Need some help wiring the house for a network

[_cashel]

I'm about to setup a wired network throughout the house. I was going to go ahead and buy one of those network kits w/ everything you need, however, according to my parents, the house was wired with Cat V a few years ago (like around '98 or '99) when it was totally redone on the inside.

The problem, though, is that this doesn't look like any normal networking cable. Looking at normal Cat-5e cable, I see many different colored wires within the rubber enclosure. Looking at the Cat-5 cable in the walls, it's got what looks like a copper wire maybe twice the thickness of the little ones in the 'normal' cable, surrounded by what I guess is white insulation that probably has a diameter 4 times that of the wire (I know nothing about wiring), which is then surrounded by very tiny strands of metal wire all the way around it. If it helps any, here's what's written on the Cat V cable:

E83032A F660BVV (UL) Cat V

Does this mean anything?

So I guess what I'm asking is, can I crimp network cable connectors onto this? I've never created my own network cables, but from what I hear it's rather easy, using the standard cables and connectors of course. I don't have any pictures to take because the camera I have really sucks, and it's just a black and white blur of the cable up close. Sorry if I'm really vague on this, but I'm just working with what I have.

 

[Canon]

Man... Your description sounds so much like Coax cable (which can be used to network). The problem with using Coax is that you need to daisy chain all your systems, you'll have to find network cards that support it (not very commonly used anymore) and you'll need to put terminators on the either end of the network in order for it to work. Network bandwidth may not be more than 10Mbits over this media either (depending on equipment but generally 10Mbits).

And to answer your last question, no you can't crimp RJ-45 connectors onto this cabling, it's not compatable.

Without a picture I don't know what i'm looking at but that's what i'd say. You'll want to run Cat6 UTP (unshielded twisted pair) probably (in case you want to do Gigabit networking later in life, reliably). Cat 5e UTP cabling will work fine for 100mbit connectivity between standard ethernet devices terminating with RJ-45 connectors. It may work with Gigabit networking as well just not guaranteed.

 

[_cashel]

I wouldn't be surprised if that's what it is. I really wish I could get a clear picture, but I can't . I guess I'll go ahead and talk the folks into re-wiring the house with Cat6 UTP and see where I'll go from there. Thanks for the input.

 

[dandragonrage]

Make sure you use the fact that CAT-5(e)/6 network cable has spare wires for 2 phone lines as well to convince the parental units to do it.