Getting internet to the garage

A cable will be more consistent, more reliable, and won't subject your network to snooping as easily.

If you are going to bury cable, bury a couple of runs. They are useful for extending phone lines, feeding security cameras back to the house, and for any low-voltage alarm/status purpose.

putting the cable(s) in conduit will be best, but the cable that is rated for direct burial (shielded and flooded with gel) is good and should last 20 years or more. If you go the conduit way, put in a 1" Schedule 40 or Schedule 80 PVC electrical conduit. and add a RG-6 coax so you can run a TV feed out there as well from whatever you use to get TV (antenna, cable, satellite, etc.)

While it is possible to use WDS and multiple routers with external antennas to do this, unless you already know how, it will be a frustrating and maddening experience. If you dig, it will be hard work (or rent a trencher) to put the conduit 12" or more down, but once done, it will be done. You can bury your power line to the building in the same trench, and you likely will be digging for that anyway (If you put power in the same trench, I definitely recommend conduit, maybe even IMC conduit to get the metal shielding effect).

EDIT: I see you are running water and sewer to the building. Definitely drop a 1" conduit into the trench with power, water and sewer lines.

 

OK, a couple of points.
1. The router is looking for a 50 Ohm impedance. While using 75 Ohm cable works, it results in at least a 50% loss of signal for both send and receive due to the mis-match in impedance.

2. 25 feet of cable at 2.4 GHZ has a lot of loss. Typical TV coax cable (RG-6 Quad Shield) will loose nearly half it's signal over a 25 foot run (2.6dB) [3.0dB is a loss of half the signal].

So although it works, you probably are only getting less than 1/4 of the signal at the router to the antenna and also the same loss applies to the signal from the antenna getting back to the router (which is usually more critical, as devices use a lot less transmit power than routers).

Glad your setup works, but it's not one I'd recommend.

 

Correct,already will be trenching to tie the water and sewage to the existing house service.

No issues running the cat6 and cable in the same conduit? I'll be running a feed from the satellite I have to get it to the building.

 

Coax is shielded. Putting it and Cat6 in the same conduit should be fine.

 

In fact, you don't need to spend extra for the direct burial stuff. You can put in either standard PVC jacket Cat 5e or Cat 6 (same 1Gb/s performance for all intents and purposes in the home). It's smaller diameter and easier to terminate. If you use PVC conduit, make sure you use surge suppressors and/or static discharge units spec'd for digital lines/coax at both ends of the cables. Use them on the coax as well. Nearby lightening strikes can put spikes on buried lines via induction, even if they are in conduit.

No issues with different kinds of low voltage lines in the same conduit.

Additional note, distance between the router or switch in the house and the switch or device in the garage needs to be less than 300 ft of cable between them. If it's more than 300 ft, you'll need fiber rather than copper.

 

You can gigabit your network all you want. and it may be helpful if you're streaming stuff from your house to the garage, and even then...you have to make sure your equipment in the middle is going to allow gigabit transfers.

But you're limited as soon as it leaves your house and the 'pipeline' only allows 30-50mbps down and 5mbps up.

If you have power going from your house to the garage, consider something like the 'power line adapter' as well.

http://www.amazon.com/TP-LINK-TL-PA...d=1399176810&sr=8-1&keywords=tplink+powerline

 

:up:

 

Both Cat 5E and Cat 6 will do gigabit to 320 ft if installed correctly. Cat 6A will do 10 gigabit over shorter distances (~100 ft). Cat 6 and 6A cables are thicker, stiffer and harder to work with than CAT 5E cables.

I'd stick with CAT 5E. Half the price and essentially the same performance for the use you are putting it to.

 

Ah good to know. I figure roughly 75' of cable +/- 10'. 5E should work well enough.

 

Had verizon run a hardline as part of us signing up for fios. It rocks!

 

Might as well run CAT 7 instead of 6. Go all out, you know?

 

I put a wireless repeater in my pole barn. I put in dd-wrt firmware as the original firmware didn't support it. I have it mounted outside the barn under the entrance roof. It's about 150' from the barn to the wireless in the house.

Works awesome.

 

Yes, because working with thick, stiff, shielded cables is such fun, especially if you get no benefit from it.

Installing Cat 6A, CAT 7, or even CAT 8.1 in this instance is like putting a V12 turbo in a 1960 VW bug. Totally awesome, and a complete waste.

Now, if you were editing 4K video direct on the NAS in the basement of the house, it'd be different story. Then having a 10Gb connection might be useful.

 

On the conduit and surge suppressor, is that just with plastic or both? Is either preferred for one reason or another? Pouring Saturday so I new to get a piece set.

 

Metal conduit that is properly grounded will be better at resisting lightning surges than plastic, but because Ethernet is a 5V signal, surge suppressors are needed at both ends of a long (more than 50 ft) outdoor run in areas where there are thunderstorms, regardless of whether the conduit is plastic or metal.

With metal conduit (IMC) you will just replace the surge suppressors less often.

If your choice is betweem EMT (thinwall) metal and Schedule 40 Plastic, go plastic. Intermediate metal conduit (IMC) is stronger, but it will require cutting and threading to assemble (although you can use compression fittings above ground)

IF you go with the plastic conduit, pull a #12 bare wire in the pipe along with the communications cables, and ground BOTH ends of the bare wire. It will help drain/dissipate any static buildup or nearby lightning strike induced voltages

Also, metal conduit will pull easier than plastic, as there is a lower coefficient of friction with the PVC wire jacket on metal vs. the PVC wire jacket on PVC plastic conduit.

Plastic won't corrode/rust out over the next 30 years, but the trade-off is you are more likely to have a surge get into the lines that blows up the terminal gear.

If it were me, I'd go plastic with the drain wire ground. 1" IMC is a PITA to work with unless you have all the right tools. As long as your local electrical code allows the plastic, it will serve you well. You glue up the PVC conduit just like PVC water/sewer pipes. The conduit has bell ends for putting the sections together.

 

Yup. And leave a low-budget fish in there should you ever want to pull anything else through.

-jim

 

Pull Rope: (Cable Rope feed line)

http://www.mcmaster.com/#pull-line/=s2gcus

Although it's often not possible to add lines to a pipe with more than 3 cables and > 2 bends without re-pulling all the cables. (too much twisting and friction in the pipe)

 

We used to pre-lube them with KY.

No bad jokes please.

-jim