[mythtv-users] Decisions, decisions

[Joseph A. Caputo]

On Tuesday 23 December 2003 12:48, Carl wrote:
> I just obliterated my house with cat5e, it wasn't that hard!
>
> Home Depot has some structured wiring stuff, although I'm sure you
> could do better. I ran two cables each from my upstairs office to
> four different locations. I didn't bother with a fancy punchdown
> block, just used 6-gang outlets (2) in the office and 2-gang in the
> four rooms. 500' of cable in a nice box that cleanly feeds out cable
> for $35, and a bunch of little terminators/plugs that were a snap to
> wire up. The faceplates and jacks are modular, you you can mix in
> telephone, coax and speaker wires if you want. Standard electrical
> boxes designed for existing construction worked great (little flaps
> flip up behind the drywall and clamp against it as you tighten the
> screws).
>
> Fortunately, I had good access through an existing raceway into the
> garage, all the rooms I needed to wire were reasonably convenient
> from there. The longest run was 60' (the cable was marked with feet
> remaining, so running a loop from the office to a room gave me a full
> measurement just by subtracting the numbers on the wires left
> sticking out).
>
> If I had better access to my attic, I would have run a lot of it up
> that way. You can generally find easy routes from above, and stacks
> that go from basement to attic. Although for all I know, you live on
> the 80th floor of a Manhatten high-rise...
>
> By the way, all of this may be massive violation of building and fire
> code in your location. Best to check with someone wise about such
> things.
>
> The biggest pain was making the 12 patch cables to run between the
> 6-gangers and the 24-port switch, which now doesn't seem all that out
> of place in my home. And, of course, I haven't tested all the
> connections yet, I may yet be ripping wires from the walls...
>
> And a word to the wise, mark *everything* as you go. A Sharpie is
> your best friend. Nothing worse than sitting there looking at two
> wires, wondering which is which. You want to have a marking system
> and use it on the faceplates, so when you go to patch something in
> later, you know which is which. I use 'A' for the top and 'B' for the
> bottom in a 2-gang, and made up a single letter abbreviation for each
> room. That gave every outlet an easily-recognized name ("BA" = top
> outlet in the bedroom).
>
> Also, when I pulled the wire, I would feed a loop through the hole in
> the office wall, and anchor the free end of wire, so I was pulling a
> loop from the box to the destination. It helped me keep track of
> things also (A = anchored, B = box, pulling each would give away
> which was the free one, B).
>
> Sorry this got a little long...
>
> Carl

Thanks for the tips!  I have good attic and basement access, so once 
I've solved the problem of how to get from the attic (or 2nd floor) to 
the basement, I'll be in in good shape.  I've found an air return duct 
that looks like it will do the trick; it has only one 'dog-leg', which 
is close to an opening, so I should be able to run the cable from my 
2nd floor office down to the basement.  What I'll probably end up doing 
is using 2 switches -- one upstairs and one in the basement, and 
connecting them with a single run.  From those two switches I'll devise 
a network layout with the potential for a jack in every room -- either 
up from the basement or dropped from the attic.  I can't wait to get 
started!

Thanks,

Joe