Quick question

I am about to run some Cat6 into our garden office as I’m fed up with the wifi strength etc. Question I have is what is the best way to actually get them into the office? Happy to drill through and terminate the cables, but how do I seal the hole properly?

Is there a grommet or adapter that’s made for this type of thing?

I took mine out the kitchen wall, down the wall and into a conduit below the aggregrate. Along the wall on clips and into back of summer house. Sealed both ends up with silicon, easy.

What Nobeer said, plus I used a couple of these in white
SDS drill with a 10mm bit and armoured cat7 cable from kenable
Don’t forget to buy the terminals and a punch down tool

Make sure you include a drip loop.

Just silicone is the easiest way, should be fine (hopefully – that’s what I’ve done 😃)

Perfect – thanks chaps

Make sure you include a drip loop.

presumably that serves no purpose if the cables exit the wall then go straight down?

Bog standard indoor cable has lasted 8 years here.

You could terminate it with an RJ45 faceplate, https://www.amazon.co.uk/MainCore-Faceplate-Ethernet-Network-Available/dp/B07FZ8WKFF/ref=sr_1_9?crid=19U7OP33N419A&dchild=1&keywords=rj45+faceplate+cat6&qid=1610546843&sprefix=rj45+fa%2Caps%2C178&sr=8-9

But to plug the hole once the cable is routed I’d just use whatever sealaent you have laying around, silicone, or expanding foam or whatever.

I just plugged in a pair of tp Link network extenders plugged in at both ends to router and machine.

Across split circuits /through 2 RCD boards and 2 anti surge trailing sockets and still get 10meg at my office….. Which is 40ft from the router at the end of the garden

Only get 12 meg at the router 🙂

Just a question regarding power line adapters. I’m planning a similar build in my garden and understand that a power cable out will have to run to a separate consumer unit in the home. This means that my existing power line network wont work. Is there a fancy pants device that can link up the two consumer units, e.g. maybe something that attaches to the garden office consumer unit rails where I can plug a cat 5/6 cable into in order to extend the power line network to the separate power supply? My Google fu has failed me on this.

My mesh wifi reaches the bottom of the garden but not sure how good it would be.

Mines goes through two consumer units. That’s what I meant by 2 RCD units.

That is its plugged into the house circuits on the house consumer unit at the router

Then at the shed end its plugged into the circuits on the shed consumer unit which is seperate to the house box.

Running a cable will almost always be:

faster speed
more reliable
cheaper

I’d always use a fixed cable unless it’s really really impractical.

Mines goes through two consumer units. That’s what I meant by 2 RCD units.

Just because yours does, it doesn’t mean everyone’s will – for example, we have a small consumer unit in an outbuilding at the end of a spur off the main circuit, but powerline extenders don’t work in the outbuilding – but they do everywhere else in the house.

If I can’t get mine to work like Trail Rat’s then I guess I could just run a 3 pin socket off the main home consumer unit, a second 3 pin socket from the outbuilding consumer unit and link the two with a network cable?

If you’re actually running the network cable then just get a couple of cheap switches surely? Cheaper & better?

Like Trail Rat my powerline adapters work in the summer house that passes through an rcd in the outhouse. Powerlines also work in the caravan that is plugged into a three pin socket then through the caravans own rcd. We cannot however have computers working in the summer house and the caravan at the same time, it is first come first served.

If you’re actually running the network cable then just get a couple of cheap switches surely? Cheaper & better?

Not sure if I’ve got my knickers in a twist. My assumption is that you just can’t connect an outhouse to your current consumer unit, so for an outhouse you need a completely separate consumer unit next to your main home unit. Obviously both fed by the same power cable coming into the house, but the consumer units themselves completely separate? So I’m thinking about connecting a data bridge between the two consumer units in the home – the main home one and the outhouse one.

Appreciate if the outhouse power supply comes from the same home consumer unit then there shouldn’t be an issue with power line adapters.

[awaits Cougar’s cat6 vs cat 5e post]

You could just run an external grade Ethernet cable, just find a convenient route. I built a summer house a year or so ago and have been working in it since March just connecting to a mesh WIFI setup in the main house. I am about 30m from the back of the house. Works fine. I actually ran cable with my power during the installation but the connection is good enough so never terminated it.

[awaits Cougar’s cat6 vs cat 5e post]

I couldn’t be arsed figuring out who was right so just used fibre instead 🤣

[awaits Cougar’s cat6 vs cat 5e post]

Probably incomming, but unless you want gigabit speeds (how many peoples home broadband can privide gigabit uploads and downloads/ ….none,), cat5e (STP) is fine. you probably don’t even need an outdoorsy thicker cable.

Personaly i’d go cat6 STP, just for the hell of it, as the exta cost for the cable is negligable, if you plant it in conduit along a path or flower bed or something you’ll never have to worry about diging it up to upgrade the cable.

I couldn’t be arsed figuring out who was right so just used fibre instead

You’ve got FTTS? (fibre to the shed?) heheh 🙂

Not sure if I’ve got my knickers in a twist. My assumption is that you just can’t connect an outhouse to your current consumer unit, so for an outhouse you need a completely separate consumer unit next to your main home unit. Obviously both fed by the same power cable coming into the house, but the consumer units themselves completely separate? So I’m thinking about connecting a data bridge between the two consumer units in the home – the main home one and the outhouse one.

Mine both downstream of main fuse. But are seperate circuits

The book says it won’t work.

Real world it was easier quicker and cheaper to give it ago. And when it worked it has been reliable and fast enough to allow me to work real time on systems and calls sharing media at the same time.

Probably incomming, but unless you want gigabit speeds (how many peoples home broadband can privide gigabit uploads and downloads/ ….none,), cat5e (STP) is fine. you probably don’t even need an outdoorsy thicker cable.

5e supports Gb anyway up to 100m cable run. But I also wouldn’t bother with any special cable and would run whatever I could get cheap pegged out of the way.

Real world it was easier quicker and cheaper to give it ago. And when it worked it has been reliable and fast enough to allow me to work real time on systems and calls sharing media at the same time.

Assuming the consumer unit in the house has a spare slot, just run a new ring main or even a spur from it’s own breaker switch, job jobbed.

You mean if you find a case where it doesn’t work I assume…. Mines working fine despite the two tp link boxes being on circuits on very seperate csus

My TP link home plugs work fine in the workshop which has it’s own consumer unit. Way cheaper and faster than running cables so worth trying first.

If the OP doesn’t fancy laying cables an outdoor Wifi point to point solution might work – something like this:

https://www.broadbandbuyer.com/products/23819-tp-link-cpe510kit-pnp/

[awaits Cougar’s cat6 vs cat 5e post]

Well, sometimes there’s bigger fish.

SDS drill with a 10mm bit and armoured cat7 cable from kenable

how far is it? a wifi mesh with a unit in a rear window of the house and another in the shed will work at most normal distances, and improve coverage elsewhere, for a whole load less hassle

is cat7 even a thing? maybe in datacenters?

CAT7 isn’t a thing by any sensible metric. CAT6A and CAT8 are both better options (with the caveat alluded to by several posters here already).

I have (some) ethernet in the attic, so just ran a cable from the roof down behind the drain pipe under the patio and down the garden. Terminated in a socket and then a switch and a £30 wifi repeater (in AP mode). Works a treat.

Just checked and it’s Cat 6 that I used (Phew !)

🙈