Building a new house - need network advice

[splat_ed]

As per the title...

We're in the design phase for our new house and I want to make sure that the network side of it works correctly. The wife is not into computers so she doesn't want to put too much money towards this.

Details: (sizes are approximate)
Location: Japan
Overall size = 150m2 (1st floor = 50, 2nd floor = 60, 2 x loft @ 10 each; rest is covered outside areas)
Construction type = post and beam

Networkable equipment (at present) = 1 x TV, PS3, 2 x PCs, Radio

I'm looking into the Ubiquiti range of wifi devices. Would one Uni-Fi be enough to cover the whole house? Where would the best location be (I'm thinking either 2nd floor hallway or 1st loft)? The first loft will actually be used as a cinema room (hopefully!)...

Secondly, I'm trying to decide on the network router / central location. How big of a room/closet would be needed for a small rack, patch panel etc...?

I'll pop the set of rough plans that we've got so far up later.

Thanks

 

[Emulex]

wire up cat6a and worry about the wifi later. in the past 10 years wifi has come a long way and will continue to progress! Folks can run 10gbit over cat5E up to 100 meter so that 10 year old CAT5E is still viable!

 

[nsafreak]

With that size of a house, yes a single Ubiquiti wifi AP should be plenty sufficient. I'm curious why you're putting in a rack though when you have such a small space as is and you're definitely don't have a lot of equipment to network. It should be a pretty simple network setup, plug the AP in an inconspicuous location, hook it into the router (unless you get an AP/router) and be done with it. You might want to hardwire the PCs but those can go directly into the router.

 

[splat_ed]

Mainly thinking about a rack to keep things tidy in the central location. Given that all the cables will terminate there and the wife's lack of computing knowledge, it would be better to give her no reason to poke around there!
There will be extra hardware coming in the future. So I'm aiming for at least one Ethernet connection in every main room.

 

[Red Squirrel]

Depending on what your potential future goals are I would look at having a dedicated network/server room where you can have a 42U rack. Put patch panel on top running cat6 to jacks throughout the house. You can put your switch below it and then any future stuff you can add to the rack. Though if you don't plan on having much in terms of server stuff you could get a small wall mount "rack" that will fit a patch panel and switch nicely and even room for a small UPS. You want to ensure all your network gear is UPS protected. It's nice still having wifi if the power goes out, or having the chance to move your character to a safe spot in a game.

It's always good to think about future expansion though, so a dedicated server room is nice to have, even if it acts as a storage room till you grow it. You don't really need to worry much about cooling. Heck, I get low temp alarms most of the time with my racks being in my uninsulated basement. Still a work in progress.

 

[azazel1024]

wire up cat6a and worry about the wifi later. in the past 10 years wifi has come a long way and will continue to progress! Folks can run 10gbit over cat5E up to 100 meter so that 10 year old CAT5E is still viable!

45 meters is max spec length, but otherwise yes. Frankly I'd wire with Cat6 to save a bunch of money.

If it is initial construction, ask how much it would be. Different countries, but my parents just finished building a house in the US about 2 years ago. IIRC it was around $50 per location wired with Cat6. They did each bedroom, kitchen, living room and office.

For space, look at how large a rack is, that is how much space you need if you want it to house a rack. If you just need/want it to hold a bit of networking equipment, your typical linen closet is plenty to hold a 1u rack mount switch, a NAS/server and a router...though you might need/want to add a little ventilation to the door.

Typically I'd put the networking gear where ever the utilties are going to be housed. They generally don't take up much space, unless you are running a server farm.

I'd agree on the "why worry about a rack". I mean, heck, I've got a server, a couple of 16-port 1u switches, MoCA bridge and network printer stuck in my utility room in the basement on some shelves, but I don't really need a rack. If I were to "clean it up" with one, I'd probably be using about 7u of space, including the server's ATX case sitting on a rack shelf. From what it sounds like you'll likely need, a small 8 port gigabit switch should be enough to feed the entire house.

 

[Cerb]

Secondly, I'm trying to decide on the network router / central location. How big of a room/closet would be needed for a small rack, patch panel etc...?

A closet, a bit out of the way, but not too far from where service comes in, with air conditioning (closets usually don't get included), would be ideal, IMO, for keeping it out of sight, but not hard to get to. You can get temperature controlled fans for A/C registers, too, to keep good ventilation when the house A/C isn't blowing any air.

But, you'd really not want a rack in a small space. Just have the drops go straight to connectors that go to a switch, and install some kind of common adjustable shelving on the wall(s). If only having networking there, and no servers running, just install a couple shelves near where service comes in, and leave it at that. get a wall plate for the bundle of networking cables, so that looks nice, and you'll be in business. If it's somewhere that the light could be an issue, something partially enclosed would work, or totally enclosed, with added ventilation (you could even get slick, designing the house, and make it a built-in "hidden" cabinet).

Also, a closet would limit powerful components used in there, even with A/C, but servers using more than Atoms could be put elsewhere, with sufficient drops.

 

[joutlaw]

Not sure if it used there, but I would be cautious about using TechShield decking and paneling - http://www.lpcorp.com/techshield/. Basically, you create a faraday cage of house that blocks wireless signals. Kind of ironic when you think about the name.

I have it in my house and get lousy cell coverage inside. I also have issues with Ubiquiti AP signal strength, but I was able to buy another one for the part of the house that has problems.

 

[VirtualLarry]

From what it sounds like you'll likely need, a small 8 port gigabit switch should be enough to feed the entire house.

ProTip: Buy a spare. Nothing beats having spare networking gear to swap in in case of an outage.

 

[Cerb]

ProTip: Buy a spare. Nothing beats having spare networking gear to swap in in case of an outage.

Yup. Right after the last power outage here, which didn't last too long, my room's switch went bye-bye. Not totally, as it would perform well enough to let the DHCP server give out IPs, but no sustained connections would work. Did I have a spare? Of course not. Luckily, Staples had some on the shelf. And, you know Murphy: right as I discovered something was wrong, I got a call to do some support work, that I should have been able to do remotely, were it not for my main PC being practically networkless.

 

[dawza]

I tend to agree on having open shelves for space efficiency and ease of access. I have a 9U rack only because we didn't have a dedicated network closet space previously, and a rack provided centralization and cleaned up/organized the cable mess. It's great, but adjustable shelving would be much more flexible now that we have a proper closet space. Then again, a rack is a convenient excuse for purchasing that 24 port managed switch with mounting ears over the desktop 8-port version...

Full support on having spare gear for the inevitable failures/troubleshooting. Spare power supplies are especially handy, as these tend to be problematic more often than the equipment they drive, in my experience.

 

[Red Squirrel]

And get a UPS! This will prevent equipment failures when the power does go out or brown out. You don't have to go as overkill as mine which lasts 4+ hours but it's nice to at least have 5-10 minute buffer zone to allow you to shut stuff down properly.

 

[kevnich2]

Depending on what your potential future goals are I would look at having a dedicated network/server room where you can have a 42U rack. Put patch panel on top running cat6 to jacks throughout the house. You can put your switch below it and then any future stuff you can add to the rack. Though if you don't plan on having much in terms of server stuff you could get a small wall mount "rack" that will fit a patch panel and switch nicely and even room for a small UPS. You want to ensure all your network gear is UPS protected. It's nice still having wifi if the power goes out, or having the chance to move your character to a safe spot in a game.

It's always good to think about future expansion though, so a dedicated server room is nice to have, even if it acts as a storage room till you grow it. You don't really need to worry much about cooling. Heck, I get low temp alarms most of the time with my racks being in my uninsulated basement. Still a work in progress.

I'm sorry but for a residential house with as few networking devices as was mentioned, you're SERIOUSLY going to recommend a dedicated network room with a 42U full size rack?? OMG. I have 3x as many devices in my home, every room has atleast 2 wired jacks and I'm comfortable having everything wired into a 4u wall mount patch panel with a small 8 port POE switch connecting everything in the MDU with a 24 port switch in my main office. Most of my devices are mobile devices with 2x ubiquiti AC WAP's. This is what I'd recommend going with.

If the walls aren't up, just have 2x cat6 lines run to each room, maybe to an outer wall as outer walls can't really be accessed once drywall is up, inner rooms can be, and have everything come to a central location with a 24 port patch panel. This way you can use each jack as data or phone and can be easily swapped as necessary. A small closet in a loft area would probably be perfect for this.

 

[Red Squirrel]

Future proofing. Might want to add servers in the future for home entertainment, file storage, security PVR, UPSes etc... Since it's new construction may as well take advantage of that and plan things out.