, and less reliable. I'd say run a few cables to the places you find yourself working the most under conditions that necessitate those factors.
 
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Where is x86 going? Unless of course you mean it's already gone and replaced by amd64 which is backwards compatible with x86.

As for wireless, it's just hard to go all-in on it after being conditioned for so many years that it is slower, less secure, and less reliable. I'd say run a few cables to the places you find yourself working the most under conditions that necessitate those factors.

I believe he's getting at ARM.
 
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Where is x86 going? Unless of course you mean it's already gone and replaced by amd64 which is backwards compatible with x86.
I believe he's getting at ARM.
Correct. But even more specifically, Risc-V chips, which can be modified (like Apple's proprietary arm based A series chips) are soon going to be powering cells phones, devices, wireless routers, computers, and eventually servers too.. Apple is shipping something before the end of the year, but I expect others to show up this fall in the rush to be first to 5G.
 
When I finish my basement, Im going to run Cat5 for the media stuff. We run wireless for most of the stuff, I just want the reliability and speed that wired produces.
 
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It's 2020 brah, go wireless and never look back. And for the guy asking about Kratom in the other thread, DON'T do it man. Drive up to Colorado, where they have more personal liberty, and get the good stuff. Any other questions Husker faithful? I got answers.
 
So wireless is fine for most, but understand it is a shared medium, your neighbors signal can interfere and slow you down, an excess number of devices can slow you down also as the radio in your access point gives equal airtime to all clients. If you have more than 15 wireless clients most consumer gear is going to reach the limit of performance and you start to see latency (buffering and slowdowns).

If you have the ability to wire some systems in, it can help improve things overall as you grow.
 
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I second running Cat 5e and terminating it yourself, you'll pay through the nose for premade Cat 6 wire in the lengths you'll need to cable the whole house. It'll also be more annoying to fish with the end capped. You won't be able to buy enough speed to exceed what Cat 5e can do anyhow.

I bought a big box of Cat 5e and a crimping tool off Amazon several years ago and it's one of the best purchases I ever made. I've had it at least 5 years and still have tons of it left.

I have cabled most of what I care about with Cat 5e and it's just so much more worry-free than WiFi it isn't even funny. I only have 100 Mb/s switches and I don't pay for super fast bandwidth so it isn't a speed thing, it's that the device just freaking works when it's hardwired.

Latest example, I got a new Dell Vostro laptop from work, it's all the latest and greatest stuff in it. Except for reasons nobody can explain, I'm getting like 0.26 Mbps speed over WiFi on it when I should be getting 90-100 in my house. And they've eliminated the ethernet port on this version so I have to plug into this Dell docking station and they're notorious POS's.

Long story short there was some kind of hidden problem in a Windows 10 update that screwed up data handling over WiFi. It is only the latest device to perform strangely over WiFi but far from the first. I bought a ethernet-to-USB3 adapter for it for use in a pinch.

My PS3 used to drive me insane on WiFi, it would constantly lose the connection. I have had zero problems since plugging a Cat 5e cable into it. Likewise all my other gaming systems. Our smart TV same thing, fussy and slow over wifi, I plug it in and it's a champ at streaming HD content.

Plus the more access points and intermediate devices you have to form this mesh network, the more you get to do the dance of turning them on in the just-right order when you get a blink in the power or your ISP goes out for a couple hours.

Run the cable and don't look back. WiFi routers and bridges are so fussy and vary so wildly in quality that you'll probably save money in the long run plus you'll save hours of confusion and frustration trying to figure out why you're on on access point instead of another, why does your speed suck, why does this device say "Connected, no internet," etc.

I got a Netgear Nighthawk for WiFi-only devices like phones and tablets that covers pretty much my whole house and I've been very happy with it. It gets fussy once in a great while but overall it has been fast and reliable.
 
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Correct. But even more specifically, Risc-V chips, which can be modified (like Apple's proprietary arm based A series chips) are soon going to be powering cells phones, devices, wireless routers, computers, and eventually servers too.. Apple is shipping something before the end of the year, but I expect others to show up this fall in the rush to be first to 5G.

They have been touting RISC for the past 40 years. For the same reason people still use FORTRAN and COBOL programming languages, you will see amd64/x86 continue to be used for many decades to come.
 
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ARM not replacing amd64 anytime soon.
that is why apple is ditching it starting this year, and completing it by the end of 2021...

They have been touting RISC for the past 40 years. For the same reason people still use FORTRAN and COBOL programming languages, you will see amd64/x86 continue to be used for many decades to come.
you also realize Intel hasn't done anything of value to x86 for over a decade now..

x86 is going to be uglier than my underwear come 2024.. but hey, I understand if you own Intel stock.

Last call for Fortran and Cobol programmers... (very few of these left)
 
that is why apple is ditching it starting this year, and completing it by the end of 2021...


you also realize Intel hasn't done anything of value to x86 for over a decade now..

x86 is going to be uglier than my underwear come 2024.. but hey, I understand if you own Intel stock.

I would not touch Intel stock with a 50 foot pole right now. It has nothing to do with my preferences and everything to do with inertia and compatibility.
 
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that is why apple is ditching it starting this year, and completing it by the end of 2021...


you also realize Intel hasn't done anything of value to x86 for over a decade now..

x86 is going to be uglier than my underwear come 2024.. but hey, I understand if you own Intel stock.

Last call for Fortran and Cobol programmers... (very few of these left)

Very few left, but when you understand why they are left you will see where I am coming from.
 
I second running Cat 5e and terminating it yourself, you'll pay through the nose for premade Cat 6 wire in the lengths you'll need to cable the whole house. It'll also be more annoying to fish with the end capped. You won't be able to buy enough speed to exceed what Cat 5e can do anyhow.

I bought a big box of Cat 5e and a crimping tool off Amazon several years ago and it's one of the best purchases I ever made. I've had it at least 5 years and still have tons of it left.

I have cabled most of what I care about with Cat 5e and it's just so much more worry-free than WiFi it isn't even funny. I only have 100 Mb/s switches and I don't pay for super fast bandwidth so it isn't a speed thing, it's that the device just freaking works when it's hardwired.

Latest example, I got a new Dell Vostro laptop from work, it's all the latest and greatest stuff in it. Except for reasons nobody can explain, I'm getting like 0.26 Mbps speed over WiFi on it when I should be getting 90-100 in my house. And they've eliminated the ethernet port on this version so I have to plug into this Dell docking station and they're notorious POS's.

Long story short there was some kind of hidden problem in a Windows 10 update that screwed up data handling over WiFi. It is only the latest device to perform strangely over WiFi but far from the first. I bought a ethernet-to-USB3 adapter for it for use in a pinch.

My PS3 used to drive me insane on WiFi, it would constantly lose the connection. I have had zero problems since plugging a Cat 5e cable into it. Likewise all my other gaming systems. Our smart TV same thing, fussy and slow over wifi, I plug it in and it's a champ at streaming HD content.

Plus the more access points and intermediate devices you have to form this mesh network, the more you get to do the dance of turning them on in the just-right order when you get a blink in the power or your ISP goes out for a couple hours.

Run the cable and don't look back. WiFi routers and bridges are so fussy and vary so wildly in quality that you'll probably save money in the long run plus you'll save hours of confusion and frustration trying to figure out why you're on on access point instead of another, why does your speed suck, why does this device say "Connected, no internet," etc.

I got a Netgear Nighthawk for WiFi-only devices like phones and tablets that covers pretty much my whole house and I've been very happy with it. It gets fussy once in a great while but overall it has been fast and reliable.

You don't even need a punchdown tool with some of the 5e keystones now. I'd have to look but I think P&S just need a pair of channel locks to close the cover and it punches down on its own.
 
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