Signet St2000

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thekiwi

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# 20437 26-Mar-2008 15:50

Hi

Didnt want to Hijack totally the Home Wiring thread in the HomeTheatre, but wanted advise from those who have wired up a Signet box with their own 19" Patch Panel (I think Cyril has done this).

Here is my box all wired and working well .... now its time to tidy it up.

Top Right is the 8 port Phone Distribution Box and its wired and wokring patched through to the Patch panel. Also sitting on top of the ADSL router is the Dynamix ADSL Splitter, also working sweetly.

Questions are:
* How do you attach your 19" Patch Panels into the box, eg what do you use physically to mount them? It fits nicely in the vertical aspect.
* Ditto for the Splitter.

I ended up using a Cat5e module instead of a BT 2 socket as the wires I had for my modem were all rj11. I might still do the BT module as I have one sitting here and the wiring would certainly be tidier.

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# 118819 26-Mar-2008 17:41

Signet make a angle bracket pair to hold the patch panel, and yes it means the panel is vertical, but still works the same. You will need to visit Mastertrade/Corys and ask to look at the Signet catalogue to find the bracket part number its pretty obvious once you see the picture, their website is useless.

Cyril

webwat

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# 118821 26-Mar-2008 17:43

That Cat5e keystone jack you have there is RJ11 or RJ45? BT jack is useful to terminate the Telecom line so that its a kind of demarcation point useful for Telecom testing, should be a master jack thats pretty reliable. Then you can isolate all your house wiring easily whenever you test for a fault by plugging the ADSL directly to the BT jack, for example if you suspected the splitter or other wiring was faulty. There are lots of horizontal mounting brackets around if you can find a cabling wholesaler in your area, then mount the ethernet switch on top so you have a convenient place to sit the ADSL router above it.

I am intrigued about why you have a huge patch panel there but Cat5 LAN cables are going directly to the phone distribution instead of the patch panel (look like they could be pulled off by accident too but I know you will tie them later). The point of having so many ports on the patch panel is to allow you to patch any line to phone or ethernet as-needed, without rewiring anything. You probably need shorter patch cables though to keep it tidy, and make sure the plugs match the type of patch cable (solid or stranded) if you made your own cables.

I recommend running all jackpoints to the patch panel (label jackpoints with the port number) and also allocating 8 ports on the patch for wiring to the phone distribution box (from the back of the patch panel). Also Then you can put the patch panel on the wall and forget it until next time you check the splitter or incoming telecom line. When you need to activate phone or LAN on a jackpoint in the house you just plug a short patch cable from that jack to the phone ports the way you do for the ethernet switch. You probably want to make up some RJ45 phone cables.

Also note that the blue and brown wires are only really needed for Gigabit, so if you have 100-base ethernet then later you have a choice to run different services on the same cable simply by moving the wires to spare ports on the patch panel and wiring another jackpoint onto a 3-way faceplate on the user end.

Qualified in business, certified in fibre, stuck in copper, have to keep going ^_^

sbiddle

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# 118831 26-Mar-2008 18:03

The brackets you need are part # ST2012PPB - sorry I don't have the PDF here just the printed brochure.

These fit at the top and bottom of the cabinet so the patch panel fits vertically in the cabinet.

I'm also intrigued why you ran the phone cabling direct to the phone module rather than the patch panel. The beauty of having a structured solution is the ability to easily reconfigure ports. It doesn't look to me like you have more than 24 cat 5e cables coming into your cabinet, you could have put a 24 port patch panel in one side and then jumpered that across to the phone module. Signet even sell 110 to RJ45 patch leads to run from the phone module to a patch panel.

cyril7

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# 118853 26-Mar-2008 19:07

I must admit that it all looks very all over the place, those cables on the phone patch are likely to drift away. Obviuosly something got lost in translation I had assumed from previous threads that you would use 110 to RJ45 patch leads to patch phone circuits to where needed. As Steve says you dont need the phone patch due to the spare sockets on the patch panel that you have, although it does offer an isolation point for test to meet Telepermit requirements.

A 19" patch panel and 19" switch will not both fit in one of those cabinets, hence normally a wall mount panel would be used.

Cyril

thekiwi

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# 118866 26-Mar-2008 20:05

webwat: That Cat5e keystone jack you have there is RJ11 or RJ45? BT jack is useful to terminate the Telecom line so that its a kind of demarcation point useful for Telecom testing, should be a master jack thats pretty reliable. Then you can isolate all your house wiring easily whenever you test for a fault by plugging the ADSL directly to the BT jack, for

The Signet box has exactly this. THere is a master BT plug in it where I can plug a phone into.

example if you suspected the splitter or other wiring was faulty. There are lots of horizontal mounting brackets around if you can find a cabling wholesaler in your area, then mount the ethernet switch on top so you have a convenient place to sit the ADSL router above it.

I am intrigued about why you have a huge patch panel there but Cat5 LAN cables are going directly to the phone distribution instead of the patch panel (look like they could be pulled off by accident too but I know you will tie them later).

They were a lot tidier and shorter, but the security guy insisted on stripping them all nback when he attached his Security Line. Ive since disconnected that.

The point of having so many ports on the patch panel is to allow you to patch any line to phone or ethernet as-needed, without rewiring anything. You probably need shorter patch cables though to keep it tidy, and make sure the plugs match the type of patch cable (solid or stranded) if you made your own cables.

You have lost me sorry.
There are 8 Cat5e cables coming from the Phone Distribution panel to my patch panel. 2 are bringing my office line down and 6 are for the home line. none of them are LAN. IN each Cat5e Cable Im only using 1 pair. They go to positions 1-8 on my Patch panel. I can then grab anyone of the room ports on the Patch Panel and patch them through to a phone line.

I guess I wasnt clear in my wanting to make this tidy
* THe leads from the rooms to the box are too long. I just needed to get everything working and to leave room for me to then tidy up.
* THe Patch leads are too long, but they are all I had :)

I recommend running all jackpoints to the patch panel (label jackpoints with the port number) and also allocating 8 ports on the patch for wiring to the phone distribution box (from the back of the patch panel).

Yup this is already done.

Also Then you can put the patch panel on the wall and forget it until next time you check the splitter or incoming telecom line. When you need to activate phone or LAN on a jackpoint in the house you just plug a short patch cable from that jack to the phone ports the way you do for the ethernet switch.

This is exactly what Im doing at the moment.

You probably want to make up some RJ45 phone cables.

Also note that the blue and brown wires are only really needed for Gigabit, so if you have 100-base ethernet then later you have a choice to run different services on the same cable simply by moving the wires to spare ports on the patch panel and wiring another jackpoint onto a 3-way faceplate on the user end.

Dont want to use the extra pair in any of the cables as Ive read thats not recommended.

thekiwi

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# 118867 26-Mar-2008 20:09

sbiddle: The brackets you need are part # ST2012PPB - sorry I don't have the PDF here just the printed brochure.

These fit at the top and bottom of the cabinet so the patch panel fits vertically in the cabinet.

I'm also intrigued why you ran the phone cabling direct to the phone module rather than the patch panel.

My naievety probably. So how do you take 2 incoming lines and distribute them to say 8 ports on your patch panel? I thought that was the idea of the Signet Phone Dist Panel to allow that flexibility?

The beauty of having a structured solution is the ability to easily reconfigure ports. It doesn't look to me like you have more than 24 cat 5e cables coming into your cabinet, you could have put a 24 port patch panel in one side and then jumpered that across to the phone module. Signet even sell 110 to RJ45 patch leads to run from the phone module to a patch panel.

Sorry thats where Im lost. Ive got 8 pairs coming down from the Phone Dist panel to my patch panel ... how is that different from what you are suggesting?

thekiwi

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# 118869 26-Mar-2008 20:15

cyril7: I must admit that it all looks very all over the place, those cables on the phone patch are likely to drift away. Obviuosly something got lost in translation I had assumed from previous threads that you would use 110 to RJ45 patch leads to patch phone circuits to where needed. As Steve says you dont need the phone patch due to the spare sockets on the patch panel that you have, although it does offer an isolation point for test to meet Telepermit requirements.

A 19" patch panel and 19" switch will not both fit in one of those cabinets, hence normally a wall mount panel would be used.

Cyril

Yea not worries about the swicth as Ive got that mounted below. Didnt want a Wall mount rack as it would stick out too far, at the moment it will allow me to have the swicth flush against the wall.

Sorry, not good at the Telecom lingo.
YOu are saying 110 to RJ45, which effectively brings a single pair from each port in the Phone Dist panel to the Patch panel? Isnt this what Ive got except Ive used a single pair within a Cat5e cable?

If the Signet Phone Dist panel isnt supposed to have the incoming line go straight to it, that seems contrary to the advise I got direct from SigTech.

Also a bit lost as to how you get 1 single pair line joined into say 6 ports on a Patch panel? At the moment Ive got full flexibility, the on;ly part Id have to redo manually is if I want my config to be 3 lines for Phone1 and 5 lines for Phone 2 (compared to my current config of 2 lines phone 1 and 6 for Phone 2)

sbiddle

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# 118871 26-Mar-2008 20:18

Ahh sorry my mistake - looking at the pictures it looked you had wired all the grey cat5e cable straight into the phone module as I couldn't see them running from an RJ45 socket on the patch panel into the phone module.

webwat

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# 118956 27-Mar-2008 02:58

Strip the sheathing back to expose the wire pairs like your security guy did, much easier to work with. The idea is for all that to be hidden when you put some kind of panel on the front. I would say your hole-in-the-wall is designed for 19" panels but might have to mount them on their side... The switch is not going to fit in that space without a proper wall bracket, but why do you need such a big ethernet switch? You must need more ports than you have on the router but could mount a small/cheap switch there just screwed onto the wall.your vertical bracket looks like its designed to cause problems with wires and power cables getting tripped over.

Ok, time to work through that tangle of wiring.

Do you want the ADSL splitter installed before your isolation point or after? I recommend that you should connect it into the back of that BT jack because its not part of the Telecom wiring and therefore could cost oneday if a contractor comes out for repair and proves the splitter is faulty. Keep in mind that its probably your family who gets to do the testing on advice from your ISP, so make it easy for them to find the Telecom line.
I guess from the back of your BT jack you take the wires out to the splitter, which you can tie on next to the phone box. Other wire goes to the back of an ADSL port you can allocate on the patch panel ($5 I will make a RJ45-RJ11 cable for patch to your adsl router... $10 at Dick Smith). If you have a security system then it links to the phone side of the splitter because you dont want the famous problems of ADSL interferance — thats the whole point of having your nice splitter.
I presume your black phone box is the signet thing you mentioned? I guess it links all the phone wires together onto one incoming line from the splitter? Presumably it has some extra function or you would have just run a jumper wire between the phone ports on the patch panel, so I would tend to keep it tidy and just run 2 cables between the patch and the phone box. There are 4 pairs in the Cat5 cable, but the cable has to be long enough to tie back to some points where they can stay permanently tidy. Dont just leave them dangling though. Looks like you need to move that patch panel to a position where you can cover the wires up, keep it tidy, and close the cupboard to avoid ports filling up with dust. Work out final position of the patch so you know length of wires back to the phone box.
It looks like you have mixed types of jackpoints around the house (BT and RJ45/RJ11) or at least mixed the pairs that they connect to because you have some on orange and some on blue, maybe you fixed it already. Generally you buy/make a few RJ45 phone cables for your telephones. RJ45 plugs/jacks are cheaper anyway.
Cables from all jackpoints around the house terminate on the patch panel, including phone jacks, straight to the patch panel from correctly numbered jackpoints. The phone distribution box supplies separate ports on the patch panel. Each phone supply port goes nowhere until you plug a patch cable (see below) from it to a port that goes to a jackpoint.

So you might connect the phone box to ports 41 to 48. The house jackpoints might be on ports 1 to 16. To make jackpoint 16 a phone jack, you simply plug a patch cable from port 16 through to port 8 on the patch panel. If you change your mind you can pull it out of port 8 and into the ethernet switch and suddenly you swap the telephone for a computer.
If you honestly cant find any place to put that big rackmount switch, at least tie its power cable to something, cover the network ports, and keep the cooling vents clean because its fan could get blocked easily in the open like that. Better to get the wall cabinet you were looking at, or possibly trunk all the cables to a cupboard where you can mount the patch and the switch. Tie the cables together, and if you ever get a hinged bracket make sure the cables follow the hinge so its all tidy whenever somebody opens the panel for testing (maybe a Telecom contractor).
The 4u wall bracket you have at the moment won't save much more space than a 300mm horizontal bracket that can be mounted high enough to be out of the way, probably mount onto a board that will cover that big hole you have. Perhaps you can split cover and mount all your accessible components in the bottom half of the board to allow access and mount your patch panel on a wall bracket above it. Your family might demand a wall cabinet or cupboard with a door to hide all the cables and look nice, not to mention preventing visitors playing with cables. Good idea I think.
Lastly, a "patch cable" is a short flexible (ie "stranded") cable with a plug on each end. Those are the cables plugged into the ports on the patch panel and network switch. Shorter is better, they only have to reach another on the patch panel. Long dangly ones become a beautiful set of gallows, and will jump out to catch anybody who ventures close enough with a vacuum cleaner.

Good luck!

Qualified in business, certified in fibre, stuck in copper, have to keep going ^_^

thekiwi

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# 118970 27-Mar-2008 06:34

webwat: Strip the sheathing back to expose the wire pairs like your security guy did, much easier to work with. The idea is for all that to be hidden when you put some kind of panel on the front.

Not my idea :) Its in the Garage and I dont mind seeing patch leads from Swicth to Patch

I would say your hole-in-the-wall is designed for 19" panels but might have to mount them on their side

Its a Signet enclosure so pretty sure its not designed specifically for 19" gear.

... The switch is not going to fit in that space without a proper wall bracket, but why do you need such a big ethernet switch? You must need more ports than you have on the router but could mount a small/cheap switch there just screwed onto the wall.your vertical bracket looks like its designed to cause problems with wires and power cables getting tripped over.

Its a 24 port switch and I need at the moment a Minimum of 12. Its rackmountable which makes life easier. I run my business from home so have lots of gear. I have 3 servers, 2 laptops, network printer, VOIP gear, kids workstations etc etc.

Ok, time to work through that tangle of wiring.

Do you want the ADSL splitter installed before your isolation point or after? I recommend that you should connect it into the back of that BT jack because its not part of the

Not sure where you are seeing a BT Jack. Dont have one in the entire house.
From what I nunderstood from Cyril was to take the lines from the street straight to the ADSL jack, then from there via the splitter to the Phone in point on the Phone Dist Board.

Telecom wiring and therefore could cost oneday if a contractor comes out for repair and proves the splitter is faulty. Keep in mind that its probably your family who gets to do the testing on advice from your ISP, so make it easy for them to find the Telecom line.

I guess from the back of your BT jack you take the wires out to the splitter, which you can tie on next to the phone box. Other wire goes to the back of an ADSL port you can allocate on the patch panel ($5 I will make a RJ45-RJ11 cable for patch to your adsl router... $10 at Dick Smith). If you have a security system then it links to the phone side of the splitter because you dont want the famous problems of ADSL interferance ? thats the whole point of having your nice splitter.

I presume your black phone box is the signet thing you mentioned? I guess it links all the phone wires together onto one incoming line from the splitter? Presumably it has some extra function or you would have just run a jumper wire between the phone ports on the patch panel, so I would tend to keep it tidy and just run 2 cables between the patch and the phone box. There are 4 pairs in the Cat5 cable, but the cable has to be long enough to tie back to some points where they can stay permanently tidy. Dont just leave them dangling though. Looks like you need to move that patch panel to a position where you can cover the wires up, keep it tidy, and close the cupboard to avoid ports filling up with dust. Work out final position of the patch so you know length of wires back to the phone box.

It looks like you have mixed types of jackpoints around the house (BT and RJ45/RJ11) or at least mixed the pairs that they connect to because you have some on orange and some on blue, maybe you fixed it already.

No that is how it is meant to be.
Blue pair is carrying one line in bound and the Orange pair the other line. The way the Phone Dist panel works is that those pairs then get patched through to the patch panel.

Generally you buy/make a few RJ45 phone cables for your telephones. RJ45 plugs/jacks are cheaper anyway.

Thats what Ive already got ...

Cables from all jackpoints around the house terminate on the patch panel, including phone jacks, straight to the patch panel from correctly numbered jackpoints.

Ummmm thats exactly what Ive already got.

The phone distribution box supplies separate ports on the patch panel. Each phone supply port goes nowhere until you plug a patch cable (see below) from it to a port that goes to a jackpoint.

That is how its already working

So you might connect the phone box to ports 41 to 48. The house jackpoints might be on ports 1 to 16. To make jackpoint 16 a phone jack, you simply plug a patch cable from port 16 through to port 8 on the patch panel. If you change your mind you can pull it out of port 8 and into the ethernet switch and suddenly you swap the telephone for a computer.

Thats how it is currently working.

If you honestly cant find any place to put that big rackmount switch, at least tie its power cable to something, cover the network ports, and keep the cooling vents clean because its fan could get blocked easily in the open like that. Better to get the wall cabinet you were looking at, or possibly trunk all the cables to a cupboard where you can mount the patch and the switch. Tie the cables together, and if you ever get a hinged bracket make sure the cables follow the hinge so its all tidy whenever somebody opens the panel for testing (maybe a Telecom contractor).

The 4u wall bracket you have at the moment won't save much more space than a 300mm horizontal bracket that can be mounted high enough to be out of the way, probably mount onto a board that will cover that big hole you have. Perhaps you can split cover and mount all your accessible components in the bottom half of the board to allow access and mount your patch panel on a wall bracket above it. Your family might demand a wall cabinet or cupboard with a door to hide all the cables and look nice, not to mention preventing visitors playing with cables. Good idea I think.

Lastly, a "patch cable" is a short flexible (ie "stranded") cable with a plug on each end. Those are the cables plugged into the ports on the patch panel and network switch. Shorter is better, they only have to reach another on the patch panel. Long dangly ones become a beautiful set of gallows, and will jump out to catch anybody who ventures close enough with a vacuum cleaner.
Good luck!

Its in my garage up high, no vacuum cleaer is getting near it :)

cyril7

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# 118974 27-Mar-2008 07:32

I think the this pretty much reinforces my original comments in other threads that these inwall systems are fine when you only want a few points, like 8 and you can get away with a 8port switch, beyond that they loose there value, I avoid them they are just not big enough. A wall mounting 2U or 4U bracket would have been half the price of the inwall unit, and if mounted above head height would not be in the way.

By not using a BT2 surface mount socket you have made the whole phone side of things a bit messy. If you terminate the inbound line on a BT2 socket, then wire the filter in parallel of the back of the BT then wire the ouput of the filter to the phone distribution panel things will be a lot tidier. Use a BT>RJ11 modem line cord to connect your DSL modem.

The rest of it I am afraid is too messy to see what you have done.

Cheers
Cyril

thekiwi

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# 118992 27-Mar-2008 09:26

cyril7: I think the this pretty much reinforces my original comments in other threads that these inwall systems are fine when you only want a few points, like 8 and you can get away with a 8port switch, beyond that they loose there value, I avoid them they are just not big enough. A wall mounting 2U or 4U bracket would have been half the price of the inwall unit, and if mounted above head height would not be in the way.

Cool thanks for that.

By not using a BT2 surface mount socket you have made the whole phone side of things a bit messy.

Sorry that bits temporary. Ive got the surface mount gear and can use BT2 or RJ45 ... just my modem/router came with RJ11 so was quicker to get that up and going (new house, needing to work atthe same time forced my hand in the short term

If you terminate the inbound line on a BT2 socket, then wire the filter in parallel of the back of the BT then wire the ouput of the filter to the phone distribution panel things will be a lot tidier. Use a BT>RJ11 modem line cord to connect your DSL modem.

The rest of it I am afraid is too messy to see what you have done.

Cheers
Cyril

HOw do you normally mount your Splitter and Modems in any enclosure or do you use a shelf?
Maybe I will go to a Hinged Wall mounted 4U Rack ... but if I do that, would still need somewhere to house the modem and splitter, and like you said, (I think) would be good to keep the wire to the ADSL gear as short as possible?.

thekiwi

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# 119001 27-Mar-2008 09:59

cyril7: I must admit that it all looks very all over the place, those cables on the phone patch are likely to drift away. Obviuosly something got lost in translation I had assumed from previous threads that you would use 110 to RJ45 patch leads to patch phone circuits to where needed. As Steve says you dont need the phone patch due to the spare sockets on the patch panel that you have, although it does offer an isolation point for test to meet Telepermit requirements.

A 19" patch panel and 19" switch will not both fit in one of those cabinets, hence normally a wall mount panel would be used.

Cyril

Ahhhhhh its like a light suddenly turning on.

When you say 110 - RJ45 patch leads these are litterally a lead with a 110 "plug" on one end and the standard RJ45 at the other. I thought I had to punch down into the Phone Dist box :)

I'll invest in some rj45 -110 1 pair cables ... as that would indeed make it a bit more flexible.

If I understand this part right, and please correct me if Im wrong, for 8 lines, this setup will however use up 16 ports on my Patch Panel cause I would have to jumper across the back from Port 1 -> 9, 2->10 etc ... so that I can plug Room patch lead from its corresponding outlet into say port #9 to activate the line which is patched into #1?

cyril7

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# 119136 27-Mar-2008 19:35

I dont understand the last part of your post, but dont forget teh 5REN rule, you can only have 5REN of total load on the line, most POTS phones have a 1REN loading, faxs and Sky modems somewhat less. So having more than 4-5 slots set aside for Phone is enough.

You can either buy the 110-RJ45 cables or just have 3-4 RJ45 cables punched down to the phone panel to patch to the main patch panel as desired.

I still dont understand what you are getting at, your house should have RJ45 fully wired sockets that ALL terminate on the patch panel, using the 110-RJ45 cables you can patch a phone circuit from your phone patch to the desired house socket via the patch panel as required, most folk only have 1-3phones or POTS devices ever connected, so only 1-3 patches for phone should ever be in use. Or have I missed something in your comments.

Cyril

thekiwi

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# 119173 27-Mar-2008 21:07

cyril7: I dont understand the last part of your post, but dont forget teh 5REN rule, you can only have 5REN of total load on the line, most POTS phones have a 1REN loading, faxs and Sky modems somewhat less. So having more than 4-5 slots set aside for Phone is enough.

Thanks. At the moment I have 2 ports from one line (both used) and 6 on the other, but only 3 are used so should be OK.

You can either buy the 110-RJ45 cables or just have 3-4 RJ45 cables punched down to the phone panel to patch to the main patch panel as desired.

I still dont understand what you are getting at, your house should have RJ45 fully wired sockets that ALL terminate on the patch panel, using the 110-RJ45 cables you can patch a phone circuit from your phone patch to the desired house socket via the patch panel as required, most folk only have 1-3phones or POTS devices ever connected, so only 1-3 patches for phone should ever be in use. Or have I missed something in your comments.

Cyril

Dont worry I had had a late night and wasnt thinking straight. Now that Ive had some sleep and some food I can see my error in the above paragraph. ;)

The Difference to the what you say above and what I have is that I have punched down both ends of the leads from Phone to Patch Panel, eg
Line 1 goes to Patch 1, LIne 2 to Patch 2 ... through to 8 (LIne 1 being the #1 output from the Dist Board).

All my rooms are also punched down to the Patch panel, so when I want a line on say Patch Panel #9 I just patch a lead across from #1 to #9, but in your approach above all I would need to do is plug my RJ45 end from one of the line outputs the Phone Dist panel direct into Patch port #9. Saves me some cable but I guess achieves the same end :) I'll make up some RJ45 ends to my current grey Cta5e and save on the 110 plugs.

I also got the PDF of the Sigtech catalogue form Sigtech today ... will post it up later as it might be handy for others.

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