Help on DSL hookup

[Gunpowder]

I am somewhat techi but am limited in my internet hardware knowledge since I am in the darkages at the moment.

I am the sole employee of a nonprofit nature park. I live on the property and share the phone line. Currently we only have dialup here in copper land but Verizon finally ran some fiber between the local towns at least so we just got DSL set up and available in the last few days. I am close enough to our local switching hub so I can finally get out of the stone ages via DSL.

The capabilities are minimal but I have access to two speeds: 768 kbs/128 and 1.5 mbps/384 kbps. I currently maintain a website housed off property for the park. We have plans for a webcam of the birdfeeders so eventually plan to have a static type IP address for the cam but dynamic will work until we add the cam in future years.

My phone line runs first to the office to a distribution box and then a line runs across the yard approx 300 yds to my residence so the phone rings both in the office as well my house. I ran new conduit to the house this year so I ran a T5 and a T6 line. two wires of the T5 is currently supplying the phone to the house.

goal: I obviously want DSL in the house and the office. future plans are to provide public WIFI as well as the webcam for marketing purposes at the bird feeding station outside the nature center which houses my office.

Question? How can I set up the DSL so I can serve both the house and the office? I assume the webcam will require a server to pipe it but do I need to set up a basic server now for internet purposes or can I do this another way. I get 1 modem from Verizon.

I am clueless on DSL since it involves the phone line verses a cable modem. I still need to receive phone calls through this same line at both sites.

Any help would be appreciated. Also if I need to get additional equipment I need to know that ASAP as my Dec board meeting is Dec 11th and I want to ask for the budget for internet access and the basic equipment needs to get me up and running all at one meeting.

Thanks,

Mike

 

[grateful1]

Get Cable!


(Let me re-read it and I'll let you know)

Just make sure you have filters in all other items(other than computer connects) and you'll be fine.

 

[junkman_56]

I would use a wireless router.
It will give you the capability to access the internet from both places and not have to run cat 5 wire.

Just make sure to password protect it.

 

[robbiex0r]

This incorporates the two previous posts. As far as the streaming webcam, I'm not 100%, but the 1.5down/384up *should* be able to handle it. (you're not streaming birds in HD are you?)

There are some tricks to configuring wireless security, yes, but nothing too difficult.

Excuse the mspaint drawing, and I hope I didn't miss the point.

edit:
Budget: linksys wireless B/G router ~50
cable ~10
filters, should be free from verizon
1.5mbs ~40/month
webcam ~40 (for a nice one)
there might be other expenses I'm overlooking regarding the hosting of the webcam

 

[mrrt]

Hey nice drawing Robbie. A couple things to keep in mind Gunpowder. The max distance for an ethernet cable run. That would be the run from that router to the office Pc or the Home Pc, that max distance is limited to 100M. The thing I've found in the past is that you can run that distance ,but the closer you come to that 100M marker the more likely you are to run into some issues, like dropouts and LOS.

Another thing to remember is that you need to filter all those phone jacks that actually have a phone plugged into them. I'm not sure if Verizon does the whole house filter routine (they place a filter at their network interface point that covers all you phone jacks), but if they dont then you'll need to filter all the jacks, or if a phone is picked up it will drop the DSL sig.

And I agree about the wireless security. Its essential, sometimes tricky, but nothing that cant be handled.

Any issues just give a yell.

Art

 

[Gunpowder]

the house is like 350 feet from the office. I beiieve tthat is at the extreme of a signal so I might need to include a booster maybe right where the cat5/6 leaves the building or where it enters the house. Wireless would be nice shot to the house but it would have to be fairly directional I would think to travel the 350 feet to the house.

We have an astronomy observing field to the north with plans to eventually shoot wifi out to them. Perhaps 600-700 ft. Not sure how to do that.

 

[Marco-Polo]

I'd say use a repeater midway, although with the right wireless (Linksys WRT series using the DD-WRT firmware, for example, or using an aftermarket antenna) you can manually up the power a fair bit.

I can't say enough good things about the dd-wrt firmware. When I was living in Amsterdam, we couldn't get internet service installed, so I used dd-wrt to create an auto-roaming wifi stealer from my apartment block (it scanned available networks to find the best one, then so on, so forth.)

 

[mrrt]

Marco...the only thing I dont like about repeaters is they repeat (and amplify)everything, that includes any noise or garbage that is on the line.

One of the things I might suggest is the wireless approach. I would set one area as the main location, whether this is the house or the office is your call. Have the DSL modem and router setup there. The other location would best be served wirelessly. I really think that the long cable run is going to be more headaches than its worth.
To make the run to the other location your best bet is wireless. This could **maybe** be done with a SOHO wireless router like a Linksys. you might have to just try it and see how it works. Probably a better (unfortunately better always = more $$$) approach is to use an outdoor antenna off your wireless router. I have used Hawkings in the past and they work excellently. (NOTE: I have no affiliation with Hawkings, just like their stuff). That could easily handle the 300ft distance. It could also handle the distance to the astronomy area.
One other thing to keep in mind, and this is a biggie for you, is wireless signal are distorted and reflected and bounced all over the damn place by obstructions. If you guys are out in a wooded area, then line of sight is a big issue (line of sight from wireless antenna to reception area). If your line of sight is blocked by trees and buildings then you'll have to remember that the wireless signal strength is going to be decreased. So try to find a location for the antenna or antennas, if you need 2, that will give you the best line of sight. A site survey is a good idea. Go walk the area and scope it out. See what looks good and may work for you.

And FWIW...the dsl profile you choose should be the one with the 384k Up. The streaming feed will be constantly using the upstream bandwidth and the price difference between the 2 offers shouldnt be that much. If it is, you may need to look at a stream that isnt a total continual stream, but maybe updates every 10 or 15 0r 30 seconds and uploads that picture.

hope that helps..


Art

**edit for spell check

 

[moki]

I would not go wireless. Yes, you can get point to point wireless solutions that can bridge the 300 yards from your office to your home... but remember that you'll be susceptible to the vagaries of mother nature and line of sight obstructions.

I'd run Thick Ethernet cables in the conduit to connect your home to office. You'd then have this setup:

DSL line drop->Office Router->OfficePC
DSL line drop->Office Router->Thick Ethernet->Home Router in bridging mode->HomePC

You'd effectively have one logical network, with the office router using NAT to share your DSL connection among the office/home, and the home router in bridging mode so that you're just joining the two networks.

I'd also suggest buying routers for both home and the office that are wireless routers as well. That way you'd get 802.11/n wireless network bubbles around your office and home as well as a wired solution.

None of this will cost you a lot of money to do. My only suggestion is to buy more router than you think you'll need... makes it easier to upgrade when you have lots of free ports.

 

[mrrt]

Moki,
The only issue with ThickE cable is the speed

Thick Ethernet, 10 base 5
Speed: 10 Mbps
Max Len: 500 Meters
Cable: RG-58 type coax, 50 ohm impedance

** edit to add

If you use the rg58 coax then you'll need to convert rg58 to rj45 for connection to the router. I think the connectors I see are around $100. I havent use'd them enough to know if they are cheaper elsewhere on the Net.

Art

 

[moki]

Yeah, he could also probably get away with Cat5e or Cat6 1000baseT run through the conduit, and assuming it spans that distance, I agree it'd be the better solution.

I'm ruling out fiber, even though it's the best solution, simply because of the expense not just of the line, but the routers on either end too.

 

[mrrt]

Yeah, he could also probably get away with Cat5e or Cat6 1000baseT run through the conduit, and assuming it spans that distance, I agree it'd be the better solution.

I'm ruling out fiber, even though it's the best solution, simply because of the expense not just of the line, but the routers on either end too.

Moki,
The only difference between the Cat5e and Cat6e is the supported speed. The Cat6e just has more twists per foot on the pairs and between pairs to reduce interference and give the higher speed. the distance limitation would be the same. Still limiting to basically the 100M rule.

Fiber would be an awesome alternative but I agree with you that the costs of the line and network devices makes it prohibitive for this situation.

Cant somebody out there develop a cheap fiber solution...AHAHAHAH (me laughing and the manufacturers laughing too)

Art

 

[moki]

Moki,
The only difference between the Cat5e and Cat6e is the supported speed. The Cat6e just has more twists per foot on the pairs and between pairs to reduce interference and give the higher speed. the distance limitation would be the same. Still limiting to basically the 100M rule.

Right... that's why I said or. We have Cat5e in our office, and it's plenty fast (often faster saving to network RAID arrays then to local drives), but if I had to do it again now, I'd go with Cat6.

Thing is, I don't have the distance issues he does. I'm sure it will work, 100 meters is a bit over 300 yards, and that's just the rated distance... it's not like it will fail beyond that, it'll just degrade. I'm sure it'll work.

 

[mrrt]

Yep, if that Raid is a 0 or 5 i t will be significantly faster than your straight local drive. The stripe array is always a good choice for speed. The only time the local is faster is if they have that Raid set to be a straight 1 array mirror. Then you sacrifice the speed for redundancy.

Art

 

[Gunpowder]

tidbits and thoughts:

First. No obstructions between the house and office. Just a yard and parking lot between us.
I don't think they make wireless routers. wish they did, I can probably get these routers for free since I know the owners.

Linksys sure doesn't have many fans for their reliability.

 

[mrrt]

tidbits and thoughts:

First. No obstructions between the house and office. Just a yard and parking lot between us.
I don't think they make wireless routers. wish they did, I can probably get these routers for free since I know the owners.

Linksys sure doesn't have many fans for their reliability.

I dont have much experience with the Imagestream brand. And as far as the Linksys goes, they are much better now since they are a division of Cisco.

Art

 

[Gunpowder]

Here is the Verizon pricing. I also can get it from my local provider who already host my website. they contract to piggyback on the Verizon lines most likely for a cheaper price as they don't hit us with a higher business price for the same service.

I wouldn't need the Static level until we were set up to run the web cam but I am guessing that the 768 kbs/128 speed would not be very adequate for basic work like web management. incidentally the $29.95 I was quoted was for the 768/128 even though it list it as 1 mb/384 on the pricing page.

Incidentally, 1.5/384 is priced @ $37.95 by my local regional provider

 

[mysterea]

Hey, yaknow, I just scooped one of the Trendnet 802.11n wireless routers, it might be a really good solution for you, or absolutely useless without a repeater. but for 25$ w free 'budget' shipping!!??!? it's worth a try!

The wireless 802.11n protocol has a 'max range' of 300 yards, so it might be a bit too far (depending on your specifics) but if you put this in a second story window away from all your other devices it'd be worth a try. You will need 'wireless n' wireless cards for your computer at the 'off location', and the minus is wireless is slower than wired, but it's certainly a very cheap option. Keep an eye out on www.passwird.com for the cards cheap! Check reviews and such at www.newegg.com[/url and [url="www.amazon.com"]www.amazon.com] before you buy!

If you do need a repeater someplace between the two and you're crafty I saw a good DIY windmill (with 'found' parts) for just such a purpose. holler if you're interested.. I've also seen some good schematics for making wireless range extenders (directional) with (funny enough) wonton scoops.. again, if you go this route, let me know.