Ok, since earthlink's Live Chat from India™ was so worthless in this matter (though I was wished to have a "sparkling day") I'm asking this here.

So I'm moving into a new apartment and the whole apartment is wired with cable outlets in each room, but there's no ethernet connections in each room. We're planning on getting cable internet but want each room to be able to have access.

Short of investing in some wireless networking equipment or running CAT5 all over the floors is there any way to have a connection in each room just using the cable outlets or is this a hopeless quest.

If it is hopeless anyone have any recomendations for making a connection wireless but then returning to an ethernet connection at the other end? A few of the computers are old enough that wireless connections would be a pain in the ass.

4/26/2006 2:01:44 PM

Wired/wireless routers are cheap as balls

wireless pci cards are $texas


your options for going from wifi back to wired would be something like a h4xed wrt45g or another comp with a wireless card and an open ethernet port for connection sharing.

of course if they're all in the same room you could just put the cable modem and router in that room so they can just use the wired ports.

also, someone was selling 2 wifi pci cards for $15 each in classifieds. thats a good deal.

[Edited on April 26, 2006 at 2:09 PM. Reason : .]

4/26/2006 2:09:21 PM

Yeah, I've already got routers, it's the wireless cards that are a concern. Best case we need to buy 2 pci cards and a USB dongle.

I thought about sharing between computers in the rooms, but unfortunately that required leaving a wind tunnel on all day, not the best option but possible.

In all, the wireless/wired option isn't impossible but I'd rather be able to use the existing coax.

4/26/2006 2:13:22 PM

Won't Time Warner give you wireless cards for the computers?

But, you can get USB wireless adapters for fairly cheaply. Just have each person who doesn't have a wireless adapter to do that, and get a wireless router.

4/26/2006 2:30:24 PM

http://www.mocalliance.org/en/index.asp is the near future solution (pci cards and modems) to using your houses coax network in the place of cat5...

cat 5 is superior based on direct link, but most houses are run with coax throughout.

wireless is the easiest solution today, just be warry of 2.4Ghz cordless phones, microwaves, or speakers in the transmission path.

4/26/2006 3:10:12 PM

^^ They do but I'm not paying an extra 10/month for that.

4/26/2006 3:14:01 PM