Wires in the wall

[ahhaa]

This is a kinda fuzzy topic...

We all have telephonic copper wires running thru-out our houses, its usually convenient to seating, TVs & computers; but also less and less useful in these cell phone times.

I was thinking about how to reliably transfer a lot of stuff from one computer to another- some ways were expensive, some were slow, one way that came to mind was to use the phone line (without the phone company) as a network connection.

In the end, I just moved a hard drive, but the question keeps coming back to me: what would be the best future use of all that signal wire in our walls? 8)

[aedipuss]

due to the tiny gauge of phone wire it can't carry much of a signal. even 56k modems had a hard time with it. you can use the power lines more effectively because of their larger diameter.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_line_communication

[Abbadon]

Install ethernet cable through the same conduits, make sure to use shielded wire to protect the data from electromagnetic fields, I think this called LAN.

Wireless is cool, but not as reliable, cell phones are cool, but I still love hard wired telephones for best sound fidelity.

[SLK001]

due to the tiny gauge of phone wire it can't carry much of a signal. even 56k modems had a hard time with it. you can use the power lines more effectively because of their larger diameter.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_line_communication

Totally nonsense.

Though it is true that the tiny gauge of the phone wire cannot carry much CURRENT, the amount of current required for data transmission is miniscule. The 56k limitation of the data rate is an FCC limit, not a current/wire gauge limitation.

You can use these lines for data transmission, but you will need to run tests to see just how fast you can transfer data. Just make sure that you are no longer connected to the phone company network (they DEFINITELY will not like that). Most ethernet cables, ie CAT5 cable, consists of twisted pairs in order to minimize noise pickup. Phone line is not twisted pairs, so you may be affected by noise pickup.

Powerline communications is also possible.

[AlanHK]

due to the tiny gauge of phone wire it can't carry much of a signal. even 56k modems had a hard time with it. you can use the power lines more effectively because of their larger diameter.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_line_communication

Wrong.

56 k modems are limited because they use audio frequencies, guaranteed to pass through all parts of the legacy POTS (Plain Old Telephone Service).

DSL broadband goes over phone lines using higher frequencies.

Anyway, ethernet is the way to go for fixed devices.
And the new generation of Wifi, 802.11n, is 160 Mbps.

[redwudz]

I run full color video of about 4.5Mhz bandwidth over six conductor phone cable at distances up to 150 feet with no problems, so it is possible to use it for data at decent data rates. It's probably good for maybe 10Mb/sec anyway. Worth a try with a 10/100 LAN NIC. But CAT5 cable would be a lot more reliable and allow higher data rates.

[edDV]

Before I went to wireless, I used HPNA 2.0 Ethernet to connect two remote computers to the host router using in home phone wiring. It worked well for internet/office type computing
http://www.homenethelp.com/web/howto/HomeNet-HPNA.asp

The new version 3.0 supports 100Mb/s so should do better with video.