Wireless network question

Tom · Post by **Tom** » Tue Feb 08, 2011 3:58 pm

This is a bit complicated but I'll try and explain.

We currently have a phone socket in the house into which is plugged our router that also provides our phone line.

In the other house there is a Test socket where the phone line enters the property from the road. If anything is plugged into this socket none of the other phone sockets will work.

We're going to run a new phone line from the Test socket about 50metres up to where the mobile home is going to go. We need to have the main router (Neufbox) in the mobile home with us as the phone has to be plugged into that router. The router has no external antenna so I can't change it for a high gain version.

I've bought a high gain antenna ( http://www.amazon.co.uk/NEWLink-Directi ... 199&sr=8-3 ) which I'm going to plug into our old Netgear router (DG834G v3). This will be plugged in in the main house and will cover the both houses.

Can I plug two different routers into the same phone line and basically have two separate wireless zones from one phone line?

If I can't do this, can both routers be part of the same wireless zone? And will two overlapping signals from two routers interfere with each other?

Hope this is clear enough....

Cheers

Tom

Daveb · Post by **Daveb** » Tue Feb 08, 2011 4:46 pm

You cant run two routers on the one phone line.

Run some Cat5 with your telephone line and use a wireless access point in one place, wireless off your router in the other.

Peter · Post by **Peter** » Tue Feb 08, 2011 4:58 pm

As above, you can use your spare Netgear as a wireless router by plugging the extended Cat 5 into one of the 4 ports.

Before you do that, plug the netgear directly into your computer and reconfigure the LAN settings by turning DHCP server off, give it a fixed IP other than the other gateway (e.g. if the neufbox is 192.168.1.254 then make this box 192.168.1.253) and set the wireless channel to something well away from the channel the neufbox is transmitting on.

This worked for me but someone more IT literate may have a better solution..

HTH

Sanjøy · Post by **Sanjøy** » Wed Feb 09, 2011 12:21 am

Peter wrote:As above, you can use your spare Netgear as a wireless router by plugging the extended Cat 5 into one of the 4 ports.

Before you do that, plug the netgear directly into your computer and reconfigure the LAN settings by turning DHCP server off, give it a fixed IP other than the other gateway (e.g. if the neufbox is 192.168.1.254 then make this box 192.168.1.253) and set the wireless channel to something well away from the channel the neufbox is transmitting on.

This worked for me but someone more IT literate may have a better solution..

HTH

Tom · Post by **Tom** » Tue Mar 29, 2011 3:18 pm

Right, I'm back on this again.

On Thursday we're digging a 50 metre trench for the electricity and water. I also need to bury some phone/internet cable.

Is Cat5 cable the same as phone line cable (the wires inside I mean)? And can I run 50 metres of it, or will there be too much loss/interference?

The plan is to run a phone line up the trench so the telephone/main router can be plugged in in the mobile home. I was then planning on running a Cat5 cable back down to connect to the spare router.

I had a go at changing the settings on the two routers and got myself in a bit of a muddle. Looks like I'm going to have to get someone in

Ferg · Post by **Ferg** » Tue Mar 29, 2011 3:44 pm

Cat5 has 4 twisted pairs (8 wires) and phone cable has 4 untwisted wires. You can run two phone lines over a cat5 cable as a result. If you're going to bury cat5 make sure it's sheathed, ie not directly exposed to the earth. While it would be fine short term, long term it would fail. If you'#re getting a trench dug then make sure you put in redundant lines so if one fails you have backup without digging again. Cable is cheap, diggers I'm sure are less so.
EDIT:
here's an example of sheathed/armoured cable
http://networkvideosystems.co.uk/epages ... cale=en_GB

Sanjøy · Post by **Sanjøy** » Tue Mar 29, 2011 3:49 pm

Leccy cables next to cat5 are where you will get your interference from. Two separate trenches or a trench wide enough to make sure they are not next to each other ?

Tom · Post by **Tom** » Tue Mar 29, 2011 8:05 pm

Sanjoy wrote:Leccy cables next to cat5 are where you will get your interference from. Two separate trenches or a trench wide enough to make sure they are not next to each other ?

Is this true even if I fit the stuff that Ferg recommended? ie armoured, sheathed etc? Trench will be maybe 1 foot wide. Is this wide enough?

vxc · Post by **vxc** » Tue Mar 29, 2011 9:16 pm

cat5 should be fine for upto 80+ meter no signal loss i think....

also...always double up i say, would be sh*t to find that after the finishing touches and the cable turn out to be snagged somewhere....happens....

Tom · Post by **Tom** » Tue Mar 29, 2011 9:44 pm

vxc wrote:cat5 should be fine for upto 80+ meter no signal loss i think....

also...always double up i say, would be sh*t to find that after the finishing touches and the cable turn out to be snagged somewhere....happens....

So can I run the phone up 2 strands, and the ethernet back down 2 other strands? And that leaves me with 2 spare pairs? Or should I be running 2 lengths of this armoured cable?

vxc · Post by **vxc** » Tue Mar 29, 2011 9:54 pm

well, you can use cat 5e cabling to pass normal bt phone signal, just how you wire the ends really... a few adaptors and your sorted.

so if youre original idea is to run 1 cable for phone and 1 for a network, then for fail safe i would run 4 x 50meter runs .... i know this seems over kill if all you really wanted was 2 but, just me being anal..... your 1 foot wide trench should be fine, someone else can probably advise better.

cable is cheapish...you can grab 300meter reels for 60quid i think.... check out http://www.comms-express.com/products/c ... 05mtr-box/

vxc · Post by **vxc** » Tue Mar 29, 2011 9:56 pm

that site you can buy shielded lines and stronger casing ones...

CubanGav · Post by **CubanGav** » Tue Mar 29, 2011 9:56 pm

Run at least 2. Cable is cheap. Time isn't.
You want one for the phone and another full cat5 for the network. I'd have 4 x cat5. Plenty redundancy and spares.
May seem like overkill but do it once, do it right n all that. I'm forever running in extra when cables are full. I understand it's not wall street your trying to run but it'll always be cheaper to drop in extra while the trench is open.

Tom · Post by **Tom** » Tue Mar 29, 2011 10:47 pm

Still looking at cable...

Is armoured cable over-doing it, or is that the sort of stuff you have to use for burying? Can't help feeling that using this stuff is overspeccing it a tad...

All I'm really looking for is a phone line with a return ethernet cable built-in that I can bury. I might have to put it in conduit anyway as in theory all underground cables/pipes get conduit. Leccy gets red conduit, water gets black, and phones get blue - it's 2 inch plastic stuff with a nylon rope supplied that you use for pulling it through.

A*se. Don't know what to do.

Sanjoy, would you mind ditching S for a few days and nipping down here to give me a hand?

robin · Post by **robin** » Tue Mar 29, 2011 11:17 pm

Armour is for direct burial.

Normal cable should work OK in a plastic tube, provided it's a continuous run of tubing or any unions are water tight. Are you using an electrician to do the mains side of it (please say yes!).

If you don't use armoured/shielded mains cable you will get hum on the telephone line if it's lying too close to the mains cable; the longer the parallel run, the more cross talk. So you would need to test 50 meters of it above ground (in the plastic tubes) and see what sort of noise you get, then keep increasing distance between cables until hum goes away or is quiet enough not to care.

It's very common to run telephone and data/ethernet on the same cabling infrastructure so I think you can run telephone up and ethernet back on a single cat 5 cable. If you can afford two cat 5 runs, then you might as well put telephone on one and data on the other leaving plenty of spare pairs for future expansion.

You have my number if you need to talk it through.

Cheers,
Robin

Scottish Elises