Networking 1930's house

[moosekat]

Hey Guys,
In the midst of buying a 1930 4 bed house. One of the first jobs I want to try and do before we decorate is to fully network each room with Cat6. I am looking to chase the walls (foot from ground), lay the cable, punch down and terminate myself, but get someone in to plaster the walls after my woefully poor chasing. I was also looking to have 4 cat6 points in each room, with the idea of future proofing for possible hdmi over cat 6 at some point. I am also going to have Unifi Wireless throughout the house ceiling mounted so that cabling would be easy (All first floor carpet is coming up so should not be too hard.)

Has anyone tried a job like this before? As we have so much going on, should I just get someone in to chase the walls for me - I have never done it. Also any possible issues with my plan? I have laid cables before, but never to this size scale. I am also quite worried it is too big a job for me, and thinking about getting outside help.. Is this possible for 1 man??

Any help / ideas would be greatly appreciated..

Thanks

Nick

 

[Lucid]

It's possible for a single man. Electrician chase walls all the time. It's simply a question of time spent doing it and the mess versus what it costs for a sparky to do it for you.

Be aware that old plaster is fragile. You'll often find it has blown from the wall behind (sounds hollow when knocked) so cutting in to it might result in bigger chunks coming away. Factor that in to the materials and time budget for the plasterer.

HDMI over Ethernet needs to be kept separate from the IP network. Treat it as more point-to-point with baluns via Ethernet. There are solutions that will IP-ise AV signals and handle mixed AV and IP in a single network. Starting prices for the hubs are around £3-£4 K though. You'll also need the adapter breakout boxes at the display/audio/IT ends.

One common mistake with DIY pre-wires is not considering what will happen with signal cables once they've got in to the room. A good example is network enabled TV. Bringing cables in to the room at 400mm from floor height isn't much use when the TV is mounted at least a metre high. Then there's power, local AV sources and also audio out from the TV to consider. Some other point include wiring for Freeview. It makes sense to wire in distrubuted RF (TV aerial signals) and then let the TVs in each room decode the signal to SD/HD and individual channels. RF distribution is cheap as chips and it makes best use of the TVs built-in for very little cost.

Flooding a house with cable isn't sufficient to guarantee success. You need a solid plan of what you're going to use in each room to make a cohesive and usable entertainment environment that is robust and user friendly. That's a pretty tall order when you're staring in to the abyss.

All too often I come across jobs where the principal has assumed that there'll be something available to meet his requirements as long as they provide a bit of network cable. That's rarely the case unless you go ultra high-end. So without working out first what you're going to use in each room, you're unlikely to be able to put together a working system. Honestly, chasing the walls is the least of your worries.

What you need is the experience to design a workable solution for the money that you think you might have available. Now, you can either invest a load of time reading up, then buying and testing gear to find out if it works and where the weak points are. Or you can buy in that expertise from people who do this for a living.

Where do you want to be?

 

[moosekat]

Hi Lucid,
Thanks for the reply. i work in IT, so I have quite a bit of experience with networking. But it has mostly been in businesses and schools, where we usually just chuck everything into external trunking. I have a very clear idea of what the networking is going to be doing, and also where the ports are going to go. I am doing it the same height as any power sockets, and I will be making sure that it will be where the TV / Computer / Wifi etc is going to go now and in the future. The new thing is trying to do the networking tidily and hidden.
With the HDMI over ethernet, this was just a "possibly in the future" thing. I am well aware that extra hardware can be expensive, and the compression can be pretty poor. I just saw the whole node zero thing and thought that it would make a great project!!

I think I will get someone to chase the walls. And possibly get a quote once in for actually pulling the cables through. Might be surprised at the cost

Thanks

Nick

 

[Sam Gangee]

I am doing it the same height as any power sockets

Don't run signal cable closely in parallel with mains cable and never in the same trunking.

 

[Lucid]

Hi Lucid,
Thanks for the reply. i work in IT, so I have quite a bit of experience with networking. But it has mostly been in businesses and schools, where we usually just chuck everything into external trunking. I have a very clear idea of what the networking is going to be doing, and also where the ports are going to go.

Hi Nick,
You're welcome. I could see from the first post that you are comfortable with the networking side of things. So chasing the walls is simply an extension of what you've been doing elsewhere.

The networking isn't that complicated anyway. Once you know one end of a punch-down tool tool from the other then the actual mechanics of running cable, terminating, installing patch panels and network switches isn't that difficult

The point is what makes or breaks the system is what's hanging off the ends. In turn, what's hanging off the ends determines where those ends should be. That's a little chicken and egg but one has to start somewhere. Since the things that you and your family will interact with is the media streamers and networked TVs then this is actually quite a sensible place to start the planning process.

Once you have the streamers selected then you can turn your attention to two other areas: distributing AV signal that either can be or don't need to be IP-ised, and what you might do about audio since the sound from most TVs sucks.

I mentioned in the previous post about distributing RF. If you're planning on using Sky or Virgin Media as the primary TV source then some thought needs to be given to whether or not you distribute that through the rest of the house, and if you do, then what to do about controlling it. From there you then need to think about who has priority if everyone can access and control the box. IOW, would you be happy if you were watching the match or a film and someone in another room switched the box over to a music channel?

Bearing in mind that TV sound sucks, and also in some rooms you might want audio only, then what's your plans for that?

Have you given any thought to lighting, security, telephones, HVAC?

 

[moosekat]

Thanks again for you reply.
I am also looking at chucking in sattelite cable into a few of the rooms, as at the moment we have sky multi room. Luckily I have a friend who is an installer. Audio wise, I have started the expensive road of Sonos, so no need for audio cables. I have a micro server holding all my movies in bluray ISO, and will have a few pop corn hours placed in the Bedroom, family room and lounge.
The other thing that I need to look at is security. We want to have a security system that will work with 2 cats. As we are chasing walls etc, a wired option is best??? Any help with this would also be greatly appreciated.

Thanks again

Nick

 

[Lucid]

Sonos.... expensive....ha ha ha.

I supply and install Sonos along side Systemline, Living Control, NuVo and others. Trust me, for what Sonos does, and for how well it works, and for the features and 3rd party devices it supports out of the box, Sonos is cheap.

If I tried to replicate all that functionality with a hardwired multiroom system with keypads I could easily triple the budget and the result wouldn't be as slick. If all you need is single room replay from a network where there's control via iPhone then Airport Express or ATV3's would be cheaper. But that relies on a solid buy-in to the Apple ecosystem. Sonos is cross platform.

Philips is trying to muscle in with it's Fidelio/Streamium range. The products are 20-30% cheaper than the equivalent Sonos device. But when you experience how they work (or don't) and the limitations on the server side then you soon realise where that 30% went.

Logitech had Squeezebox (SB). It was out before Sonos and it had a loyal following. The range of products was developing nicely. Again it was a little cheaper than Sonos but it still relied too heavily on server software running on a PC. There was a later version that would run as an app on smarter NAS drives. This went a little way to making it more install friendly. The rub though was the higher cost of the NAS ate up any savings made from buying the cheaper SB streamers. Sonos isn't fussy about the NAS drive.

So where is Squeezebox now? Answer: Discontinued and no replacement.

Logitech abandoned SB 18 months ago. The current UE Radio is merely a shadow of Squeezebox of old. That should give you some idea of how tough it is to compete with Sonos.


For your CCTV requirements check out the dedicated CCTV forum here.

 

[moosekat]

Hey Guys,

Well the time to completion is getting ever closer. I am still trying to work out if I should just get someone in to chase the walls, or if I want to try my hand at it. How long would it take a sparky (or handiman) to chase in 15 back boxes, approx foot off the ground, in both brick and whatever internal walls in a 30's house are made from??

If some of the internals are lath & plaster, are these walls usually hollow so that I can drop a cable down it? This is due to the fact that I want to ceiling mount the UnFi Access Points, and will be feeding a couple cat6 cables up to the loft and drilling a hole in the roof to plug into the AP.

Also I want to try and install sky into about 3 or 4 rooms. I have decided to go the proper satillite cable route (2 per room for sky+). What is the best way of doing this?I think most of the walls are external, so is running each cable directly outside the way to go?


Thanks

Nick

 

[Sam Gangee]

It's "satellite". The LNB cable is usually run outside and enters the room near the Digibox. All the information you need is here:
http://www.satcure.co.uk/sitemap2.html#tech

 

[ericmark]

My son is doing the same thing. He had to put the server cabinet into the loft before fitting the ladder as it's too wide for ladder hole. I think he has two 25 port switches originally intended running all the radiator thermostatic valves hard wired but could not find hard wired units for sale so seems forced to go wireless.

He decided to remove ceiling to wire as really wanted doing anyway also completely rewired house and re-plumbed the central heating at the same time with under floor heating in bedrooms and loads of insulation between floors plus moving bathroom wall and door and opening up door in living room and relaying floors wood block and using self leveller on other floors.

All plaster removed off the walls and replaced with thermal plaster board. Been at it a year still not finished.

Believe it or not this was not his original plan. Cutting channels in walls on a 1980's house is easy but with 1930's house often the plaster has blown and as soon as you touch it the plaster falls off the walls. Often electricians use surface wiring on old houses sticking self adhesive trunking on walls is the safe method even removing paper off the walls can result in huge chunks of plaster coming away. Much will depend on previous work done and also what the walls are made of. In my sons house there are hollow internal bricks raw plugs just will not work and hammer drill specially a SDS will smash the bricks so it's pain staking drilling with a tile drill and use toddles to hold anything up.

So bathroom wall where he wanted shower pipework hidden it was easier to renew wall than work with old one using a stud wall all pipes are within the wall. What you have to remember in the 1930's they did not have plaster board like we have today hence different building methods.

Not all 1930's houses were built this way and my mothers house post war had brick inner walls and in the main better plaster but even in her house when we came to do kitchen it was a complete re-plaster job as it all fell off the walls when old units removed. Likely years of damp had taken toll.

Paper is the main problem when chasing walls. With no paper assuming a good wall then some thistle plaster and a float and very easy to repair chase want the cable or capping to be firm if it bounces then that's a problem as a result plasters like metal capping. For mains today that is a problem with regulations and earthing so often oval conduit is used it does not bounce as much as plastic capping and the grove can be narrower. Often use screws with large heads either side to secure as hammer can cause more damage. With papered wall I would say forget it until paper comes off I have seen it so many times where plastered to paper level so when paper is removed plaster is proud of rest of wall.

I would try living in house for 6 months before you start as likely there will be other things required and some times one kicks once self for not doing Y when doing X.

In early days I put cables in my 1980's house for use latter. In the main never used. An example was telephone and fax I spent ages fitting double telephone sockets one direct to incoming phone the other an internal loop and when the fax machine was installed it linked both together so when a fax was received it turned off all phones to ensure a good fax signal even had the two numbers with two different ring tones which the fax machine recognised.

However latter fax machines did not require this system and latter all but one phone is cordless so all this wiring is now redundant. First router I had was wired only then got wireless but would not work between TV and office so required a cable. Today my router has no problem with that distance and all the LAN cables are now redundant.

Good luck Eric

 

[moosekat]

Thanks Eric

I would love to be able to wait 6 months, but we need to fully redecorate so it would be counter intuitive to decorate and then rewire. Also remember that I am not (hopefully) chasing full height of the walls. Only the bottom foot or so.
I have also just picked up from lidl a wall chaser for £60! Once we move in, I go have 2 weeks off to start wiring and decorating some of the rooms.

Thanks again.

Nick

 

[ericmark]

Again good luck. What is the important factor is quality of plaster. We did have all the tools until my sons garage was broken into and yes the wall and socket box chaser and sinker worked well in most houses.

But 1930's is the thing I looked at and too young to expect already re-plastered and too old to expect the plaster to be really firm.

 

[SimonH2]

It's "satellite". The LNB cable is usually run outside and enters the room near the Digibox.

Only because it's :
a) Usually an afterthought and it's too late to do it properly, and
b) The people fitting it are budgeted with only a few minutes/install to do it
And for good measure, they usually drill from the inside, using lots of pressure on the drill to make rapid progress, and blow half a brick (or worse) out of the outside of the house.

As the OP is, he can run all the cabling he needs before decorating, so not have washing lines around the outside of the house.


Back to the OPs question, I'd suggest he needs to try it and see what happens. There are techniques* that will minimise the amount you knock off, but if the plaster is blown then the only real fix is to pull it off and have it redone properly.
I make a point of opening up the holes in the backboxes so that the white oval conduit can finish flush with the inside of the box. No electrician on a job rate will do this - they will stop the conduit short and dogleg the cable to go through the hole, and then plaster in the cable. The former allows cables to be removed/replaced/added to with ease, the latter doesn't.

And don't fit any accessories until after the wall is plastered. It's a lot easier if the cable end is just wound up neatly inside the box so the plasterer can just go right over the box with his float. Also beware the plasterer that will "helpfully" knock out the excess plaster - which often breaks off a bit around the box where it will show past the edge of the accessory. When my mate had his kitchen done I made a point of telling him to tell the plasterer to leave it - it's less work to do it yourself than to go round filling in the gaps he'd made

* I always start in the middle of the chase, and angle my chisel so that the blows are into the gap I've made, working outwards until the chase is the width I need. With some practice it usually does the trick.

 

[Sam Gangee]

Also note that, wherever you decide to put the sockets, your spouse will decide that they need to be moved to the opposite wall within a year!