I am going to be putting a network/phone hub into my new house. There will
also me a small NAS working from the same area. Where do people recommend
for running this from? I was thinking of one of two places..

1 )- I have an area under the stairs which is dead space - I was going to
put it there and build a small cupboard around it which would provide easy
access if there were any problems.
2) - In the loft - Main worry is the heat in the summer as the NAS might get
a bit too warm and lack of easy access

I am going to be running 3 cables to each room (1 for network, 1 for phone
and 1 for future) i.e. there are going to be alot of cables - 12 in places -
what are the rules in terms of running this through conduit or is it just
common sense i.e. not crushed, away from mains etc?

Cheers

Rob

In article ,
Rob Convery wrote:
I am going to be putting a network/phone hub into my new house. There
will also me a small NAS working from the same area. Where do people
recommend for running this from? I was thinking of one of two places..

1 )- I have an area under the stairs which is dead space - I was going
to put it there and build a small cupboard around it which would
provide easy access if there were any problems. 2) - In the loft - Main
worry is the heat in the summer as the NAS might get a bit too warm and
lack of easy access

Under the stairs would be my choice. I've got a cellar, and located my
router there - just where the phone line came in. So I simply installed a
new BT master socket with a built in filter and replaced the original
master with a slave.

I am going to be running 3 cables to each room (1 for network, 1 for
phone and 1 for future) i.e. there are going to be alot of cables - 12
in places - what are the rules in terms of running this through conduit
or is it just common sense i.e. not crushed, away from mains etc?

I don't think there are crosstalk issues between phone lines and CAT5, etc.

Well, not for domestic runs, anyway.

Good luck with predicting what the future may bring. ;-)

--
*Why is 'abbreviation' such a long word?

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

Rob

Without wanting to complicate things for you, you may consider double
screened co-ax at the same time for TV/CCTV later!

Phil

In article ,
"Rob Convery" writes:
I am going to be putting a network/phone hub into my new house. There will
also me a small NAS working from the same area. Where do people recommend
for running this from? I was thinking of one of two places..

1 )- I have an area under the stairs which is dead space - I was going to
put it there and build a small cupboard around it which would provide easy
access if there were any problems.

This is probably OK if you can provide ventilation.
You might want to add some type of overtemperature stat to
cut the power if the NAS gets too hot. You might be able
to use some feature built in to the NAS itself, or some
type of room stat set to something like 35C through which
the NAS is powered (probably want to to latch off though).

I built such a mains controller many years ago (actually
for a minicomputer I use to run at home). I has a couple
of temperature set points -- above 23C is switches on a
fan to circulate the air in the cupboard which helps prevent
hotspots, and at 35C it cuts the power and latches off.
(It also cuts the power if an interconnected smoke detector
triggers, and can do so if there's more than half a mains
cycle missing, although this was really for the benefit of
an old large minicomputer, and I have the missing mains cycle
detection disabled to run a PC, which generally handles many
missing mains cycles without any problem.)

2) - In the loft - Main worry is the heat in the summer as the NAS might get
a bit too warm and lack of easy access

Yes, my loft goes over 40C routinely, and up to 50C occationally.
I do have a very low power home automation microcontroller up
there which handles the upstairs and outdoor lighting, which
doesn't seem to have any problems. I would probably not have
installed it up there if I had known at the time what the
temperature could reach.

I am going to be running 3 cables to each room (1 for network, 1 for phone
and 1 for future) i.e. there are going to be alot of cables - 12 in places -
what are the rules in terms of running this through conduit or is it just
common sense i.e. not crushed, away from mains etc?

Just common sense. One comment I would make for phone wiring is
to only route a pair (on 2 and 5) to each socket, and to use
master sockets throughout to recreate the bell wire on 3. If
you start routing 2, 3, and 5 around and use secondary sockets,
there are no 'twisted triple' cables suitable, and you can get
crosstalk when the phone rings. Generally, this only upsets a
different phone line where the ringing can be heard. Ethernet,
being both ballanced and isolated at each end, is still quite
immune.

--
Andrew Gabriel

On Tue, 14 Jun 2005 09:58:48 +0100, "Rob Convery"
wrote:

2) - In the loft - Main worry is the heat in the summer as the NAS might get
a bit too warm and lack of easy access

Forget the heat for the moment - a loft is full of dust and no NAS is
going to enjoy that.

Andrew Gabriel wrote:

Just common sense. One comment I would make for phone wiring is
to only route a pair (on 2 and 5) to each socket, and to use
master sockets throughout to recreate the bell wire on 3. If
you start routing 2, 3, and 5 around and use secondary sockets,
there are no 'twisted triple' cables suitable, and you can get
crosstalk when the phone rings. Generally, this only upsets a
different phone line where the ringing can be heard. Ethernet,
being both ballanced and isolated at each end, is still quite
immune.

Good advice...

In fact I think if I were doing my setup again I would just stick in a
structured wiring system and use cat5 and rj45 sockets all over. Then
use the plug in LAUs to convert to a BT compatible socket where you want.



--
Cheers,

John.

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| Internode Ltd - http://www.internode.co.uk |
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| John Rumm - john(at)internode(dot)co(dot)uk |
\================================================= ================/

On 14 Jun 2005 11:20:34 GMT, (Andrew
Gabriel) wrote:

[snippage]

One comment I would make for phone wiring is
to only route a pair (on 2 and 5) to each socket, and to use
master sockets throughout to recreate the bell wire on 3. If
you start routing 2, 3, and 5 around and use secondary sockets,
there are no 'twisted triple' cables suitable, and you can get
crosstalk when the phone rings. Generally, this only upsets a
different phone line where the ringing can be heard. Ethernet,
being both ballanced and isolated at each end, is still quite
immune.

Another option here, depending on the cost, is to use STP [screened
twisted pair] for the phone, and earth the end closest to the
distribution [under the stairs/loft].
I had a setup years ago with 2 phone lines in the same conduit, both
using separate CW1308 cables in the same conduit [cat 5 was *just*
available then, but was hideously expensive]. I had very little
crosstalk from the lines, I would imagine STP would cut the 'very
little' to 'zero' pretty well. The main problem seems to be cable
company lines because they use cheapo square wave ringing generators
which cause harmonics and so forth. Certainly the cable co phoneline
interfered with the BT line more than vice versa.

HTH

--
"I think computer viruses should count as life. I think it
says something about human nature that the only form of life
we have created so far is purely destructive. We've created
life in our own image." - Stephen Hawking

John Rumm wrote:

Andrew Gabriel wrote:

Just common sense. One comment I would make for phone wiring is
to only route a pair (on 2 and 5) to each socket, and to use
master sockets throughout to recreate the bell wire on 3. If
you start routing 2, 3, and 5 around and use secondary sockets,
there are no 'twisted triple' cables suitable, and you can get
crosstalk when the phone rings. Generally, this only upsets a
different phone line where the ringing can be heard. Ethernet,
being both ballanced and isolated at each end, is still quite
immune.


Good advice...

In fact I think if I were doing my setup again I would just stick in a
structured wiring system and use cat5 and rj45 sockets all over. Then
use the plug in LAUs to convert to a BT compatible socket where you want.



You canm get an old analogue PABX to drive many phones, have doorphons
and intercom as well.

Thats what I did. So house is structured cable, to the point where it
hits the sockets: Then I wire in whatver I beed BT master or ethernet..

On Tue, 14 Jun 2005 09:58:48 +0100, "Rob Convery"
wrote:

I am going to be putting a network/phone hub into my new house. There will
also me a small NAS working from the same area. Where do people recommend
for running this from? I was thinking of one of two places..

1 )- I have an area under the stairs which is dead space - I was going to
put it there and build a small cupboard around it which would provide easy
access if there were any problems.
2) - In the loft - Main worry is the heat in the summer as the NAS might get
a bit too warm and lack of easy access

I am going to be running 3 cables to each room (1 for network, 1 for phone
and 1 for future) i.e. there are going to be alot of cables - 12 in places -
what are the rules in terms of running this through conduit or is it just
common sense i.e. not crushed, away from mains etc?

I am midway through a similar project, which has currently been put on
hold and temporarily 'gone wireless' due to other immediate DIY needs.
I decided that despite the heat issues the loft represented a far
better space in my house as it has reasonably convenient access. As I
currently have a Wifi AP in the loft this has the added advantage that
it broadcasts over rather than through the internal walls (and all the
way to the bottom of the garden too). I have a 1950's house so the
internal walls are mostly brick.

With regard to heat in the loft, one thing to watch is that the
temperature gradient is very steep, i.e. the apex is usually very hot
but at floor level the heat usually isn't too bad. My firewall and
server PCs (two low profile Compaq SFF PCs) cope very well in the
summer despite having passive heatsinks and the whole PC being cooled
by the PSU fan. I am currently on the lookout for a 12U cabinet and
will be looking to rack mount the servers as it will be much easier to
bring in cool(er) external air and ventilate a small cabinet than cool
the entire loft space.

I am going to run some cable downstairs in the near future and was
going to follow the wet services down through the airing cupboard and
the small duct between the living room and kitchen. Since there are
only data cables and no voltages involved I see no major problem with
this.

Regards,
Jason.

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