Why do you think it's a "power line"? Does it have power on it?
"Jason L." wrote in message
om...
Thanks for the help folks. If it is indeed a power line, I don't
think it's live because I (rather foolishly) fiddled with it hoping
that it was a phone line. A couple people mentioned a satellite
hookup - ironically enough, that's what I'm dealing with. I'm pretty
sure no previous owner ever had a satellite system, but I can't be
sure. We've had our DirecTV setup in this house for about 6 years,
but we never hooked up the phone line (not completely necessary if you
don't order pay-per-view shows). We recently upgraded to a
Tivo-equipped receiver and you need the phone line to activate your
DVR service. I had always assumed that the wire was a phone line, but
when I went to install the jack, I was baffled by the wire internals.

The only other clue I found was this: in the basement I can see two
grey wires that look to be the same gauge running parallel. The come
from the finished part of the basement (so I can't see where they
really terminate) and run towards the family room, but disappear up
into the insulation and wall framing. If one of these is the
"mystery" wire, I'm not sure what the other one is for.