Ask MetaFilter posts tagged with homenetworking

How to pull cable using existing cable

Jupiter Jones — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 19:02:27 -0800

Our home builder installed cat6 network cable for me as a favor, but now that we've moved in, a cable tester now reports it as shorting out. Wires 5&6 are shorting. I guess they treated the cable too roughly. Does anyone have any advice for me on using the old cable to pull new cable through the walls to the second floor? If I was to install a messenger cable for future pulls at the same time, what should I use for that? I figure that I would pull two cables at once to future proof myself. How would I go about attaching these two cables to the cable being replaced so that it wouldn't break in the walls? Duct tape?

I've read references in other questions here about network cabling to "messenger cables", which you could use to pull further cable in the future, which seems like a good idea. What should I get at Home Depot to act as a messenger cable?

Any general advice on how to do this without treating the cable so roughly again that it breaks? I read about data cable lubricants for pulling... is this a good idea? What would you use for that?

I think the cable may be coming through a hole between an HVAC line and the floor on the second floor, which may be the culprit for breaking the line. I bought the house while it was half built, and he had already drywalled before I asked him to pull networking cable and coax cable.

Network reachable, but (Suddenly) file sharing stops working. Any thoughts?

TrueVox — Tue, 17 Jul 2007 17:16:26 -0800

My home network isn't cooperating. It worked fine for months, and then, unexpectedly (after a day of bad electricity (I hate my power company)), it isn't. See, if I couldn't connect to the internet (wired or wireless, no less!), I'd assume that my router was simply fried. But no, I can get to teh interwebs. Thankfully, even to the far reaches of Ask Mefi :). However, my file sharing (and printers too!) isn't functional. It's SMB file sharing (though I'm running a couple of Linux machines on the network too with SaMBa). I can ping the rest of the network, there's just something STUPID that I'm missing (I assume). Or can a power surge/failure fry JUST THAT PART of the router (I find that hard to believe, it's all just TCP or UDP, right?).

Anyway, thanks in advance!

Advice for building a home media network with virtually unlimited budget.

anotherpanacea — Fri, 06 Apr 2007 11:23:50 -0800

Home Media Networking Filter: Advice for building a home media network with virtually unlimited budget. Ideally, this network will connect four or five televisions to a media server and a big DVD jukebox. Once I've set it up, it should be extremely easy to use, and allow some sort of intuitive PVR functionality. I's also like to have the capacity to get 1080p on all the televisions in the house, though at present only two of them are able to pull that off.

The media box seems pretty easy: dual Hauppauge tv tuners, mythTV or maybe the PC version of ReplayTV, dual 500GB SATA drives, etc. But how do I connect all that data to the televisions spread around the house? I'm planning on using wireless N, but what's at the other end? Xbox Media Extenders? AppleTV? MiniPCs? How can I ensure that the interfaces at each television are maximally simple to use?

In order for this setup to be absolutely perfect, it should allow the user to watch live or recorded television, something purchased from Itunes, or a movie on the DVD shuffler, pause it, and then move to another room and continue where she left off. It should also be possible to do different things at each screen. Is this an absurd demand? I'd also consider a Mac based solution, if PCs aren't up to the task at present, but I'd need a lot more guidance.

Network attached storage for media streaming on Mac

cahlers — Mon, 05 Feb 2007 04:30:25 -0800

I'm interested in setting up network-attached storage for my media, which mostly consists of digital photos (iPhoto) and 70+ GB music accessed via iTunes. I'd appreciate any links to blogs, etc. discussing this sort of thing for the Mac. My music collection continues to expand. Currently I have AirTunes over a wireless connection, and iPhoto and iTunes libraries on a 250 GB external Lacie drive. Eventually I'll want to set up a Sonos system. I have some time to set all this up, since it won't happen until I move this summer. That also means I'll have some control over wireless modem placement, etc.

I already looked at this link: http://techdigs.net/content/view/134/46/, and am interested in other discussions along these lines.

. . . building a home network so cool, it's HOT.

datacenter refugee — Sun, 14 Jan 2007 00:24:27 -0800

Not-My-Walls-To-Cut-Through-Filter: Anyone have experience running Cat5 through HVAC ducts? I just moved into a space-limited Row Home and would like to keep my rack of various equipment (dvr, X10, security, nas) out of sight and earshot. The basement looks to be ideal for this purpose - but with plaster walls and new hardwood floors I can't in good conscience drill to run cable to the first and second floors. New windows eliminate the possibility of external-house runs, and the existing cableTV drops were drilled through the houses external brick and grometted. The only option seems to be the existing heating duct. There is a straight vertical duct-work run to all floors that terminates in the basement roughly 8' from the furnace itself. My non-plenum rated cable says it has a max operating temp of 140°F.

My question(s):

- Has anyone ever done this?
- Did the cable (or even cable jacket) melt?
- Would a 70+ year old duct run have built-in obstructions like a grate or something to stop urban rodents?

Thanks in advance!

NAS for dummies 2

Dave 9 — Thu, 14 Sep 2006 11:27:35 -0800

Network Attached Storage for dummies 2 [a follow-up to this post]: If you backup your home computers to a device that's also sitting in your home, do you then take additional backups off site? And what about encryption? (Thinking of fire, or if the babysitter walks out of the house with the NAS drive in her backpack.) (1) Do folks backup the backup? I'd welcome any thoughts, methods, recommendations.
(2) Can any of the NAS devices do encryption on the fly? Would be nice if stolen data remained inaccessible.

Traffic shaping with a cheap consumer router

Eamon — Sat, 23 Jul 2005 21:35:04 -0800

Are there any inexpensive home routers with support for traffic shaping? I'm willing to load third-party firmware as long as it's stable and cheap. It looks like some of the alternate firmware distributions for the Linksys WRT54G can do this... if you've done traffic shaping with one, I'd love to hear about your experience. However, I'd prefer to save money and forego wireless capability if possible, since this thing will be sitting in my basement. Besides, I already have a fine wireless router that I plan to use as a WAP in my improved network.

I am aware that I could just set up an old computer for this, but since I don't have one handy, I'd wind up spending more money on a PC and a switch. A consumer router would also generate less heat and consume less power.

TivoToGo without a Network

anastasiav — Thu, 05 May 2005 09:16:28 -0800

How do I extract a file from my Tivo and put it onto my computer? We have a Series2 box, but it is not networked in any way - we would need to physically hook a computer to the Tivo (somehow). Tivo provides this helpful information about how to play the files once they're moved, but nothing about how to actually move them, except the TivoToGo info, which requires that the Tivo be networked, which is more trouble than we want to go to to remove a single clip.

The eventual goal is to burn some material to DVD for storage, rather than saving it to video tape. I'm sure there is a simple way to do this, and that people do it all the time, but clearly we are not those people.

Rookie Home Networker

jonmc — Sun, 27 Feb 2005 10:32:50 -0800

I've just recently set up my first wireless home network consisting of a Win XP box on a cable modem hooked up to an AirPort Extreme sending a signal to an iBook. It's working great except for problems with my favorite p2p program (WinMX). I now have to use a "secondary" connection to the network which yeilds less effective search results and performance and I am unable to upload files to the network. My research tells me that I need to do some fiddling with my firewall to make things work better, which is uncharted territory for me. Does anyone know what I need to do, and can you explain it to me in basic, clear terms. Thanks.

Mp3 Players for Home Stereo

skwm — Mon, 31 Jan 2005 12:54:43 -0800

Looking for recommendations on networked mp3 players for a home stereo. [+] I've been browsing around, and there are an awful lot of them available. The Netgear MP101, the SliMP3 Squeezebox, the TurtleBeach AudioTron, and a whole lot more.

Features I'm lookg for are:
- wireless ethernet
- no local storage - all mp3's will reside on my server, not on the mp3 device
- RCA output
- simple to control from the front panel/remote control. I don't want to have to pre-load it with playlists, or go to my PC to choose what songs to stream to it
- My mp3s are scattered in a few locations, so the device will need to be able to "mount" several network paths at once
- Price is important, but I will pay more if it's worth it.
- I don't really care if it plays other formats besides your standard mp3.