When building houses, one thing that often gets forgotten until it is too late (e.g. drywall is already up) is the wiring for cable TV, computer, telephones, thermostats, and door bells. This is commonly called “low voltage” wiring by electrical contractors and the NEC (National Electrical Code).

It is quite easy to have this done while the walls are open and thus avoiding having to pay the phone company or cable company to do this. Even if the walls are finished, the wiring can still be installed, it just takes more time.

Running cabling in open walls is easy. The installer needs to follow the latest version of the NEC, as of this writing NEC 2005. I recommend installing either plastic or metal electrical boxes to terminate the wires in. In my house I pulled two runs of category 5E and one run for quad shielded RG-6 coax to each room. In larger rooms such as the living room and master bedroom, I ran two separate drops. On the first run of Cat 5 cable, I installed two RJ-11 jacks for regular phone line wiring. On the second run I installed an RJ-45 jack for computer network wiring. In the basement, the telephone lines are terminated on a small phone line punch block made by Leviton. This is a bridging block, i.e. all of the lines terminated on this block are bridged together.

The computer network is terminated on a different type of block, called a patch panel, which has individual RJ-45 connectors for each line. This allows the computer network to be connected to a small network switch, which is in turn connected to the DSL modem. With ethernet computer wiring, there are two standards, T568A and T568B. It does not matter which standard is used, so long as the same standard is used on both ends of the cable. Usually the patch panel will have either an “A” or “B” to indicate what standard was used to wire the RJ-45 jacks on it.

The RG-6 coax is terminated on both ends with type F connectors, which are standard CATV equipment. In the basement, the incoming CATV feed is connected to a six port splitter. This allows the CATV signal to be routed to any or all rooms as needed.

Each drop is terminated on a Leviton 6 port termination plate. These plates have 6 opening in which various wire terminations can be mounted. RJ-11, RJ-45 and double F female connectors are what I used. Also available are terminations for speaker wires, RCA connectors and other types of audio wiring.

To run wiring in the wall, locate the position of the wall from the basement. You can usually tell where walls are by looking for a line of nails, most often protruding. Verify then verify again you are in the correct spot. You don’t want to drill a hole up from the basement through your floor or carpet. Once you are sure, drill your hole. Make sure it is large enough for all the cables. Snake your cables up into the hole, then go upstairs. Locate the approximate position of your cables in the wall. Most old work boxes come with a template. Using the provided template mark the wall where you are going to locate the box. Then cut out the drywall. You should be able to see the cables in the wall cavity. Grab them and run them through a knock out in the old work box, then mount the box.

Our home computer “network” is really pretty simple. My wife has an Apple Powerbook laptop that uses an Apple airport wireless network. The airport is stationed upstairs in the living room. We did not try putting it in the basement with the DSL modem, it doesn’t seem to make much sense to put it there. She also has a color printer and scanner (both USB) that I want to hook up to the network. The printer should be pretty easy, just buy a box. I am not sure about the scanner although I never really looked into it. My computer is a Dell laptop, but I am using a wire, not the wireless card.

Here is a video on installing computer network wiring. Pay attention to the RJ-45 jack Tim is holding. You see the two different wiring standards marked “A” and “B” on the jack. They have different color codes, so be sure to use the right one!

Here is another video on structured wiring, which is the name for the overall low voltage wiring system:

This year (I keep saying to myself) I am going to install an outdoor automated weather station and log all the weather conditions and upload the data to the internet. I think I can get an older P2 or P3 computer for free from my job. That will be all that I need to run the weather logging software. I have always been a bit of a weather freak so that should be a fun project.

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