Move to the new house

[MurphCID]

Since the wife decided and pushed through the move to the new house (a single story house, not our current two story), I am allowed to set up my "man cave". The issue has now become I have an "L" shaped desk, and the room is set up so that the desk can only be in one spot. The internet connection also requires the boxes to be in one location which places me in an awkward position of having to organize so that I am not "daisy chaining" computers into one or two power outlets. I could move the internet boxes to another location by running a LONG, cable around the sides of the office and have a free power outlet. So for now I am not sure what I am going to do.

I purchased two new monitors, so the Windows desktop will get the two new ones, and the Thelio will get the old ones. The new ones are G-sync compatible and I could not get free-sync ones within my budget. So once the office is set up the Windows computer will be the gaming system, and the Thelio will be pretty much everything else. It looks like I am going to have to run Ethernet cables to both computers, and then around the room to where I am going to have to put the printers.

The house has Ethernet jacks in several of the rooms, but the router/modem only has three Ethernet jacks. So I am not sure how I am going to make this thing work if I want to connect Ethernet across the house. I also have to cram four large bookcases into the office, since She Who Must Be Obeyed has told me I cannot put them anywhere else in the house. So that is another consideration.

She is moving her desk to the area of the kitchen where the kitchen table would normally sit. I got an "open box" Dell 27" monitor with an hdmi to usb-C dongle so she can sit at the desk and connect her Macbook Air to the monitor as well as her keyboard since she likes to type on a physical keyboard (in her case an older Logitech).

So the adventure begins next week when the movers arrive.

[AndyMH]

The house has Ethernet jacks in several of the rooms, but the router/modem only has three Ethernet jacks. So I am not sure how I am going to make this thing work if I want to connect Ethernet across the house.

Get a switch and plug the router into that. My router has 4 ports and I also have an 8 port switch plugged into that. Even that is not enough, I have another 4 port switch in the attic and a 4 port switch in the garage.

[Lady Fitzgerald]

The house has Ethernet jacks in several of the rooms, but the router/modem only has three Ethernet jacks. So I am not sure how I am going to make this thing work if I want to connect Ethernet across the house.

Get a switch and plug the router into that. My router has 4 ports and I also have an 8 port switch plugged into that. Even that is not enough, I have another 4 port switch in the attic and a 4 port switch in the garage.

And here I thought I was nutz getting a router with eight LAN ports and running four Ethernet cables from the router to my bedroom.

[MurphCID]

Well that was a bust, only two rooms have the proper RJ 45 jacks. So it is back to wifi.

[AZgl1800]

I used to have AT&T ADSL, the cable comes into my office, which is not used anymore, except for storage

we have two hotspots with 2g, and 5g plus a Gateway with 2g and 5g.

I like the freedom of WiFi, but not the bandwidth limitations.

[Lady Fitzgerald]

I like the security of Ethernet; it is pretty much impossible to hack into, unlike WiFi. It's also more reliable. I have WiFi capability but keep it turned off unless I need the portability (which is rarely). Routing the Ethernet cables through my home was a royal...no, make that ROYAL PITA (and other body parts) but was well worth it.

[AZgl1800]

Well that was a bust, only two rooms have the proper RJ 45 jacks. So it is back to wifi.

just run a new run around the house, you know you have to do it anyway.

[majpooper]

It is a BIG PITA but if you can somehow run just one CAT 5 or 6 cable from your man cafe to where the router is located all you will need is a switch in your man cave. I was lucky in that as my house was being built I had them run Coax and Cat 5 to every room in the house from the garage where I have the Cable modem and my routers. In my other house my brother-in-law "fished" the wall from an extra room we had upstairs that we used as a home office down to the kitchen closet where the router was located. You may be able to do something like that.

All my runs terminate to a switch that then connects to my wired router. Then in the room where I have more than one device I connect them into a router at the room end. I have no speed issues and the wired network is faster and more secure. I use a Y router config so that my guests can use my wireless router but they can not get onto my LAN - I have too many guests with Windows and I really don't want them to have access to my home network.

[AndyMH]

Neat, what did you use to create the diagram?

[MurphCID]

I also want to know how you created that diagram, that is too cool. I will see more Tuesday when the Spectrum cable folks show up to set things up. I have looked, and my brother in law has looked and there are two, a total of two cable jacks in the house one in my office, and one in the Spouse-Unit's sewing room. The money has pretty much run out for upgrades at this point, so if I am going to eventually run Ethernet, it looks to be next year most likely. But it is literally astonishing how much junk we have been packing and discarding. Monday I start on boxing up the books in my office, and disconnecting the computer. I am going to start some light moving today with clothes, and other stuff that needs to go.

[majpooper]

Neat, what did you use to create the diagram?

Here is the link:
https://online.visual-paradigm.com/diag ... -software/
Just a heads up; yeah it's free until you want to really use it and keep your diagram . . . maybe - I may not understand exactly how that part works. But being a hack (nothing that Murph or Andy don't already know) I took a screen shot then cropped and edited it on GIMP including erasing some shadow stuff at the top. Also I don't show the 4 additional runs that come out to the switch where the routers are because they are not in use, I had them run a coax and Cat 5 from each bedroom (never used) and 2 Cat 5 runs from the computer room (in retrospect that was a waste as I really only needed one - not sure what I was thinking 10 years ago).

I also want to know how you created that diagram, that is too cool. I will see more Tuesday when the Spectrum cable folks show up to set things up. I have looked, and my brother in law has looked and there are two, a total of two cable jacks in the house one in my office, and one in the Spouse-Unit's sewing room. The money has pretty much run out for upgrades at this point, so if I am going to eventually run Ethernet, it looks to be next year most likely. But it is literally astonishing how much junk we have been packing and discarding. Monday I start on boxing up the books in my office, and disconnecting the computer. I am going to start some light moving today with clothes, and other stuff that needs to go.

When I retired and we decided to settle in NC we had been moving around with our household furniture etc. but we never really would take everything with us. So over the years it was we just but that extra bedroom set or stereo or whatever in storage and sort it out later. Well later finally came . . . . It was either leave all that accumulated crap in storage for the rest of our lives or start dealing with. We literally could have furnished two houses easy. what we couldn't give away to family and friends we took to a consignment shop - what they didn't want we took to Goodwill. I was surprised - we made several thousand dollars from selling all that stuff on consignment. It took a almost two years but finally we got down to a manageable amount of "stuff" although my wife still has class 5 hoarder tendencies so the attic and garage are packed but no more storage fees.

[Lady Fitzgerald]

...I had them run a coax and Cat 5 from each bedroom (never used) and 2 Cat 5 runs from the computer room (in retrospect that was a waste as I really only needed one - not sure what I was thinking 10 years ago)...

You were smart and trying to future proof your network. Even if you never use the second cat 5 in each room, it's still better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it. Running additional cable after the house has been completed is a chore and, unless you do the work yourself, can get expensive, depending on how the house is built and where you need the cable.

An advantage to having that additional run, even if it's currently unused is, if the one you are using goes bad (unlikely but it can happen, such as a mouse chews it, someone drives a nail though it, or it had a weak spot that finally gives out), you already have a replacement in place. Another advantage is, if you need more bandwidth that exceeds the capability of cat 5 to a room that has multiple devices, you can split the load between the two existing cables.

If I was going to have a home built (which, at my age and finances, will never happen unless I win the lottery I never play), I would have all wiring and cables run in conduit (along with a pull string for possible future ) or hidden chases (such as a drop ceiling; they can be made to look like a coffered ceiling instead of one in an industrial office) so replacing and/or upgrading anything wouldn't involve demo and repair.

[MurphCID]

Started on the making boxes, and storing books in them. I am going to need more boxes!

[majpooper]

I was lucky in that my brother-in-law started out as an electrician - I guess apprentice you would call it - during and after High School. When he went to get his license he failed the color blind test - and he never knew he was color blind. Anyway he had learned enough to know how to fish walls and he ran a CAT 5 from our second floor to where our router was in our old house. But, yeah, I would never have known how to do that.

[Dullard du Jour]

I was lucky in that my brother-in-law started out as an electrician - I guess apprentice you would call it - during and after High School. When he went to get his license he failed the color blind test - and he never knew he was color blind. Anyway he had learned enough to know how to fish walls and he ran a CAT 5 from our second floor to where our router was in our old house. But, yeah, I would never have known how to do that.

Years ago, the company I worked for hired this fellow, he worked about a year and they sent him out to wire a bunch of RS-232 connectors. After 4 days on the road he returns and the following week another team starts testing. Every cable failed. Cables are picked up and every cable has the same wiring mistake. One of the guys is unhappy, growls, and ask the tech if he is color blind. The tech says that he is. We almost fell over in disbelief as every applicant is asked on the application paper if they are color blind. He answered Yes, and someone still hired him. He was never sent out to wire connectors again.

It turns out that he identified colors by different shades of gray, however, there were two colors that he would confuse as they looked the same.

[majpooper]

I was lucky in that my brother-in-law started out as an electrician - I guess apprentice you would call it - during and after High School. When he went to get his license he failed the color blind test - and he never knew he was color blind. Anyway he had learned enough to know how to fish walls and he ran a CAT 5 from our second floor to where our router was in our old house. But, yeah, I would never have known how to do that.

Years ago, the company I worked for hired this fellow, he worked about a year and they sent him out to wire a bunch of RS-232 connectors. After 4 days on the road he returns and the following week another team starts testing. Every cable failed. Cables are picked up and every cable has the same wiring mistake. One of the guys is unhappy, growls, and ask the tech if he is color blind. The tech says that he is. We almost fell over in disbelief as every applicant is asked on the application paper if they are color blind. He answered Yes, and someone still hired him. He was never sent out to wire connectors again.

It turns out that he identified colors by different shades of gray, however, there were two colors that he would confuse as they looked the same.

The funny thing is my brother-in-law never knew he was color blind and never had any problem with the different color wires. Now granted residential electric wires are basically red, black and white as opposed to the different colors that CAT cable has. But he had to actually take a test - and he failed it. He ended up becoming a lineman for the electric company and eventually the Safety Supervisor.

[Lady Fitzgerald]

I couldn't work in the trades because I'm color blind. I do see colors, just not the way others do and I have trouble telling some colors, or certain shades of colors, from other colors.

By the time the company I worked for removed the color vision restrictions for Machinist and Metal Fabricator (aka welder), I was too old for the apprenticeship program. By the time the age restriction was removed, I was making too much in warehousing and had too many bills to take the cut in pay needed to get into the apprenticeship program. I would have preferred to have worked in the relay side of Meter/Relay.

Ironically, I had worked as an incoming electrical inspector for Motorola the summer between my freshman and sophomore years of college testing incoming electronics components like resistors, capacitors, transistors, ICs, etc.. They even tried to get me to stay on despite my color blindness. But, when I challenged the basic electricity course (took a test to get credit for the class without having to take the call), I got only a B because of the color code section. The professor even admitted that I would have had a perfect score if I hadn't been colorblind (I wrote down what I thought the colors were and got the color codes correct based on what I saw). He wouldn't budge even after I pointed out that my color blindness hadn't been a problem when I worked for Motorola.

At least I was able to ace the Woodworking Handtools test (perfect score).

[AZgl1800]

Green is BROWN,
I swear to God that it is...

[Lady Fitzgerald]

Green is BROWN,
I swear to God that it is...

There are times I can't tell the difference. Sometimes, green looks like yellow to me. I never can tell the difference between blue and purple. The list goes on.

[majpooper]

. . . I wrote down what I thought the colors were and got the color codes correct based on what I saw . . .

This sounds like my brother-in-laws story - he claims he could distinguish all the colors of the wires themselves looking at them but the actually color blind test he failed to many of where you see a number in a sea of color circles.