Cable TV (Coax) Drops Using House Wiring

[Joe Scarfo]

My shop is a 1200 sq ft building about 100' or so from the house and it's power is from a 220 breaker off the house braker box.

I have found a few units that will allow me to use the house wiring for ethernet drops, but I can't find anything for the cable tv...

Any ideas?

Tks
Joe

[Todd Crawford]

Coaxial cable is a very unique type of cable and you are not going to be able to transmit the signal across anything other than coaxial cable.

[Matt Meiser]

I'd be surprised if you get any kind of decent performance out of the ethernet units too. Do yourself a favor and run a conduit. Barring that, you should be able to get wireless to work with for ethernet with the proper equipment which includes some good antennas.

[Bill Edwards(2)]

I have found a few units that will allow me to use the house wiring for ethernet drops,

Signal over electrical wiring has been around a long time, but nobody
seems to be able to get it right (consistant).

Have you tried it? Because our network guys tried several products
and gave up.

Aside: If they could get it right, a lot of rural folks could get better internet.

[Matt Radtke]

I wouldn't bother with running ethernet over electrical wires. You very likely won't get decent throughput (speed) and almost certainly won't get full-duplex communication (how could you? Cat 5, 5e, and 6 all use 2 pairs of wire for full duplex--1one for trans, one for receiving.)

That said, running copper, as in Cat 5, between buildings is generally not a good idea. I forget the technical reason why, but you will likely end up killing equipment on each end due to how "fragile" networking equipment is. A for business associate of mine did this on his farm, with cat 5 running between his house and barn. He'd kill a NIC every 6-9 months.

The right way to do it is fiber (expensive) or point-to-point wireless. For the paranoid like myself, run a VPN endpoint in the house or one on each end.

[Matt Radtke]

Aside: If they could get it right, a lot of rural folks could get better internet.

Rural networking has a pile of problems, everything from technical to financial.

[Matt Meiser]

Actually you can do fiber "on the cheap". Check out Mitchell Andrus's thread (with lots of comments from me) on that exact subject. My total cost was similar to buying enough waterproof cat5e and a couple surge protectors would have been. I used a surplus Corning fiber cable from Ebay and a couple soho-grade transcievers. We also found a source for new built-to-order fiber cables that wasn't too bad.

[David Nelson1]

My shop is a 1200 sq ft building about 100' or so from the house and it's power is from a 220 breaker off the house braker box.

I have found a few units that will allow me to use the house wiring for ethernet drops, but I can't find anything for the cable tv...

Any ideas?

Tks
Joe

I have been using house wiring for a laptop that is not wireless and it works good enough with the slow work computer. When i get home Ill take a look @ the manufactor and drop you a line.

These eithernet add ons are the same as add a phone jack anywhere by using the house wiring I have had good luck with both.

[Thom Sturgill]

If you run coax for the cable, be careful about grounding the shield - it should only be grounded at one end. As to network cable, Twisted pair is good for 300+ yards, so 100' should not be a problem, but again grounding could be. Much safer to go with fiber if you can.

[paul cottingham]

If you run coax for the cable, be careful about grounding the shield - it should only be grounded at one end. As to network cable, Twisted pair is good for 300+ yards, so 100' should not be a problem, but again grounding could be. Much safer to go with fiber if you can.
+1 on all this. Wiring copper to outbuildings for network and coax is more dangerous than most people think.

[Darius Ferlas]

I have found a few units that will allow me to use the house wiring for ethernet drops, but I can't find anything for the cable tv...

See if this (http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=3871577&CatId=4641) would be sufficient for your needs.

For the little that it costs, I'd still pull a direct burial cat5e wire for the ethernet in the shop. The electrical wiring systems work just fine but the home grade ones are limited to about 80Mbps. Some also have problems going through additional breaker boxes (sub panels etc) so you need to make sure the model you get will have no problem there.


As to network cable, Twisted pair is good for 300+ yards
not 300 feet?

[Halgeir Wold]

TP cable is OK up to 300' - but works on at least double that distance.....just use a cheap switch or router in both ends .
your 100' is no problem, but I'd put in som buried conduit- along with a TV coax......;)

[Matt Radtke]

Actually you can do fiber "on the cheap". Check out Mitchell Andrus's thread (with lots of comments from me) on that exact subject. My total cost was similar to buying enough waterproof cat5e and a couple surge protectors would have been. I used a surplus Corning fiber cable from Ebay and a couple soho-grade transcievers. We also found a source for new built-to-order fiber cables that wasn't too bad.

I'm more talking about total cost: the fiber, termination, fiber nic or switch, etc etc.

[Matt Meiser]

So am I Matt. SOHO grade brand new Fiber-Ethernet media converters $25 each and a surplus brand new pre-terminated fiber assembly with a pull eye for $28. I want to say the quote I got on a pre-terminated assembly was about $125. Obviously none of this is enterprise-grade stuff but its working very nicely.

[Eduard Nemirovsky]

If you will be able to run coax cable to your shop, you will be able to use it for both - TV and Internet. 100' is not a long distance for coax. And using MoCA adapter ($140 for a pair) you wil have a high speed Internet in your shop too.
Ed.

[Dan Hintz]

If you do run coax, make sure it's RG-6 and not the old -59... digital cable will have serious issues with 100' of -59.

[Larry Frank]

I am running new cable to my shop and room addition during a remodeling effort. I am running Cat 6 ethernet and RG-6 Quad Shield with the compression fittings.

[Joe Scarfo]

I sure do miss the day I had my shop in the attached 3 car garage....

Getting TV and Internt out there is much more complicated than I expected.

For wirless internet, I'm just on the edge of getting a decent signal from the router in the house... I upgrade the antenna if needed. I had just thought using the house wire as the transmission medium w/ converter boxes would be good.

Now I'm thinking not so much.

As to the tv.... that seems to be more complicated...

the ground is frozen now, no trenching going to be happening until spring.

The bummer is... I just had a trench dug last spring for the 220V upgrade out there... to bad I didn't know I could not use the same conduit, I would've simply laid the low voltage condiut in the same trench.

:-(

[Steve Costa]

Netgear makes a XE102 Wall Plugged Eathernet Bridge that will carry DSL over your household electrical system. Requires 2 units, 1 plugged into a wall socket at your router location with an RJ45 cord between your router & the XE102 & the other plugged into the wall socket at your computer's location with an RJ45 cord between the XE102 and your computer. I have been doing this for several years and it runs through both our main panel & a subpanel. Google XE102 & you will find several sources. Their brochure also talks about this working with a cable connection but I have no experience with that setup.

Steve

[Matt Meiser]

Joe when I had someone here with a trencher to run my gas line I had them do one for me too. I put in 2 1-1/2" conduits. One has all my new low voltage wiring and fiber. The other is capped on both ends with a pull string "just in case." The cost to run the empty one was something like $50--cheap insurance.

[M Toupin]

If you have wireless in the house and you're getting a marginal signal now, use a wireless bridge to fix your signal problem. I recently installed a EnGenius EOC2611P (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16833168071) for my dad and we're shooting across a small lake, somewhere around 300'-350'. The signal runs around -36 dBm or so which is great signal and gives a full 54Mbps data rate in G mode . I mounted his outside, but in hindsight, easily could have got away with just mounting it inside.

Coax is a different issue, the only real solution is to run a cable. Personally, I'd just bury it in the snow for now and trench it out in the spring.

Mike

[Jim Becker]

If you run coax for the cable, be careful about grounding the shield - it should only be grounded at one end. As to network cable, Twisted pair is good for 300+ yards, so 100' should not be a problem, but again grounding could be. Much safer to go with fiber if you can.

Ethernet over twisted pair is limited to 100 meters (about 300') "NIC to NIC" by specification. That includes any patch cords. Longer runs are best handled as Matt mentions...fiber with transceivers. But regardless of whether it's copper or fiber, if it's transiting between buildings via conduit, the cable "should" be rated for exterior/wet usage.

[paul cottingham]

the actual standard id 90 metres plus 10 metres for patch cables, I believe. Beyond that and you get propagation errors, and delay errors.
And they are a bear to troubleshoot without a certifier.

[Bill ThompsonNM]

I'm running some cisco powerline Ethernet units between my satellite connection, the other end of my house and my workshop. A few hundred feet total. Works great! It's also rated for video over Ethernet transfer. You could transfer digital video from a cable box to your workshop
With the proper converters. I have wireless hubs connected to the powerline Ethernet -- it would take about 5 wireless repeaters to cover the same area. I ordered mine from amazon. Disclaimer: I did work as a network pro in one of my previous careers-- now I'm a veterinarian!

[Phil Thien]

I'm running some cisco powerline Ethernet units between my satellite connection, the other end of my house and my workshop. A few hundred feet total. Works great!

I'll 2nd that. I don't use the Cisco product but we've been running powerline Ethernet adapters for some time with few if any problems.

[Jayson Small]

If you run coax for the cable, be careful about grounding the shield - it should only be grounded at one end. As to network cable, Twisted pair is good for 300+ yards, so 100' should not be a problem, but again grounding could be. Much safer to go with fiber if you can.

Cat5e as a standard is rated for 328' or 100m, as per TIA.

I'm an amateur woodworker, but an AV professional.

[Halgeir Wold]

We either have some strange USA/EU differences that have slipped my attentnesion, - and I most seriously serious think NOT, but a transmission line coax must ALWAYS be connected to shield in both ends. A coax these days, is usually a center and shield thing, but I've still to see, over here, a balanced 2-conductor and shield in TV distribution- If you have a normal coax -center and shield- thing jobbie - how would you form a signal path to ground ?????
JFTR- my normal more-than-a-day- job , is AMOT- signal distribution, copper and fiber...........

[Dan Hintz]

Halgeir,

There's nothing that demands the shield be connected at both ends, at least from a signal point of view. Not connecting it at one end can prevent certain ground loop issues in nasty systems. Granted, I'm not saying the loop issue shouldn't be resolved in another manner, but it's a cheap way to do it. And putting in isolators has a similar effect...

[Steven Hardy]

Your idea for ethernet over wiring is valid...in fact you could do it all except power over ip...theres nothing wrong with overkill...but cat6 AND fiber IS overkill.
I currently watch netflix in hi definition over a 1 mbps dsl line. Netgear claims 500 mbps.
You asked for ideas....so
What you might consider for your cable is a Slingbox at your main cable box..and a pc/laptop in your shop to save on cable subscription costs in the process .The higher end
slingbox will also allow to hook up a security camera as well...lets say to watch whos at the front door while your in the shop?

[paul cottingham]

In fact, when i was still cabling the accepted practice was to not ground one end. It was too dangerous, and could create weird issues that were hard to diagnose.