Basic network connection questions

[Sam Lord]

Hi all,

 

I'm upgrading a home network to send music and video to different rooms but am confused; I'm definitely not experienced at networking!

 

We have a small house with 3 (maybe 4 later) rooms where we *want* to watch video or listen to music. Now we only have one attached to our home network, and wirelessly at that. I know that wired is much more reliable, secure, and fast. Right now I have high speed cable broadband. The signal is split, one coax leg going to a good DVR, and the other to a new Motorola SB6141 cable modem and directly from there to a Linksys WRT54GL wireless router/4-port switch. I am about to connect my Mac Mini (late 2012) and the main audio system, which it now feeds, via CAT6A ethernet cable in place of the current, slow, wireless VNC connection. I'm also about to run 6A ethernet to the other rooms so that video and audio can be accessed. I'm only now learning to set up a home network. I have an AppleTV that I still haven't installed for the main system, and will probably get another one or two for AV sources in other rooms. All of our cables, modem, and router are located together in one small office next to the family room with the main HT-and-hotshot-audio system.

 

Note, there is only my wife and me in a small house. I *do* want to stream HD video and Hi-rez audio to at least 3 different systems in 3 separate rooms. I have no problem with the AV components *past* the network, well except for the AppleTV which I learning to use, I designed lots of audio gear.

 

My main question now is how I should set up the main internet connection; the advice I've heard is confusing. In a thread quite a while back, ever-helpful Eloise said in:

 

http://www.computeraudiophile.com/f22-networking-networked-audio-and-streaming/whole-house-wired-network-8547/

 

" Additional router thoughts...

 

Not sure if you were already thinking this... But I would use the router purely as a router (for Internet connection).

 

All wired Ethernet should go to a separate switch. And (optional but advised) get a separate wireless access point for your wireless connection(s).

 

Eloise"

 

So, what should attach to the cable modem? Should that be a good *wired-only* router with say, 8 GigE outputs and a high-capacity backplane, or would a very good wireless router with the same 8 GigE ports do the job? And what about other switches or WAPs downstream? If I get an Airport Extreme as the router attached to the cable modem, should I NOT use its wireless section, but add another wireless router/WAP downstream? We only need one wireless zone in the house, it is small enough for that. All my music is now on a HD attached to my Mac Mini and I use iTunes. (Um, just learning to do that!) Questions, questions, sorry!

 

I'm willing to spend some coin for good networking equipment but am not sure how to arrange it. Thanks for any help!

[jmhays]

Sam,

In this case pictures DO say 1,000 words, look here for what I mean. This is a good example of how you should think about setting up your network connections.

 

For youe specific requirements, look at the diagram and where you see router, think Airport Extreme instead. Sure you can buy a seperate wireless router, but since the Airport Extreme has one built in, use it. The simplest designs are usually the best.

 

In your post you switch back and forth between wired and wireless connections. Personally, I would recommend going wired every time possible, since again, the simplest design... Plus, you will not have any wireless signal dropouts or stutters using a wired connection right at the critical part of the movie and have to live with your wife telling you "I TOLD YOU SO!". Simplest design = BIG Wife Acceptance Factor = happy wife = happy Sam. It is *possible* to stream HD content over a wireless connection, for many people it can work fine. For me with my luddite of a wife (I call her little Miss Anti-technology), the screaming I would hear at the first wireless stutter is not worth all the agravation.

 

Since you have a small house, you *should* only need a single wired or wireless router (in your case the Airport Extreme). Depending on the layout of your house and where you have all your equipment, you should also only need a single switch.

 

I have a big house with far too many components connected together. In my office on the 2nd floor of my house I have a cable modem -> one wireless router -> switch -> whole bunch of stuff -> second switch in basement (2 floors down) -> bunch of stuff plus very long CAT 5e cable run -> 2nd wireless router (used not as a router, but as a wireless access point) -> bunch of other stuff. So, even in my large house covering three floors and too many square feet and too many toys, I only have one wireless router. The only reason I have two switches is because of the number of connections I need in the attached rooms.

[Sam Lord]

jmhays,

 

Thank you for your great reply! I expected and hoped I would be led this way. You answered every question I had! Wired connections, good equipment, no more boxes than necessary. Everybody says wired wherever possible, and the bandwidth, security, and reliability specs certainly support that. I definitely intend to be wired for all fast data rates, especially media streams of uncompressed audio and Hi-def video, not to mention batch transfers. The only reason I intend to keep a wireless point in the house is for my smartphone, kindle, iPad VNC control of my system, and surfing the web where and when wires are not convenient.

 

And thank you for linking to that GREAT article from How to Geek... I urge Chris to link to it in the CA Academy. From your explanation and the article, if my 8-port wireless router has enough ports, I wouldn't need any switches. And if I did, I could add them later. I think I'm set now. Once again, thank you for your time and great work!

 

Sam

[Fokus]

I agree with what was said above, but I also would urge you to add a switch between the router and the rest of the network.

 

Here's why: last year I did what you are planning to do, only even more so (more rooms, more clients).

 

The initial configuration used some of the router's ports (and thus its internal switch function) for passing media to one particular room. After a while the clients in that room got slower detecting the media file server, and after more time even refused to find the server. The other rooms were OKish, but also getting rather slow.

I inserted then one 8-port switch, reconnected all rooms to it, and left only a single cable between switch and router. Now the router only has to be DHCP server for the house, and do internet traffic. It no longer has any business with DLNA/UPnP and file traffic, and the network has been running like a (HS) train for months now.

[Sam Lord]

Thank you Fokus. When I asked the purpose of a bridge immediately following a router, you were the first to note that the the router will generally slow down if its ports are used in addition to routing and wireless activity--I had expected it would. Thanks for confirming!

-Sam

[roccoriley]

I prefer to use static addresses for this type of application.

[Paul R]

Eh, the router is unlikely to slow down in your situation. Even inexpensive quality router/switches, like the Airport Extreme which I also strongly recommend, have very fast multi-gigabit backplanes. What that means is more than one port can be talking at once, at full speed.

 

I use Airport Extremes to route and bridge traffic for the audio/video network all over the house, and it works flawlessly with multiple audio systems and ATVs.

 

Like the other folks, I do recommend wired connections whenever possible, even if the "wired" connection is to a second Airport Extreme bridged over the wireless network. The reason? Components, like computers just work better with a wired connection. Airports, however, do a bang up job of bridging segments of your network over the air, mostly because they have five antenna in them and can use ganged channels to provide some really respectable throughput.

 

Yours,

-Paul

 

 

Thank you Fokus. When I asked the purpose of a bridge immediately following a router, you were the first to note that the the router will generally slow down if its ports are used in addition to routing and wireless activity--I had expected it would. Thanks for confirming!

-Sam

[Sam Lord]

Eh, the router is unlikely to slow down in your situation. Even inexpensive quality router/switches, like the Airport Extreme which I also strongly recommend, have very fast multi-gigabit backplanes. What that means is more than one port can be talking at once, at full speed...

Thank you Paul, very informative as usual. I've heard so many good things about the AE, it will probably be my next router. I'm looking at the new high-speed and well-reviewed Asus RT-AC66U, but I tend to go with the most-proven product.

-Sam

[accwai]

Thank you Paul, very informative as usual. I've heard so many good things about the AE, it will probably be my next router. I'm looking at the new high-speed and well-reviewed Asus RT-AC66U, but I tend to go with the most-proven product.

-Sam

 

The main feature that the RT-AC66U has over the older RT-N66U is support for the new 802.11ac draft standard. Unless you want to jump on the 802.11ac bandwagon soon, the point is probably moot. Wifi devices has many levels of supported speed. You don't need a router that goes far beyond what your devices can do. This is especially true if you plan to go mainly with a wired LAN and leave wifi for mobile devices like tablet or phone.

 

Also, the firmware on the ASUS family is Linux based. So beyond the configuration GUI, you can go through a telnet command line interface and play with the more advanced routing and firewall functions. As a result, the ASUS in general can be made to function more like a true router than an Internet gateway plus a wireless access point and a switch stuffed into one box. It can be very useful if you want/need to fiddle with this kind of thing.

 

Andy

[Fokus]

you were the first to note that the the router will generally slow down if its ports are used in addition to routing and wireless activity

 

I did not say that.

 

I said that with my router sometimes passing DLNA/UPnP traffic the overall network functionality deteriorated over weeks, ending with one room becoming invisible as far as DLNA is concerned (it could still be pinged).

The solution was to remove the router from the DLNA path. It had nothing to do with speed capabilities, it was a matter of network (mis)management.

[Sam Lord]

Fokus,

 

Thank you for the correction. I don't know what the DLNA/UPnP traffic is, but I can learn if it's necessary. As stated I have generally low bandwidth needs: two people watching different HiDef video would generate the biggest data rate, save for occasionally copying libraries from main storage drive to archive drive. So, is the best solution to remove the router from the DLNA path by inserting a switch, or is there a simpler method, i.e. use of static addresses? Thank you.

 

Andy,

 

Thank you for the Asus overview; good points on the limited benefit of ac1750 wireless standard. I just want a very reliable router that is fast for wired archiving. The support here for the Airport Extreme as a solid, reliable router is quite convincing.

[Fokus]

I don't know what the DLNA/UPnP traffic is,

 

Music and video originating in the NAS's media server and flowing to the rendering points (i.e. TVs and DACs).

 

or is there a simpler method, i.e. use of static addresses? Thank you.

 

I assigned static IPs to the network backbone (the routers and NAS) and to the media renderers (TVs, DAC, AVR). I still have dynamic IPs on the PCs, tablets, iPod, ...

[徐中銳]

Greetings Sam,

was trying to reply to your reply of New Bowers and Wilkins 800 series... But another time as I'm too tired to write out what I've in mind.

 

Instead, recalling to this Thread from Andrew Everard :

High-resolution audio - now with added fibre...

More fibre, more sound!

Well, I’ve just introduced some more fibre optics into my audio system, and this time the sound really has taken a leap forward.

 

I took a bit of a kicking from the online ‘experts’ last year when I posted about having changed a long network run from Ethernet to fibre-optic cable (see below), simply because they didn’t understand why I’d done it. Lots of talk about how Ethernet was more than sufficient for the kind of run I’d needed, and how I’d wasted my money, but the point of it was never about speed, but isolation.

 

However, I’ve just got round to putting in another fibre-optic connection in place of copper cable, and this time there’s definitely been a boost in performance. Yes, stock up on rotten vegetables and wet sponges, folks – I’m going on record as saying...