New Home Cat5 Wired, No Patch Panel

[viking84]

I'm moving into a new house. It's ~4000 square feet, two stories. I noticed networking jacks in several rooms and my thought was - "fantastic! I can put a wifi access point upstairs and one downstairs and finally have decent whole-house wifi coverage."

I searched for a junction box and in one of the bedrooms I see the labeled cables, but they are just that - cables. There is no patch panel and no switch.

I know that one of the walls was taken out at one point and recently put back in so there is a chance that the cables got snipped in the middle by the previous resident. That would suck.

My question is really what I need to do to set this up.

The way I see it I need connectivity to one room downstairs where the cable modem and router will be and one room upstairs where I plan on putting the additional access point.

Here's what I imagine happening:
Cable Connection->Cable Modem->Downstairs Router with Wifi Port
downstairs router->RJ45 Wall Jack->Junction box Upstairs
Access Point->RJ45 Wall Jack->Junction Box

Junction Box->Punch Cables to Patch Panel
Two Ports on Patch Panel->2 Port Switch

Maybe I get a bigger switch and activate some of the other rooms, but we'll see what prices look like when I get to Fry's.

Is this reasonable? Or am I missing something or misunderstanding networks?

 

[JackMDS]

The are going from the rooms to somewhere.

You have to find the Central somewhere and then you can use a simple tool like this to check and label locations.

http://www.monoprice.com/products/p...=10524&cs_id=1052401&p_id=8138&seq=1&format=2

Only when the above is done you can make decision about the final installation.

 

[viking84]

The cables are labeled - which cable reaches which room.

Is it just a matter of punching it down to a patch panel and adding a switch? Or am I missing a fundamental?

 

[Fardringle]

Are the cable ends in the 'central' closet just bare wires or do they have plugs on them? If they are bare wires, then yes you will need a patch panel. If they have plugs you could just connect them all to a switch (although using a patch panel is usually better).

 

[skyking]

One other option is to use keystone jacks instead of a patch panel at the central location.
In my office, I really could not use the closet, so I opted for (2) 6 gang wall plates and keystones. It is a wiring jungle now because I am a geek, but I could remove all those cables and that room would look "normal", unlike a patch panel hanging on a bedroom wall.

 

[viking84]

Are the cable ends in the 'central' closet just bare wires or do they have plugs on them? If they are bare wires, then yes you will need a patch panel. If they have plugs you could just connect them all to a switch (although using a patch panel is usually better).

Sorry for the long wait... I'm moving.

It's bare wires hanging.

It looks like it's a central panel area for telco, coax, and cat5. There's kind of a blank block in there now with a patch panel for the phone lines which is populated and one for the coax, again populated, and a nice big area for me to add an additional patch panel. It looks like it was all added when the house was new and nobody since then has ever done anything with the cat5 cables. They are hanging down into the panel area, tied in a loop, with a tag on each end labeling where the other end of the cable ends (master bedroom, living room, etc.). It's just bare wires hanging. It seems as if the original owner bought the "network option" from the builder, but never actually used it.

 

[viking84]

One other option is to use keystone jacks instead of a patch panel at the central location.
In my office, I really could not use the closet, so I opted for (2) 6 gang wall plates and keystones. It is a wiring jungle now because I am a geek, but I could remove all those cables and that room would look "normal", unlike a patch panel hanging on a bedroom wall.

It's actually all embedded in a nice little wiring panel thing. It's not enormous, but there's plenty of space to add a big patch panel cleanly (and there's enough extra cable for me to do the punch down out in the open where I can see and then mount it after.

 

[piasabird]

It is possible if someone had cable TV that that connected to a cable modem and then they ran a wire to a switch to set up the network. You really only need one run to the upstairs and you could go through a closet or up to the Attic if you were going to wire up a wireless device on the ceiling or wall.

They may have also had IP Phones. That is another idea.

 

[alkemyst]

The cables are labeled - which cable reaches which room.

Is it just a matter of punching it down to a patch panel and adding a switch? Or am I missing a fundamental?

Yes, that is it. Homebuilders don't even put more than 2 phone lines in most houses unless you request and pay for it (it's common kitchen and master bedroom).

They don't do patch panels nor switches.