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Running Cat. 6 computer cable
- Thread starter bigj2
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- #3
I built a house a couple of years ago and ran coax and cat6, much like you are planning to do. When running any sort of low voltage wire, the AC power lines are always a potential issue. The more contact you have with the wires, especially running parallel, the more likelyhood of intereference. I would even recommend that if you need to cross over any AC power lines that you do so at a 90 degree angle.
The holes that you would need to drill would be small and this is a relatively easy task to do before the walls go up. If you have the "Silent Floor" beams which are 2x4s with 12" of OSB between them (or a comparable product) there should be perforated knockout holes already present and all you need to do is hit them with a hammer - ie no drilling, except the headers and foot plates.
One suggestion, when I built my house, the local cable TV company, Time Warner, offered to run upto 8 lines of coax cable free of charge. Basically, they hire a couple of guys to do the work. I took advantage of this and had these same guys run all the TV, cat6 network and (cat6) phone wires and I think they charged me about $150 for all of it.
If you haven't considered it, look into the centralized distribution boxes. I bought one at the Home Depot, made by Leviton and I was able to get the terminal boards for all the phone jacks, etc. In any event make sure all your runs go back to a single location and don't daisy chain anything.
One other thing to consider, regarding the electrical boxes you plan to use. I was told that you want to get the open frame boxes, the ones with sides only and no back so that you do not pinch the wire. I didn't do this and used regular boxes and I am not having any problems, but I was still told this was a mistake.
Lastly, if you haven't considered it, this would also be a good time to wire in any speaker wire / whole house sound systems or alarm systems. If you want to do a sound system, you will need to use special speaker wire that has a certain UL rating (CL4R or something like that - I forget) because it is a relatively high current wire. If you do run this you will most definetly need to keep it away from the AC runs.
My appologies if this information is all old news to you, but it was a real learning experience when I went through this so I figured it would be better to say something than to not.
The holes that you would need to drill would be small and this is a relatively easy task to do before the walls go up. If you have the "Silent Floor" beams which are 2x4s with 12" of OSB between them (or a comparable product) there should be perforated knockout holes already present and all you need to do is hit them with a hammer - ie no drilling, except the headers and foot plates.
One suggestion, when I built my house, the local cable TV company, Time Warner, offered to run upto 8 lines of coax cable free of charge. Basically, they hire a couple of guys to do the work. I took advantage of this and had these same guys run all the TV, cat6 network and (cat6) phone wires and I think they charged me about $150 for all of it.
If you haven't considered it, look into the centralized distribution boxes. I bought one at the Home Depot, made by Leviton and I was able to get the terminal boards for all the phone jacks, etc. In any event make sure all your runs go back to a single location and don't daisy chain anything.
One other thing to consider, regarding the electrical boxes you plan to use. I was told that you want to get the open frame boxes, the ones with sides only and no back so that you do not pinch the wire. I didn't do this and used regular boxes and I am not having any problems, but I was still told this was a mistake.
Lastly, if you haven't considered it, this would also be a good time to wire in any speaker wire / whole house sound systems or alarm systems. If you want to do a sound system, you will need to use special speaker wire that has a certain UL rating (CL4R or something like that - I forget) because it is a relatively high current wire. If you do run this you will most definetly need to keep it away from the AC runs.
My appologies if this information is all old news to you, but it was a real learning experience when I went through this so I figured it would be better to say something than to not.
When we finished our basement, we decided not to run any cables at all - we decided to go wireless.
The only cables we ran were coax (to distribute to the wireless hubs, and for the TV - not yet available in wireless) and the phones (we put the base station/recharger in the basement and just use the handset around the house).
Just a thought.
The only cables we ran were coax (to distribute to the wireless hubs, and for the TV - not yet available in wireless) and the phones (we put the base station/recharger in the basement and just use the handset around the house).
Just a thought.
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