Building a home internet network from the ground up.
Building a home internet network from the ground up.
They’d likely choose Ubiquiti products, especially their PoE switches and roaming APs, which pair nicely.
Consider future needs when choosing cabling. Cat6a supports up to 10 gbps over 100 meters, while regular Cat6 works well up to about 55 meters—stay under 40 meters if possible. Tailor wall sockets for a 5-port switch per wall using Poe-compatible MikroTik devices. This setup lets one network cable handle both data and PoE. Fiber options are available; many datacenters now use 10g/40g switches due to shifts toward 25g/100g standards. Placing more than two Ethernet ports on a wall isn’t practical—usually a compact 5-8 port switch suffices. Include at least one port for Power over Ethernet in case you need IP phones, and route cables to corners for cameras or other devices. Cat5e is often sufficient for cameras, which typically require under 1Gbps.
No, skip the Cat7—it's best for short ranges and needs costly, tricky connectors. It's not ideal for wall outlets; it works more like a patch cable (direct jack). In my imagined home setup, I'd run four fiber cables to a compact rack or a small enclosure in a corner or above the door, out of sight. Each would carry 4 x 10G or 40G QSFP+. Later, you can upgrade to 25G/100G by swapping transceivers on the switch. The fiber stays consistent between the central server room and each room's switch, with extra space in the wall for future splicing if needed. Inside that box, I'd tuck an access point for wireless use. For redundancy, I'd also run a couple of Cat6a cables to every wall outlet.