[SOLVED] Using existing Landline for ethernet networking

[EddyzHalp]

Hoi!
So i've been looking into replacing our existing Landline network throughout the house with an internet network as we do suffer from speed drops from wi-fi, and I've seen people who have converted their existing Landline network into an ethernet network. I've noticed a lot of people talking about the different types of cabling and whether or not it would be worth it, so how do I tell what kind of cabling is what? I'm not sure if the cabling in the wall is sufficient enough for a decent signal.
The cables don't come out enough to see if there is any markings on the cabling, so I can't really tell
They seem to have the same cable layout as ethernet, so?

 

[kanewolf]

Hoi!
So i've been looking into replacing our existing Landline network throughout the house with an internet network as we do suffer from speed drops from wi-fi, and I've seen people who have converted their existing Landline network into an ethernet network. I've noticed a lot of people talking about the different types of cabling and whether or not it would be worth it, so how do I tell what kind of cabling is what? I'm not sure if the cabling in the wall is sufficient enough for a decent signal.
The cables don't come out enough to see if there is any markings on the cabling, so I can't really tell
They seem to have the same cable layout as ethernet, so?

Unless the cables all come to a common point, they can't easily be used for ethernet. Many times phone cabling is run in a daisy-chain manner rather than home-run to a common point.
So the first thing is to determine how your cabling is run.
Next question would be, how many wires are in the cabling? 4, 6 or 8 ?
When you can answer that there are 8 cables and they all go to a common point, THEN your cabling can be converted from phone to ethernet.

 

[SamirD]

Actually, you still can use wiring that does not go to a single point, but it requires opening the box and disconnecting the wires from each other and creating two jacks. Instead of all the wires running to a single point, you will have runs between rooms with one of them returning back to your Internet source. You might have to add switches in each room for everything in the house to be wired, but you still can make this work.

The critical thing is the number of wires--if you don't have 8, you are limited to vdsl ethernet extenders, which when priced out against moca and powerline, cost more and aren't as fast.

 

[EddyzHalp]

@kanewolf Thanks for the quick response! Would a common point be a box where all the cables lead into? Also, there are 2 cables that connect to the existing telephone network per socket, each cable has 8 wires in it

 

[EddyzHalp]

@SamirD I think that would be a good solution if so, yes
Thanks for the tips! I guess I should find out how the wires are all connected now

 

[SamirD]

Also, there are 2 cables that connect to the existing telephone network per socket, each cable has 8 wires in it

This is interesting...

Telephone can be run over ethernet too since it just uses the first pair. It sounds like you have wiring that may already be ethernet.

 

[SamirD]

@SamirD I think that would be a good solution if so, yes
Thanks for the tips! I guess I should find out how the wires are all connected now

Yep, but from your answers above, it sounds like you may already have everything wired to one spot and the wiring to the wall jacks may already be terminated for ethernet. This would be awesome as you'd basically just have to disconnect the telephone lines at the central location and just put an ethernet switch there.

 

[kanewolf]

@kanewolf Thanks for the quick response! Would a common point be a box where all the cables lead into? Also, there are 2 cables that connect to the existing telephone network per socket, each cable has 8 wires in it

To help you more, some pictures would be beneficial.
Here is the how-to on posting pictures -- https://forums.tomshardware.com/threads/how-to-post-images-in-tomshardware-guide.1845556/

 

[gggplaya]

How old is your house, some newer houses the builders started using cat5 cable because it's the same price as phone cable and you can buy really long spools at home depot. To check, you need to open up one of your wall jacks and if it's ethernet, you can see it written on the jacket of the cable.
Do you have TV coax to each room of the house, this is more common even in old homes? If so, you can utilize MOCA adapters with the existing coax outlets. You'll need to install a MOCA adapter at your main router, then one in each room you wish to use ethernet. The latest MOCA adapters are capable of 2.5gbe, and actually have 2.5gbe ports on them. They're fast!

 

[EddyzHalp]

How old is your house, some newer houses the builders started using cat5 cable because it's the same price as phone cable and you can buy really long spools at home depot. To check, you need to open up one of your wall jacks and if it's ethernet, you can see it written on the jacket of the cable.
Do you have TV coax to each room of the house, this is more common even in old homes? If so, you can utilize MOCA adapters with the existing coax outlets. You'll need to install a MOCA adapter at your main router, then one in each room you wish to use ethernet. The latest MOCA adapters are capable of 2.5gbe, and actually have 2.5gbe ports on them. They're fast!

I believe our house was built around 2008, and no we only have those in the living room which sucks, but I guess it's back to option one

 

[EddyzHalp]

To help you more, some pictures would be beneficial.
Here is the how-to on posting pictures -- https://forums.tomshardware.com/threads/how-to-post-images-in-tomshardware-guide.1845556/

Alright, yeah I'll upload some pictures
I assume you wanna see behind the telephone socket? And the telephone box ? That's doable

 

[gggplaya]

2008 is actually pretty new, I would check behind your wallplates to see what you have.

Odd that they built a house in 2008 and only ran cable lines to the living room. 2008 was still dominated by analog tv, they usually run lines into each bedroom as well. It super easy to do before drywall.

They must have built the house, then called the cable company later to install it.

 

[EddyzHalp]

Yep, but from your answers above, it sounds like you may already have everything wired to one spot and the wiring to the wall jacks may already be terminated for ethernet. This would be awesome as you'd basically just have to disconnect the telephone lines at the central location and just put an ethernet switch there.

That would be very ideal! Fingers crossed

 

[EddyzHalp]

2008 is actually pretty new, I would check behind your wallplates to see what you have.

Odd that they built a house in 2008 and only ran cable lines to the living room. 2008 was still dominated by analog tv, they usually run lines into each bedroom as well. It super easy to do before drywall.

They must have built the house, then called the cable company later to install it.

Ya? Maybe. I found 2 cables, each with 8 wires in it that looked similar in colour to the ethernet cable I have to hand
Pictures tomorrow !

 

[gggplaya]

Ya? Maybe. I found 2 cables, each with 8 wires in it that looked similar in colour to the ethernet cable I have to hand
Pictures tomorrow !

With 8 wires in each??? That's some sort of ethernet if the cables are twisted in pairs, then it's most likely cat5 or cat5e.

I've only seen phone cable in 2 or 4 strand cables.

 

[EddyzHalp]

Here's the phone jack, with the wiring going into it (See how I can't pull em out very much)
The full album is here incase it helps:

https://imgur.com/a/VaogtSM

View: https://imgur.com/a/VaogtSM

Although finding where the connections all lead to has been a pain, I'm going to keep looking tomorrow
I think we're going to ask the guy who built the house but for now I'll keep looking, thanks guys ! <3

 

[EddyzHalp]

oh that came out quite big, my bad! haha

 

[bill001g]

I have my doubts but you have nothing really to lose by trying it.

First that does not look like twisted wire it looks like 8 individual wires. Maybe someone just did a really good job of untwisting the ends.

Next I suspect these are daisy chained. Now if you have some box that has a bunch of cables maybe. What makes no sense is why you would splice 2 cable together like this if they did run back to a central location.

In any case I would try 1 cable and see if it works. Get a couple keystone jacks and take one of those cables and put one on each end. It will be simpler than crimping on rj45 ends especially where you do not have much cable slack. Then take short ethernet cable and hook something up to both ends.

The big problem is going to be if this is not twisted wire pairs. It might work at 100 or 10mbps but then it might not work at all. When you are using non conforming wire it is going to be pretty much luck if it works.

 

[SamirD]

Sorry for the delayed post. Yep, I think bill001g nailed it--it doesn't look like twisted pair so maybe 100Mbps tops, but you can get lucky and it might run gigabit too.

As he suggested, I would carefully separate the cables at one of the plates and punch them down to some 'keystone' jacks and then do the same at an adjacent plate where you know one of the cables goes and see if you can get ethernet to work between them. If you can, then repeat all over the house and you'll have a wired infrastructure you can use.