Want to wire my house with Cat6 - suggestions?

[Geofram]

I've recently put an offer in on a house. My wife and I are moving in to our own place for the first time, out of apartment living. However, I'm presented with a problem. I'm going to need network wiring throughout the house, and the house is not (currently) wired.

Some details- it's 3 floors (counting an unfinished basement) and on the new side - it's about 5 years old. I'd like to install a switch (and rack) in a utility closet in the basement that I would finish off. We have small children, and I don't want them to be able to get to my home server, router, etc - which I plan on putting in a rack down there.

So in essence, I want know - what's the best method going to be of making this dream a reality? I'm looking to ultimately put drops in virtually every room of the house - I have a 24 port switch, and I want to wire it all.

I know that it's possible to wire an existing house, but most things I've read say "wire it while it's being built". I can do it myself (at least, I have in the past helped wire a building for work) but I have no idea how much work it would end up being to do a project of this scope.

I have considered having it professionally done as well, but I don't have any idea how much that would cost.

So what would you guys suggest? Does someone have experience wiring their own (or someone else's) house? How much of a pain was it, and would I be better served just hiring someone to come in and do it? If not, what kind of wiring should I be looking to get? Any suggestions or help would be appreciated.

 

[spidey07]

To do it right it's worth it to have somebody else do it. Depends on how much floor drilling you need to do and if you can fish the wire up to the attic or basement and how difficult that would be. Oh and put two drops to every outlet. Welcome to the forums.

The first floor would be easy because the basement is unfinished. It's getting from the 2nd to the basement that will get tricky. And you should be doing cat6a so you're set for 10 gig ethernet.

Welcome to the forums. I'm sure many others will say sure do it yourself, but that depends on how much you value your time. You can assume 100 bucks an outlet parts/labor/testing/everything. If you pay somebody to do it insist they scan and certify the cable to cat6a specs - that's the real value of having a pro do it because you won't have the equipment to do that.

 

[somethingsketchy]

Going off of what Spidey07 said, if you have (or will have) the floor plans to the entire house, you can try to route some of the cables through any air ducts or alongside any conduit and then exiting to any cut holes that you plan to connect to Ethernet jack.

Of course whetever or not you feel inclined to drill holes into the drywall to route Ethernet cabling, is up to you. I think it would be a good experience (especially since you'll know more about what's behind your walls.

The only obstacle(s) I could see are really bad interior sections of the wall (like if there's a rodent problem inside the walls) or if there's a moisture problem in the basement (where it could cause headaches).

Good luck on the project, and hope it turns out well

 

[Red Squirrel]

While you're doing it consider putting phone jacks and cable TV jacks on the same plate. I'd go with 2 ethernet, 1 phone and 1 cabletv. More for rooms you think may need more in future. You want to avoid having to use a switch in the future in a room, so all distribution is at one single location.

You can get keystone patch panels that way even stuff like phone and cable TV can terminate at the panel.

And document everything you do, number the jacks, etc...

Basement to 2nd floor is fairly easy. Make your hole in the wall (match the height of power outlets for aesthetic purposes) then get a very long drill bit and try to drill straight down, you will eventually get to the basement and see the bit from the basement. Try to guess where the hole will end up before you drill. Get to know your house well before you just start making holes and hope they end up in a certain spot. I find going by power outlets is a good way to know where a wall is. You will see the wire in the basement go right into the ceiling so you know the receptacle upstairs is around there. If you see big nails sticking out then that's probably the wall end. Those are not always 100% but can give you an idea.

For going from basement to 2nd floor, it might be easier to setup a conduit in a corner or something and go straight up to the attic through the 2nd floor. Make sure you seal it properly so you don't get air loss which will cause condensation.

You can also buy plenum rated cable and go through ducts but that stuff aint cheap. You'll be looking in the thousands for a roll of 1000 feet!

If interested here are some pics of when I did my house:

http://gal.redsquirrel.me/?level=album&id=27

Only did 1 room though but same idea for the others. (2nd page gets more into that)

 

[alfa147x]

Why not do the 1st floor yourself and pay for the 2nd floor to be done?

 

[skyking]

I've installed, terminated and tested about 600 drops of data, voice, cable, fiber. It has taken me a while to get comfortable with knowing where everything is and where I can drill and route wires, and where to expect things like fireblocks and insulation, plumbing, electrical.
If you are really confident you can map out walls from floor to floor with diagrams and a tape measure, crawl around your attic without punching through the sheetrock, and terminate it all properly, have at least one if not two helpers available, and are ready to patch anything up that you mess up in the process, then go for it.
That 3rd floor is really a bitch. If you want drops in an outside wall the insulation will be a huge fight. If you want drops that are not in exactly the same stud bay from floor 2 to floor 3, you will be going up, over and down for the stuff in floor 3. It is a lot of pulling to get there, hence the helpers.
Network wiring 'assholes' on you whenever you get a couple of floors away from it. This is a subset of Murphy's Law.

My recommendation would be to wire floor 2 from floor 1, and put 1 or 2 easy drops in floor 3 and count on wireless for the rest. Easy would be a drop on floor 3 that is above a closet on floor 2, so you can make an unobtrusive access plate in both the top and bottom of the closet wall. pull the wire in and put a low voltage bracket in there, and a blank. I'd go that route regardless if I was doing it myself or paying for it.

 

[ICXRa]

You may be able to find a wire chase so to speak in your attic. In ours I found two areas that will work with very little effort, one in a large void that has our flex return for our upstairs unit and for a vent pipe for our water heater and another adjacent to a line set coming from our condenser coil. The first is about the size of a small closet so I could safely run multiple risers and still be a couple feet from anything.. If you can locate something like this for your riser you may be able route your new cable to use the existing top plate penetrations for the third floor.

Aside from that I second skyking's wireless recommendation with fewer drops. I have run cross connections for years in our data center and on the occasion I have to go between floors it's never fun....even in our commercial building with floor penetrations installed for this specific purpose.

 

[Geofram]

Thanks for the suggestions everyone - I've got a hunch that this will be a big pain to try to do myself, especially since I basically would have to bribe some of my friends to help me pull wire.

I think I'll probably end up doing the basement (since it's unfinished anyway) and maybe a couple drops on the 2nd floor, if things go well. I'll then hire someone to do the 3rd floor. Since I intend to be in this house long term, I want it to be done right, and I don't know that the best place for me to get all this experience is by screwing up my own wiring. :/

So what's a normal price to do this kind of thing? $100 a drop?