Home LAN Wiring

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Ducman69

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Builder pre-wired six of the rooms w/ CAT5E.

The six wires do NOT join inside a home network box, but instead are unterminated just sticking out the side of the outside wall as seen below.

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The ISP states that when installing a box on the outside of the home, they can "activate" each of those connections at $25 a pop.

Recommendations on how to use these cables and setup a home LAN w/o having to fork over the $150? And I am not entirely sure how a box outside not connected to the home router inside would help on the LAN regardless.
 
Wow thats an odd one, haven't see that before. You would almost have to put a switch outside to make use of those cables.

Another option is to put 2 6 port patch panels in a box outside and reroute those cables back in some other place.

IMO the contractor did a half ass job with this cabling
 
Yeah, generally in that situation you'd have those wires terminating in a patch panel or something inside the house. You'd then run short jumpers from the patch panel to the switch/router. And you'd generally have your modem/router inside too, so you may not even need a single Cat5 cable running from the outside to the modem - it could work for DSL, but cable would be coming in on coax.

Sounds like the builder really didn't know how most people wire up a house up for a LAN. Is it possible to pull those cables back into the house and hook them into a patch panel? Sort of leaves a hole in the wall though, which sucks.
 
I'd cut those cables off inside and punch them down to a patch panel. Then get the builder to fix the hole in the exterior wall. Pulling the cables all the way outside is ridiculous.
 
Do you know where they come inside?

I'd cut them inside and terminate on a patch panel. But leave those wires running outside so you have something to bring phone or DSL into the house with.
 
I'd pull them inside. ISP will run their line into the house, to where the modem will be located. From the modem, ethernet run to your broadband router. From the router...LAN ports to plug your computers ethernet cables into (terminate those ones in the picture) Depending on number of those ethernet cables you need to terminate, may need to uplink a switch.
 
What room is directly inside of that hole? Pull them back inside and setup a patch panel.
 
Wow, that's EPIC FAIL! Definitely pull those cables inside and terminate to a patch panel in your basement or something. Setup a nice little wall-mount rack and put the patch and your switch/router/etc in there. You may be able to leave one of those cables outside for the ISP to use as their demarc, I've seen that at a few condos I did before.
 
That's ghetto-tastic... Make sure the builder fixes this appropriately without passing on the labor/material charges to you.
 
It looks like there is a piece of packing tape holding the wires to the side of the house, that's one hell of a ghetto mod. If it were me I would pull them all back inside and have the builder fix the hole in the side of your house.
 
Fix what?

You guys are all assuming the builder intended for that cable to be used for a network.

It's quite common for phone cabling to all be pulled to the outside of the house to then be terminated in the box the phone company provides.

Shitty for the OP? Yep, sure is. But the contractor didn't do anything wrong.
 
valve1138 said:
It's quite common for phone cabling to all be pulled to the outside of the house to then be terminated in the box the phone company provides.

Shitty for the OP? Yep, sure is. But the contractor didn't do anything wrong.
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Really? Well normally if a contractor is running phone lines he'll use CAT3 or maybe CAT5 but it will be run to come up behind the phone network interface - not a huge gaping hole on the side of your house. That's shoddy work no matter how you slice it and the fact of the matter is that there looks to be coax there too. This 'contractor' decided he'd install a home media distribution center on the OUTSIDE of the house? Horrible. You do not want switches, splitters and amps exposed to the weather unless it can't be helped. And just leaving the loose cable ends exposed to the weather? Yes, corrosion is good for wires!

OP - Get a contractor to come back and pull the cables inside, then terminate them to a patch panel and fix the hole in the side of your house.
 
I vote to keep the ghettoness. Drill a second hole thought the house, stick the wire ends though it and then terminate them inside. That way you can still post in the ghetto mod thread
 
Orinthical said:
Really? Well normally if a contractor is running phone lines he'll use CAT3 or maybe CAT5 but it will be run to come up behind the phone network interface - not a huge gaping hole on the side of your house. That's shoddy work no matter how you slice it and the fact of the matter is that there looks to be coax there too. This 'contractor' decided he'd install a home media distribution center on the OUTSIDE of the house? Horrible. You do not want switches, splitters and amps exposed to the weather unless it can't be helped. And just leaving the loose cable ends exposed to the weather? Yes, corrosion is good for wires!

OP - Get a contractor to come back and pull the cables inside, then terminate them to a patch panel and fix the hole in the side of your house.
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You're making several assumptions. You have no idea what the contractor intended.
 
No one runs cat3 anymore for phone, and yes that isn't a bad job by the contractor it was probably intended for the phone company.

If you want to use for network pull or cut and patch the hole
 
valve1138 said:
You're making several assumptions. You have no idea what the contractor intended.
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It's an internet forum - we're all making assumptions. You are assuming this contractor is not at fault. Any way you slice it, wire hanging out of an obvious hole on the side of a new house with the exposed ends in the grass without anything protecting them from the weather equals fail. I also don't see a telephone interface box anywhere near that giant hole - though it might be a couple feet away next to what I assume is the power meter. And if your assumption was correct - and it was done for the phone company - why are there coax cables there as well?

Regardless of the answers - these cables should be in some kind of conduit and they are exposed. I'm willing to bet that isn't outdoor grade CAT - might not even be outdoor rated coax.
 
As a telecommunications I&M tech this is par for Phone home runs. Most of the time on new builds or remodels, there is a 66 punch down block at some central point (usually by the electrical panel) with a feeder wire to the outside where a NID or network Interface Device would be located. However there are cases in which those home runs are run to the outside for the telephone I&M tech to handle it. Also if you notice there Coax coming out of the same location. Same basic idea for the video aspect of the home.

Cat5E is pretty much the standard now for phone station wire. 4 pairs to use if a pair goes bad. Excellent anti cross talk properties. Multi-purpose use.

It looks like crap right now, it you put it the hands of a tech like myself, I could make that look like gold. If you got a good cable tech sub or co, he could do the same with coax. Personally and depending on the layout of the build or remodel, the contractor (electrical or GC) should have centralized the telephone and cable and home wired network by the electrical or utility area. The contractor should have just wound up the cat 5e and the coax with some tape to make it look better.
 
You need to call Holmes on Homes... whoever did that is a complete idiot. Ive never, in all my time, come across someone who ran the wires outside like that. Only FIOS has ever done that and it was 1 network wire going into their ONT box on the building, otherwise everything is done INSIDE. Get your contractor to fix his screw up.
 
valve1138 said:
Fix what?

You guys are all assuming the builder intended for that cable to be used for a network.

It's quite common for phone cabling to all be pulled to the outside of the house to then be terminated in the box the phone company provides.

Shitty for the OP? Yep, sure is. But the contractor didn't do anything wrong.
Click to expand...


In what world have you ever seen this done??? In the old days with the old boxes outside of homes it was fine... but now adays nobody runs the network wires outside like this. Phone company runs a single line inside and then theres a box inside for the wire terminations... they used blue, which is your standard color for DATA. White, is used for phones... any telecom company would know that... and they wouldnt use blue for phones...

Contractors on the other hand, may use whatever they have... but i think this thread is indicating its service for network, not phones... so basically, as everyone has said... the contractors a knucklehead
 
I agree that running the wire out the side of the house like that is a half assed way of doing things. It is much cleaner job to have the minimum amount of wire running in from the outside with distribution inside. All this should be designed in to the blueprints of the house. But today corners are cut to make cookie cutter homes that go up fast. To me crap like this always makes me wonder what has been covered up by drywall.

However given the way things were done it should be clear to everyone that the 6 pre wired rooms were pre wired for phone not networking. Sure if they were not run to the outside like this you could have repurposed them for networking and figured something else out for phone lines.

As others have asked I would like to know what’s on the other side of that wall? Does the house have a basement? Can we get a picture of where your breaker box is installed? Just trying to get some idea why they didn’t run them to be terminated near the breaker box.
 
Went into a customer's brand new home recently, which they said they were told by the builder was 'wired for networking'. Sure was, nice RJ-45 port in pretty much every room alongside the RJ-11 and coax. But I can't find a patch panel anywhere, and the homeowners aren't sure where it is either. Do some more poking around and the builder apparently pulled all the wire outside into a junction box separate from the phone cabling and terminated it into a little patch block inside. No power. No space for networking gear. No conduit into the home to a space for such, with a bedroom on the inside. Left me going WTF... seemed like it would have been more work than doing it in the basement or garage like I normally see in new construction.

Didn't end up doing it, but I was thinking I might be able to cram a passive POE powered switch in there instead of rejigging all the cabling. Maybe you could do something similar?

This does look like shoddy workmanship to me, but if the intent was that it be terminated by the telco, maybe they weren't doing anything stupid, just being lazy, or the telco didn't show up when they said they would or something?
 
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Adam said:
You need to call Holmes on Homes... whoever did that is a complete idiot. Ive never, in all my time, come across someone who ran the wires outside like that. Only FIOS has ever done that and it was 1 network wire going into their ONT box on the building, otherwise everything is done INSIDE. Get your contractor to fix his screw up.
Click to expand...

I hope you're joking.

And I've seen it countless times where a contractor installs the wiring in that fashion.
 
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