Like 15 years ago, when I first bought the house, I was very keen on modernizing it. I was going to have a network closet and a server to run all the automation stuff throughout the house, and network wiring everywhere. It was ambitious and very much of-the-time.
Well, times have changed and for better or worse, I didn’t get very far with my plans. What did happen was the absolute necessities. I had network wiring and phone lines run for the two offices used in the house. I had set up a nasty wiring closet in a bedroom closet to house the network devices and wiring… but this story has been told already.
It’s been almost a year and a half since I moved my network wiring to its current location. And now, there is an impetus to make some improvements.
Projects have dependencies, and also, projects cause dependencies. One of the projects on my immediate list is fixing the lanai. The window sill needs replaced and it’s going to be upgraded to granite so it’ll never rot again. I have the quote for the work now, but I can’t start it. That’s going to put me out of my office for an extended period, and with me working from home as is everyone now, that’s not an option.
So, move to another room! I can’t. No other room has network wiring set up. So that’s the new priority: to get wiring set up in all the other rooms so I can relocate and free up the lanai for construction. Piece of cake, except for the unknowns.
I mentioned before that I had two offices wired up for networking, but now I only seem to have one. That is because when I relocated the wiring to the laundry room, one room’s cables didn’t reach anymore. So those need re-run. Those will be the easy ones.
While I am expending the effort, I had it in my mind that when the weather cools back down, I would delete all the phone jacks from the house. Land lines are now an antiquated concept and their presence actually lowers the impression of the house. So I will convert all the phone jacks to network jacks and leave a single phone line in the kitchen, in case someone really wants a physical phone and sets up a wireless base station.
So the re-wiring is going to be an unknown. I don’t know if the existing phone wire is stapled to any studs or if the hole in the framing is large enough for a cat5 cable. Since they are mostly installed on the outside walls, that’s going to be hard to access. While I’m at it, I may try and run a couple of ethernet lines from the FIOS ONT module inside, so I can eventually convert to ethernet completely for the internet access.
Then, after I have all my cables run, I have to upgrade the ceiling jacks by my router. I currently have a single jack with 6 ports. I’ll have to replace that with a 2-gang plate with 12 outlets. Eventually, I’ll need a larger switch, but for now, I can just patch whatever jacks I’m currently using to the router.
So at this point, I’ve committed the money. The CAT5 cable is ordered as is a cabling tool kit. It doesn’t seem there’s going to be any end to the home quarantine anytime soon, so this is the time for home improvement, isn’t it?