Ethernet line to the office for dummies

I'm on plusnet, dpending which model of router you're using this may help

https://community.plus.net/t5/My-Router/Sagemcom-2704N-as-wired-access-point-switch/td-p/1534314
https://community.plus.net/t5/Tech-Help-Software-Hardware-etc/Quick-Question-Re-2704n-as-access-point/td-p/1272457

I have 2 routers and am using the sagemcom as the AP. if you have the newer technicolor tg582n you don't need the hidden pages

not sure about your device switching to a better signal though unless it loses signal / connectvitity entirely. IME once the device has a signal, it sticks

Cool, I'll have a dig through that lot when I come to sort it.

That's a really good question and I'm not certain of the answer. The ability to swap SSIDs to prefer a stronger signal might be device-dependent?

Certainly it'll do it if you lose connection the previous Wi-Fi completely. On merely a weak signal I'm not sure. One way to find out (-:

perhaps run two cables out to the shed if you can?

I thought the usual advice was run two lots of cable if you can, though even the cheapy TP-Link WAP I had in the kids' playroom had LAN in and LAN out sockets.

If you want two APs on the same network, I can endorse mesh APs for actually doing handover successfully. I've two APs in the house connected by a length of cat5 across the house, and if I walk around the house the devices switch pretty seemlessly. The APs co-operate and kick users off when the strength gets too low.

Slight thread resurrection - we've now moved into our new place, which consists of a main house and a detached annex, the annex is about 20 feet away from the main house, across a stone-cobbled yard. There's no option of getting an ethernet line across there that doesn't involve lifting those cobbles, and that ain't happening.

However, it looks like the previous owners gave some thought to this, as they've got one of these on the back wall of the main house, facing the annex:

https://www.broadbandbuyer.com/products/19211-tp-link-cpe210/#content

I assume they set it up as an AP to provide WiFi to the annex, as there's just the one unit. The cabling (ethernet and power) runs back into the main house to a controller/power unit where the main router lives. Well, will live, we don't actually have broadband yet, it should get turned on tomorrow, and when it does it'll be something like 7mb (for now, we might look at 4G/satellite/other options if needs be).

So, I assume that, as an AP, that unit is pretty 'beefy', and should easily handle providing WiFi to a separate building twenty feet away? The other option is to get a matching one facing it across the yard, setting them us a point-to-point link, and wiring the second unit into a separate router in the annex, but I think that's probably overkill?

Ignore me i re-read your post. Good luck.

@IHN There's only one way to find out, but wifi travels a surprisingly long way without e.g. walls in the way, so it's probably fine.

Yes, wifi without obstructions goes a long way.

On a related note, if you were fitting a ceiling mount PoE WAP how do you terminate the cable? To an RJ45 socket then a short patch cable, or with an RJ45 plug and plug it directly into the WAP?

Why bother with a faceplate?….. just connect straight to the laptop?

A decent punch-down tool for the faceplate is £20 (CK). A decent crimping tool is £40-£90. Personal experience is that less than £20 on a crimping tool is false economy. Mine was good for one crimped end and then the pins on the tool wouldn't make a connection in the plug.

And Cat 6 is the sweet spot for the Cougar-twitch!

Wall cable is solid core and should terminate in a keystone faceplate with a punch down tool.

Patch cables are stranded for flexibility and need crimping.

This is the same as an electrical circuit, solid in walls, stranded flex for connections.

I got a punch tool for £4, crimp for £10 and a tester for £10 and it was so absolutely fine for DIY over about 14 sockets.

I've just run a 35m cable from the BT box in the living room to the office in the garden. Faceplate fitted on wall in office using £2 tool.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/133777166534

The cable came with plugs on both ends but I cut one off as it made getting through holes easier.

Soo much better than before.

A decent punch-down tool for the faceplate is £20 (CK). A decent crimping tool is £40-£90. Personal experience is that less than £20 on a crimping tool is false economy. Mine was good for one crimped end and then the pins on the tool wouldn’t make a connection in the plug.

And Cat 6 is the sweet spot for the Cougar-twitch!

If you weren't using stupid cable you wouldn't to spend stupid money on use-for-one-job tools. 😁

If I had £110 burning a hole in my pocket I'd buy a £5 punchdown, a £20 crimping tool and spend the rest on a cable / network tester.

Late to the party but I was going to suggest just replacing the power line adaptors.... My 7 year old WiFi one was playing up, so bought a new kit which gives better WiFi range and and connection stability than the old setup ever did.

I bought a 2 pack of the WiFi extenders, as a single extender only just covered the house. This turned out to be overkill as the new ones have much greater range.

Sorry, not much use now!

@Cougar early morning lols

I've never bothered with faceplates. My basic [cheap] crimping tool has been absolutely fine and the recent addition of a £6 network tester has been a revelation!

.... oh, and pass-through RJ45 connectors so you know you've got the right wire in the right place!

have this on my list of jobs next month....saving for future reading

I’ve never bothered with faceplates. My basic [cheap] crimping tool has been absolutely fine

It's different cable. You (should) use solid-core cable for structured cabling (the horizontal runs in the walls) and this is terminated in Krone-style punchdown modules. You (should) use stranded wire for patch cables, terminated with RJ45 plugs.

I dislike passthrough connecters unless you insert the cables then cut with good electricians scissors (CK) then pull back the ends so they stay a 1mm inside the end of the connector. Ive been to many a job where the cable strands have touched each other or worse something inside the unit they have been plugged into. I've had water ingress run down a perrished cable run into a switch but that job was 90% stupid installation practice
A proper tool helps with them.

I dislike passthrough connecters unless you insert the cables then cut with good electricians scissors (CK) then pull back the ends so they stay a 1mm inside the end of the connector.

That's interesting to know. I think I got around that with the Screwfix stuff by buying the connectors and crimping tool from the same manufacturer. Cables cut off flush to the connector end for each one I made up.

Going back to the question of mesh versus basic wifi extenders.

We have rubbish incoming speed so I can't be bothered to spend lots on a mesh. We therefore have a few extenders at key points around house/garden - they are all on the same SSID.

Most phones switch reasonably quickly and work fine (switches after a number of seconds - so not good if you wanted to wander around on a video conference, but fine for youtube, etc).

Windows laptop does not so much and seems to latch on to the old wifi channel, this caught me out. I had to disable wifi in windows, re-enable and it switched to the new stronger signal. Only takes a few seconds, but like I say - caught me out.

That’s interesting to know.

It's not an issue I've come across yet but I do take care when trimming the ends off.

Coming back to the keystone issue, if I was mounting a WAP on a ceiling but wanted the patch cable to run through the ceiling to the keystone rather than having  socket next to the WAP, what part am I looking for?

Coming back to the keystone issue, if I was mounting a WAP on a ceiling but wanted the patch cable to run through the ceiling to the keystone rather than having  socket next to the WAP, what part am I looking for?