Advice on drilling through exterior wall and running ethernet cable outside.

[Goose]

For reasons I can't be bothered to explain my virgin suberhub is upstairs in a bedroom and is connected to my desktop and my NAS that are also both upstairs by ethernet. Ideally I would like to also be able to connect my virgin TV box and my Shield Pro with ethernet rather than wifi but both devices are downstairs. I dont want to simply drop a cable down by drilling through the ceiling because it would look awful having a cable poking out and I would never be able to run cable through walls even if you gave me a 1000 years of practice as i'm really quite a DIY noob. What i'm wondering is maybe running a cable out the upstairs bedroom, down the exterior wall and back in through the wall to the living room downstairs. The photo's below should illustrate what I had in my mind and whether or not its doable for idiot such as myself.

(For some reason I cant seem to embed the images so links will have to do).

Photo 1 shows where the Virgin cable comes in to the upstairs bedroom next to an ancient Telewest box. This is where I would like to run the Ethernet cable out.
Photo 1 - https://imgur.com/a/KtUZT2v

Photo 2 shows the other side of the wall from photo 1 and shows both cables for the Virgin cable and the old Telewest one.
Photo 2 - https://imgur.com/a/ndCxI46

Photo 3 shows on old aerial socket (I think?) in the downstairs living room in the rough area where I would like the ethernet cable to come in.
Photo 3 - https://imgur.com/a/3AWplXl

Photo 4 is a couple of feet to the left of the aerial is photo 3 and shows where the virgin cable comes in to the living room along with another couple of cables not connected to anything.
Photo 4 - https://imgur.com/a/ecdLcYH

Photo 5 is the other side of the wall from photo 4 and shows where i'd like the cable to come in.
Photo 5 - https://imgur.com/a/r2R1XNz

What I was wondering is could it be possible to avoid drilling new holes in the wall by re-using the existing ones by removing the old telewest box and cable (photo 1) and either the aerial or one of the unused cables in the living room (photos 3 and 4)?

Any advice would be most welcome.

Thanks

 

[nst68]

Is the cable from the Telewest (on the left in first picture) connected to anything?
If it's dead then I would definitely use the current holes, drilling through exterior walls even with a proper SDS drill can be a nightmare.

Get some exterior rated Cat5e cable (Kenable sell it), I would start upstairs, try to join the old and new cable together so you can start in one of the rooms, remove the old cable (maybe tape the new one to it to help pull it through from the outside), pull new new cable down to the bottom hole, and push it through the old aerial hole, making sure you add a drip loop.
Terminate both ends and test, you can buy terminating kits that have a tester from Amazon.
Once you're happy, add cable clips to secure it and then use exterior silicon to seal the outside, this might be difficult with the upstairs hole.

If there's space in the holes, then I would run 2 cables.

When I removed my Telewest box it had security screws, the removal bit is cheap to buy or you use Mr Hammer!

 

[Goose]

Is the cable from the Telewest (on the left in first picture) connected to anything?

I cant imagine what it could possibly be connected to at the other end but i'll try and find out which cable it is on the inside (Photo 4)

If it's dead then I would definitely use the current holes, drilling through exterior walls even with a proper SDS drill can be a nightmare.

Yeah, from my limited research i've concluded i'd like to avoid drilling if possible.

making sure you add a drip loop.

I'll have to look that up

If there's space in the holes, then I would run 2 cables.

What's the thinking behind running two cables? I have network switch i'm not currently using for connecting multiple devices.

When I removed my Telewest box it had security screws, the removal bit is cheap to buy or you use Mr Hammer!

I'll google the kit

I don't know if this is of any particular help but I've removed the faceplate from the old telewest box - https://imgur.com/a/IpHedJW

Thanks for you help.

 

[Deleted User 298457]

For such a basic use case, why not just powerline ethernet plugs?

I get wanting wired everywhere (I have 10 drops in my living/dining alone), but that was because of PC gaming/latency.

 

[nst68]

What's the thinking behind running two cables? I have network switch i'm not currently using for connecting multiple devices.

Purely for redundancy, esp if you're going to get up a ladder and silicon the top hole on the outside

 

[Goose]

For such a basic use case, why not just powerline ethernet plugs?

I get wanting wired everywhere (I have 10 drops in my living/dining alone), but that was because of PC gaming/latency.

I was under the impression that homeplugs were a bit rubbish and not really and faster or more reliable than wifi?

 

[Deleted User 298457]

I was under the impression that homeplugs were a bit rubbish and not really and faster or more reliable than wifi?

Nawh they're pretty bullet proof. I was using them for years gaming, and then for a year whilst I refurbed the house. My only grumble was I wanted the best connection possible for a gaming PC - but even then it wasn't noticeable change per say.