Repurpose phone point as network point

sparkymark75

sparkymark75

sparkymark75

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I recently moved into a new build house. I believe they tend to use Cat5 cable for phone lines in houses these days? I'll be able to confirm I guess once I remove one of the wall plates.

My master socket is on a wall in the lounge next to the point where the phone line enters the house. I have another phone socket in a wall across the other side of the lounge and another phone socket in the bedroom above the lounge.

How are these likely to be wired? Will it be the master socket to living room phone socket and then living room phone socket to the bedroom one? Or will the living room phone socket and the bedroom one both connect directly to the master socket. I'm hoping I could possibly "convert" these to network points and provide a wired link between the upstairs and downstairs.
 
Okay, I've taken the faceplates off and taken some pics.

Bedroom Faceplate



Master Socket in the Living Room





Socket in the Living Room Media Panel



The cable thats wired into the front of the master socket goes back into the wall on the right. I'm guessing this is the one that goes up stairs to the bedroom socket? And then one from the bedroom goes to the lounge plate on the other side of the living room? If so, how do I figure out which cable in the bedroom goes to the master socket?
 
bremen1874 said:
Disconnect one of the cables and see which extension sockets still work with a phone.
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Thanks, just need to find a phone in my garage (I don't use a house phone and don't even have a phone number).

bremen1874 said:
While you're in there disconnect those orange wires. They aren't required and can cause issues with your broadband connection. Google 'phone ring wire' for an explanation.
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So do you think my assumption is correct and the wires going to the front of the master socket are the extension to the bedroom?

My speed is only 1.6Mb so I need all the help I can get so I'll look into the "phone ring wire" you refer to.
 
Having always had broadband via cable, I'm new to ADSL having just moved house. I have a Draytek Vigor 120 modem plugged into my master socket and my router plugged into the Draytek. I've just realised I don't have a microfilter between the master socket and the Draytek. My internet still works (albeit slowly) . Should I have one? I don't have a house phone.
 
bremen1874 said:
Judging by that 321311_A ADSL firmware version that modem hasn't had it's firmware updated in quite a while.

Did you get an ISP provided router you can use for comparison?
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Okay, I've upgraded to the latest version from the Draytek website.



I did yeah, an Asus DSL-N14U. I thought the Draytek Vigor modem was highly regarded? I'm using Google Wi-fi with the Draytek as a modem. Would the Asus be able to function just as a modem with the Google Wifi still working as before?
 
Last edited:
Nah, it's a new line but it's been in for 3 weeks so I'm assuming it's past the training phase.

I've just tried the Asus and a speed test wasn't really any better/different. Line stats are..



When I do the wiring for the Cat 5 in the next couple of days, I'll see if removing the ring wire makes much difference. Thanks for all your help/advice.
 
Okay so I spent a couple of hours tonight turning all the phone extensions into network points. So I took the cable from the master socket, fitted a dry lining back box and network module. I removed the phone point in the bedroom and swapped it out for two network points. And finally I took the phone point from the lounge media plate and put in a network point.

So the wiring goes; Master Socket -> Vigor 120 Modem -> Google Wifi -> New network point -> Bedroom network point -> Google Wifi

When I told the Google Wifi to test its connection, it reported it was Ok (great is the best rating). I plugged a Windows laptop in and it reported the link speed as 100Mb. At first I was thinking was there something wrong with my crimping but the basic tester i used seemed to indicate it was all okay. It then twigged that the builder may have used Cat5 and not Cat5e for the internal phone cables. Is this likely to be the case?
 
bremen1874 said:
Possible, but I'd be looking at your terminations before blaming the cable.

Cat5e has been the standard for so long now that you'd have to try quite hard to actually buy Cat5.

Also most of the Cat5 I've worked with handled Gigabit just fine, often over quite long distances.
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I wouldn't be surprised if it is my terminations as its the first time I've terminated network cable into a wall plate.
 
sparkymark75 said:
I wouldn't be surprised if it is my terminations as its the first time I've terminated network cable into a wall plate.
Click to expand...

Re-tested it and wire 6 (green) was showing up as disconnected. I re-crimped it at both ends (twice on one end) but it's still coming up as disconnected. Maybe a break somewhere along the cable? Will this one cable prevent me getting gigabit?
 
Caged said:
The cable might have a cut in it somewhere in the wall. Depending on your network card driver you can often do a TDR test that will give you more information than a basic cable tester.
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Doubtful as I have a MacBook and a Dell laptop, both with no network ports on them. I have to use a USB to RJ45 adapter for cable connections. Might have to see if any of the network guys at work have a device to test for cable breaks. Bugger!
 
Caged said:
Didn't pick it up from your post, but you've tested each 'leg' of the thing separately, yes? E.g. you've tested master socket to bedroom, and then bedroom to living room, rather than the entire run at once?
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Yeah, I tested each leg separately. One of the legs I won't really be using just now but wired it anyway while I was at it.

Caged said:
Double-check that your patch cables have all the pairs as well, Sky routers for a while used to bundle a four-wire ethernet cable for some reason.
Click to expand...

I had exactly that issue to start with as the patch cable from the new living room socket to the Google Wifi router did only have 4 wires in it. I binned that and swapped it out for a fully wired cable.
 
Okay, i re-did both modules this morning, here they are after being re-done.




The tester is still reporting a disconnection on #6 :confused: I'm running out of slack to do any more terminating.
 
Think I might head down to Screwfix and pick up a couple of modules and swap them out. If that doesn't work, then it must be dodgy cable.

Will a Cat6 module work okay on Cat5e cable?
 
So bought a couple of modules from Screwfix. Started by changing the module in the bedroom first (the one that connected to the new network point in the living room). Cable tester tested fine. Plugged in my MacBook. Link speed 1Gbps :D

So after all that, it was a bloody dodgy module! Ah well, at least it works. (It'll bug me now that I have two modules in a face plate that look different, but if it ain't broke and all that!!!)
 
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