Networking Alternatives: Powerline, MoCA, etc.?

[The Monkey]

Can anyone recommend an alternative to wireless or Cat5? Specifically, I'm wondering if powerline or MoCA are actually viable alternatives.

[grawk]

Nope, sorry. Cat5 or wifi. If you have interference in one band, switch over to the other (2.4/5.. Change the channels your network is using, etc.

[The Monkey]

It's not really the interference as much as it is coverage. The cable modem is on the second floor, so it's difficult to get that signal in the basement where an Apple TV may go, as well as other internetty stuff. That's why I was thinking that MoCA could be a viable option. Not so much?

[grawk]

I can bring you a powerline based wifi extender down to the beach, and you can have it .

Which wireless router do you have? I'd think a combination of airport extreme + airport express would be able to extend you down into the basement in a useable way, or fish a line down from the 2nd floor into the basement to have ethernet down there. You should have a wiring pass through of some sort to make that somewhat doable.

[The Monkey]

I'd love to fish a line, but it won't be easy here, plus I don't want to cut into the wall and install a box.

[Dusty Chalk]

Microwave and mirrors?

[The Monkey]

too easy.

[naamanf]

I'm of the firm (probably wrong) belief that running Cat5 everywhere with a gigabit network is the way to go.

[The Monkey]

Naaman, I definitely agree with you (and Dan). If I had it my way, this place would have at least 2 Cat5 drops in every room. But my parents chose not to heed that advice.

At this point, with the structure in place, I'm not so sure how easy/feasible it will be to get it wired up. Add to this the fact that I'm not particularly handy.

[Grahame]

I'm of the firm (probably wrong) belief that running Cat5 everywhere with a gigabit network is the way to go.

Yeah, but where's the fun in a proven good solution that "just works"

If you want to future proof, and pamper your bits, you could always spec. Category 6 cable - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[Dusty Chalk]

A thought: in most houses, two phone lines are run -- if they're only using one, is there a way to use the second one as the network? I think the only problems are (a) that you'll have to make sure that all the phones in the house are using the two-wire method of connecting, and if not, their are stubs that you can put between the phone and the wall jack, and ( that you will have to make sure the second two wires are disconnected at the phone hub (wherever it is that it's connected to the phone service -- I know this, because at least once in my life, I had to get the second line connected, and they had to come out and physically connect it). I know this is good enough at least for DSL speeds.

[Edwood]

Yeah, but where's the fun in a proven good solution that "just works"

If you want to future proof, and pamper your bits, you could always spec. Category 6 cable - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I wired my condo with CAT6e.

By the time anything approaches saturating that bandwidth, I'll have long sold this place and moved on. Oh, the irony. Yeah, WTF was I thinking buying that fucking expensive ass spool of Belden CAT6e.

[Dreadhead]

I use a powerline based system for my music laptop because the wireless card drivers suck and cause DPC latency problems so I wanted a wired connection. It works well in my opinion though as stated it could be faster.

[manaox2]

I bought a 300mW 802.11n wireless USB adapter with some pigtail adapters and am making a couple of cantennas. This is because my apartment complex offers free wireless. The cantennas are really mostly for fun. I would definitely go with wired without a doubt if it wasn't costly compared to my options.