Hello everyone,
In about 3 weeks we should finalize our electrical planning on site. Unfortunately, our electrician is rather a bit "old-fashioned," which makes it difficult for me to plan a well-founded electrical plan for the future together with him – so currently I am in the process of acquiring some knowledge myself so that the networking in our single-family house is basically future-proof.
Basically, it's about the LAN networking... LAN connection sockets are relatively expensive, so proper planning is certainly even more important.
About us:
- Mid/late 20s - couple without children. Planned: 2 children in the near future.
- Single-family house with usable basement, 2 full floors, and fully equipped with concrete ceilings
- Technical room in the basement with air-to-water heat pump, ventilation system, photovoltaic system
- on the ground floor, the router is planned to be placed in the office
- on the upper floor there are bathroom / bedroom / 2 children's rooms
- no satellite dish and no cable TV ---> we will use internet TV exclusively!
Now I’m having a hard time networking our single-family house sensibly but as cost-effectively as possible.
I have the following questions:
1. A bit "off-topic": In the living room, I would like to have an in-wall conduit installed on the TV wall (the TV is to be mounted on the wall), so that no cables are visible. Is this sensible and affordable? I will get the exact prices from my electrician if it makes sense at all. Does it also make sense to possibly install power outlets at the height of the TV? How do you plan the connections on your living wall sensibly? What should be considered?
Since we plan to use a Magenta TV box and thus IP-TV, a total of 4 LAN ports in the living wall area certainly makes sense, right?
2. How many LAN sockets and especially where should LAN sockets be installed? Above all: which cable? Is CAT6 sufficient?
--> Such a double LAN socket certainly costs around €200, which means it should really be planned sensibly.
Is it really necessary to install 2x 2 double LAN sockets directly in children's rooms? I always wonder: What should actually be plugged in there??
1 socket for TV and 1 socket for a multimedia device should be sufficient, right? So 4 connections are certainly oversized, correct?
The fact is: It will surely take years/decades until our children actually use these sockets... Who knows what will change here? Therefore, we could probably also work cost-effectively with empty conduits, right?
Is there possibly also the option to "branch off" later on an existing double socket so I can reach more connections for the room? What should be considered here? Or should one consider preparing an empty conduit at another point in the room so that a socket can be installed later?
3. How do you solve the "problem" with the router? Place 1 router in the office (ground floor), install LAN sockets in the existing bedrooms on the upper floor, so I have a stable LAN connection there? Or is a router on the upper floor absolutely necessary?
4. How important are LAN connections in the technical room? Shouldn’t the router possibly even be placed in the technical room? Due to the concrete ceiling to the ground floor, another router is certainly needed? How should you handle the situation with a basement?
5. What do you think about laying empty conduits for CAT cables in the kitchen / hallway etc. to be able to retrofit later? Is this relatively cost-effective in new construction?
I would appreciate any feedback so that we can make our planning as good as possible :)
I can share our experiences (complete renovation) and give a few recommendations. We had two installation cables installed in every room (each with a double socket; I would say that in most cases a single socket is enough, since more and more is being done via Wi-Fi anyway). You should then just know/suspect where the devices and desks will be located. In addition, we had individual lines laid to the following places:
[*]Next to the front door for the Doorbird outdoor station
[*]On the ground floor at the stairway for the Doorbird indoor station
[*]In the hallway on the 1st floor
[*]In the hallway in the attic
[*]3x on the ceilings of ground floor/1st floor/attic for three access points
In total, 23 installation cables lead to a patch panel in a small storage room in the basement. There is also a 19" network cabinet where I consolidate the rest of the infrastructure:
[*]24-port PoE switch (Unifi USW-Pro-24-POE)
[*]A FritzBox (Wi-Fi disabled)
[*]A NAS
[*]A Doorbird I/O controller
[*](sometimes a Raspberry Pi or Jetson Nano) :)
From my perspective, it is very important that the access points are well distributed, precisely because Wi-Fi is becoming increasingly important. We now have a Unifi Access Point nanoHD on each floor and are very satisfied with it. We no longer need the FritzBox’s Wi-Fi and have disabled it.
For the DECT signal of the phone, the reception from the FritzBox in the basement (in the server cabinet) to the attic is actually sufficient. Of course, you can also use a DECT base station in a central location, such as the Gigaset Pro N670 IP DECT for about 100 euros. (Other alternatives would have been to extend the DSL signal via an installation cable and then go back into the network via a second installation cable; have the electrician lay the TAE socket directly on the ground floor; use a DECT repeater; or use a second FritzBox.)
Regarding the access points, I can only advise you to have installation cables laid directly into the ceilings for them. This looks good (or discreet) and provides good coverage. You should tell the electrician to choose a deep flush-mounted socket for this, because you then have to connect the terminated installation cable to the access point with a short patch cable.
The brilliant thing about it is that the access points already get power via PoE from my switch, so a single installation cable is enough. Besides Unifi, there are also good solutions from other manufacturers.
For the installation cables, Cat7 is commonly used in Germany today, which should be future-proof. I wouldn’t necessarily go lower than that for installation cables, since Cat7 is even better shielded than Cat6 and you either can no longer replace the installation cables without conduit or don’t want to replace them anymore (with conduit). I even decided on Cat8 installation cables—but that is too expensive for most. From the network sockets to the devices, Cat6 patch cables are sufficient on the short distances—they are at least somewhat more flexible.
What you need to pay attention to/know about this setup:
Such a large switch naturally also consumes more power than a smaller one. So if you already know that you won’t use 90% of the LAN ports anyway, it would be more economical to operate a smaller switch. (I just wanted to have such a setup.)
The access points each draw about 5W and unfortunately cannot be comfortably turned off at night, for example. That bothers me because it uses unnecessary power.
Unifi operates its devices via so-called software-defined networking, i.e., the devices themselves do not contain a controller or an administrative interface but are managed by a central controller. Although this is needed for the initial configuration, it does not have to run all the time. At the moment, I have it running on my NAS in a Docker container.
My setup is certainly at the upper limit of a purely private user. Everything can easily be done on a smaller scale. Important is that you realize what will be difficult to change in the future—and install a very good and sustainable solution there. Switches and FritzBoxes etc. can always be replaced. Good cabling maybe not anymore.
I can gladly share the cost breakdown here. However, let me first point out again that I consciously chose expensive but high-quality components because it is important to me and also a passion of mine. You can also get away cheaper. The prices below are rounded.
Here is the list:
[*2 x 250m Cat.8.2 installation cable --> €720
[LIST]
[*]I had to reorder a second set at short notice and there were also a few meters left over
[*]Roughly estimated (server cabinet in the basement, 7 connections on the ground floor, 8 on the upper floor, 8 in the attic) the cables then had an average length of about 20 meters
[*]46 x Cat.8.1 Keystone modules --> €395
[*]8 x empty box frame set 2-fold pure white for RJ45 Keystone modules --> €23
[*]2 frames are still missing from the electrician
[*]3 x Cat.6A Keystone angled for access points --> €21
[*]12 x patch cable 0.15m --> €34
[*]6 x patch cable 1m --> €11
[*]2 x patch cable 1.5m --> €4
[*]3 x patch cable 0.25m for access points --> €7
[*]19" wall/stand network cabinet NT-BOX from SCHÄFER - 12 U - 600 mm depth --> €280
[*]3 x 19" cable entry plate with brush - 1 U --> €30
[*]Two would have been enough for me here as well
[*]19" shelf - only 0.5 U height - 450 mm depth --> €20
[*]It wouldn't need to be that deep
[*]1 x 19" mounting rails for NT-Box from SCHÄFER IT-Systems - 12 U --> €21
[*]4 sets super-easy fastening material - M5 special cage nuts, M5 screws, washers - 12 parts --> €4
[*]19 inch power strip surge protection with switch --> €60
[*]1 x Ubiquiti UniFi Switch Pro 24 Gen2 - USW-Pro-24-POE --> €562
[*]3 x Ubiquiti UniFi Access Point AC Nanohd access points --> €438
In total, this should be €2630 according to the above breakdown. In addition, there were a few patch cables (either not the right length or for our end devices).
Perhaps another point to keep in mind with this setup: the power consumption caused by the switch, NAS, Fritzbox, the three access points (via PoE), and my Doorbird components (via PoE) is not insignificant. When all components are on, they require about 75W. I at least turn off the NAS and the three access points (each 15W) for seven hours at night. That leaves me with about 8Wh at night and about 18.5Wh during the day, in total now about 1.6kWh per day.