New house, new network

[Paddy]

OK, now that I have my nice new house, do I really want to run cat-5e cable all over the place? Probably not....

I have a detached garage where I intened to keep the server so rather than run a cable from the phone line up to the office (and out to the garage) I am strongly considering setting up a wireless network.

I have:

One server 15M from the phone socket (two brick walls away)
My PC ~10M from the phone socket with only plaster in the way.
The XBOX ~5M from the phone socket with bugger all in the way.

If I set up a network I need to have resonable room for expansion of the network.

[edit]
Posted big explanation, but it made little sense due to the Taittinger. See pic
[/edit]

• Can this be done?
• What sort of transfer speeds can I expect?
• What kit would you recommend?
• Any other misc advice (except regarding my spelling )

[Paddy]

;

.;

[Tjalfe]

I had enough trouble with my wireless network going through the floor from the upstairs bedroom to the livingroom directly below it. a distance of maybe 4 Meters untill I got a directional antenna. The floor is plywood and a sheet of drywall.
If I could in this house, I would pull Cat 5 or better cable around.
The transfer speed on the wireless connection was good enough to steam movies and such from my main computer. I tried playing .VOB ( DVD Rips) files and they played OK when I had a strong signal, but stuttered every so often

[Paddy]

being able to steam video to my XBOX is a must....

[agallag]

If you're streaming video, or doing lots of pr0n transfers, you should probably go to the trouble of pulling the cat5. Wireless is fine for web surfing or the odd infrequent file transfer, but it's kinda painful for copying CD images or streaming high quality vids.

Remember, the 54Mb/s on 802.11g is just the marketing speed. Actual throughput can be half that, or less, depending on day of the week or phase of the moon.

[rylan]

I'm assuming you'd want the network connection to be close to the server? In that case you're wireless switch/router will be there also, and the distance and having to go through a couple walls concerns me about the signal strength. Obviously if you want any half decent speed you'd want to go with 802.11g for 54Mbps wireless.
You might be able to get away with having a wireless switch in the house and run ethernet from the PC and XBox to that, and a directional antenna pointed to the house on the wireless router in connected to the server in the garage.

Am I understanding this correctly, or are you trying to do home network over standard Cat3 phone lines with wireless transmitters at the jacks?

[Helevitia]

You will be so much happier if you run cat5. I'd only use wireless when needed or as an addition ot the wired network.

Dave

[Wombat]

Not only should you pull the wire, but you should consider CAT6.

[rylan]

I thought gigabit over copper was limited to really short runs though?

[Paddy]

I will only be pulling large files from the server infrequently. I dont mind wating an extra minute or so however, I must be able to stream video to my XBOX (I use it as a HTPC)

It will be a PITA to install cable as I can't put it under the floor (the ground floor is concrete).

If I went for the .g standard, what's the worst case senario?

[KvHagedorn]

What really happens when Paddy gets his wireless router..

[Ribbit]

Originally posted by Paddy
If I went for the .g standard, what's the worst case senario?

The worst case scenario is it drops back to 802.11b, at 11Mbps. Which is of course, only the marketing speed for that standard....

Seriously though, I don't think you can expect much more than about 25Mbps from .11g except in really exceptional circumstances. It would be like getting a modem to actually connect at the full 56Kbps.

[Paddy]

LOL at KvH

I guess i'll hard wire the place then.
Is Cat 6 any better than 5e?

Does it really make any difference?

[GNEP]

http://swhowto.com/ should help (although maybe a little more hard-core than you need...)

[Dr Mordrid]

I agree that stringing the CAT5/6 is the way to go, especially since it's also much more secure.

Another issue is that if you're streaming prOn on a wireless and some nearby kid cracks your network & his parents see what's coming down you could end up with unwelcome visitors.

Dr. Mordrid