Cable question (home network)

[Imbrium]

I'm trying to figure out how to set up the modem/computers in our apartment. Trouble is, the cheap jerks only bothered putting one cable jack per apartment - it's on the far side of the living room, about as far as it can get from the bedroom where our computers are.

The modem/router our new ISP provided has WIFI... but like any seasoned gamer, I consider "wireless" to be a dirty word - wireless mice, keyboards and internet connections are all sketchy in my book . That leaves me having to span a distance of about 40 feet with cabling of some sort.

I scoured google for info, and while I learned all about the different types of coax and ethernet cables, I was unable to find anything that compared them... so my question is, would it be better to go with a long coax cable and short ethernet cables (ie modem in the bedroom near the computers) or the opposite (ie modem at the cable jack)? [Not taking into account the inconvenience of someone having to get up and go to the other room if the modem needs a reboot.] Or does it not really matter which I use, given the relatively short distance?

 

[code65536]

I had this exact problem. At first, I did a long coax run from the living room to the bedroom because I wanted it for TV as well.

That was a bad idea. Between the splitting and the long run, the signal that the modem was getting was less than ideal and there would be occasional connectivity dropouts.

I ended up keeping the modem at the entry point in the living room and doing a long Ethernet run to the bedroom where the router is.

This turned out to be a great idea when I later ditched cable and went fiber, which uses all Ethernet.

The problem with coax is that the run is from whereever the cable company's box is, and depending on your building, that could potentially be quite a ways away. Ethernet is good for at least 100 meters, and the runs are much shorter since you are starting at the modem and going to the router, instead of starting from some place down the street.

 

[QuietDad]

As a cable installer, the answer is "it depends". If you plan on having TV in the bedroom your modem is going to be in, your going to be running cable anyway. The issue becomes the number AND quality of the splitters in your setup. Your BEST bet is to tell the installer when he gets there you want the modem and TV in a bedroom and a TV in the living room and let the cable company deal with it. If your going to do it yourself, a GOOD two way splitter in the living room, one side going to the TV in the living room, and a two way in the bedroom (one for the TV and one for the modem) SHOULD be OK. Your mileage may vary. You'll probably run into problems adding a third splitter to the chain.

 

[Imbrium]

Code, thanks for sharing your experiences - I was leaning towards running longer ethernet cables, but I wasn't sure... I know coax is shielded/ethernet is not and shielded sounded better in theory but I also read about the evolution of cable types and remembered seeing that coax cable was basically a predecessor to ethernet cables, which made it seem like ethernet would probably be better despite the whole shielded vs unshielded thing.

QuietDad - we don't have a TV right now, which simplifies things a good bit... if we were to add one at some point, though, is the splitter the cable company provides good enough, or should we look into buying a better one?

 

[John Connor]

You want the modem as close to the entry as possible. I ran Ethernet cable that goes about 40' and it's fine.The whole house is wired.

 

[QuietDad]

The cable company supplied splitters are fine. You want to stay away from Radio Shack and Walmart when buying splitters. You want at least a 1GHz splitter. 900MHz usually work as well. If it's a gold colored splitter walk away. When I install an apartment or house, at point of entry, I usually install a two way splitter, one side goes directly to the modem, the other into a two to six way splitter fo the TV's and homerun everything from there. Daisy chaining splitters NEVER ends well in the long run. Since your just hooking up a modem, none of it matters anyway. I would personally run the cable to the bedroom and have the modem router there. Just makes re configuring things easier.

 

[smitbret]

The cable company supplied splitters are fine. You want to stay away from Radio Shack and Walmart when buying splitters. You want at least a 1GHz splitter. 900MHz usually work as well. If it's a gold colored splitter walk away. When I install an apartment or house, at point of entry, I usually install a two way splitter, one side goes directly to the modem, the other into a two to six way splitter fo the TV's and homerun everything from there. Daisy chaining splitters NEVER ends well in the long run. Since your just hooking up a modem, none of it matters anyway. I would personally run the cable to the bedroom and have the modem router there. Just makes re configuring things easier.

QFT.... all of this.