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We currently have Virgin Media for broadband and phone. Up until recently this was our only option for fast broadband. We can now get fibre to house from BT etc.
The house was built with the cable for Virgin Media TV/Broadband run to the lounge. The Developer's site manager said it ran through a conduit under the floor, but it actually looks like it goes up over the ceiling as all of the cables head upwards.
The duct from the street for the FTTP goes to our front door, but I don't really want the ONT and router in the hall. Mainly because it will get bashed about by the pushchair or played with by young children
I think there are two other options
1. Run the optical cable further, around the house and into the understairs cupboard. I can easily get a power socket installed here as the RCD box is there. This has a couple of issues though. The router would be in cupboard, not great for WiFi. Secondly, connecting the house phone line would require the cable to be run, either back outside or inside the house.
2. Run the optical cable even further around the house to the lounge and bring it in where the Virgin Media router currently is. The issue here is the area is already quite congested. There's a 'media panel', with the phone line, satellite and power connections, plus the VM connections. The OpenReach engineer might be wary of drilling through here. Plus the router would still be in cupboard, albeit a thinner wooden one. The VM router seems ok but I use a LAN Powerline adapter for my work laptop upstairs.
I think the ideal setup would be that everything is in the understairs cupboard and I have a WiFi access point (outside of the cupboard) to get the signal out to the house.... but that presents other challenges like the aforementioned telephone line and then getting a LAN cable to the access point. A Powerline adapter might help with that
Any thoughts from the STW Hive mind?
No help on the route for your cabling, but you might want to check that your exchange can handle voice over fibre. Ours cannot so we have a phone line and an FTTP line.
3. optical into understairs cupboard with modem, then ethernet from there to your lounge to the router/wifi AP. Splitting the two duties of "thus this outside cable into the internet" and "spread this internet around the house" makes things a lot easier.
Our master socket is in a cupboard in the bedroom which make sense to BT but is terrible in all other respects. Used to have a modem -> non-wifi router -> powerline in the cupboard, and then powerline -> switch -> NAS, work laptop, wifi AP in the study. Apart from Powerline being abysmal, that worked well (if I could be bothered I'd have run ethernet).
However I've now gone mesh and it's a great alternative. One point in the cupboard plugged into the modem, and another in the study extending the coverage and giving me some ethernet sockets for the stuff without wifi.
No help on the route for your cabling, but you might want to check that your exchange can handle voice over fibre. Ours cannot so we have a phone line and an FTTP line.
That would potentially sort one issue if the phone line came in the normal place by the front door as I think there's an already run extension to the media panel in the lounge.. there are wires going somewhere at least. How do I find that out?
@rossburton Mesh might be an alternative to a single access point. I think I'm leaning towards it going into the understairs cupboard
We can now get fibre to house from BT etc
Have you checked who 'etc' are? We had it from new in our new-build. BT were the ONLY providers up until late this year, so we've been paying through the nose 🙁
The other listed providers were just business only subsidiaries of BT as far as we could tell, even pricier.
Funnily enough, it was Until-recently-BT Openreach who installed the fibre for free for the developer...
#notbitter
@13thfloormonk It was BT only for a long while. But recently we've gained a lot more options, PlusNet John Lewis, EE, Sky etc.... i.e. enough options for me to play them off against each other when renewal comes around
Good stuff, I would have done same but had fallen for the BT 'free upgrade' scam whereby they lock you in contract for another 24 months without telling you...
How do I find that out?
Cant say I am afraid, other than speaking to BT. I only found out when I complained the phone line wasn't working when I plugged a phone into the FTTP box's phone port. At least they only took another few weeks to run the phone line...