Assist in planning the layout of a new home.
Assist in planning the layout of a new home.
She’s dealing with a tricky Wi-Fi setup. The modem is downstairs in the closet, and her PC is upstairs on the opposite side, making the signal weak. The only Ethernet port is high up on the ceiling without a power source nearby, so running a cable isn’t practical. They bought a PoE injector but didn’t get a power injector either. You’re wondering if using that injector with a CAT5E cable from the closet’s router would help. It seems like it could work, but you might want to confirm with someone familiar with this kind of equipment before making a decision.
It seems this setup should function. I have a comparable scenario. When my house was constructed ten years ago and I became the second owner, the contractor installed Ethernet connections outside the property where the electrical enters from the street for both power and data (TV cable and POTS/now fiber). There’s no available power source at that spot. I had two Ethernet drops going to the exterior from my home office—one for sending POE/data from my main 16-port PoE Unifi switch to a compact 8-port PoE-powered switch at the outside location, which fits snugly inside its plastic housing. The PoE activates that 8-port switch and transmits data to the other drops inside my home, plus I also received one PoE output from that 8-port Unifi switch to an AP downstairs. I’d have liked it if the builder had placed the TV cables and Ethernet somewhere more accessible, like at the upstairs alarm panel or in the mechanical room for easier upkeep. Your sister’s case is similar. You’re correct that positioning the PoE injector near the modem/router and cutting the wire to the upstairs office would simplify things. The route from outside down to the Unifi AP is long, but there are no problems with data or power reaching it. I’m not very familiar with the EnGenius brand, though. According to their marketing materials, it works well in flower shops—a really large market. lol