Mac networking advice (full fibre upgrade).

[MarkC426]

I need some guidance, as I am a bit rusty on networking (I used to do it with PC’s decades ago)…… 🥴

My broadband provider is upgrading me to full fibre, but need to get things straight in my head before.
In a nutshell, I currently have a long phone cable from downstairs socket to the broadband hub in upstairs office.

Mac’s are connected to BB hub, for internet and screen/file sharing.

With the new FF hub I think it will have to be downstairs where it comes through the wall.
I prefer my Mac’s on Ethernet.

Is it simply a case of running an Ethernet cable from the FF hub upstairs.
Connect a network hub and plug in the Macs…?

Currently the Mac’s are connected to seperate ports on the BB hub, but the new version would mean the network hub (with two Mac’s connected) will only connect to one port.

 

[Bigwaff]

FF "hub" <-- CAT6 ethernet --> GB switch |-- CAT6 --> Mac1
|-- CAT6 --> Mac2
Make sense?

 

[Fishrrman]

OP wrote:
"I currently have a long phone cable from downstairs socket to the broadband hub in upstairs office."

Could you clarify:
By "long phone cable" -- is that an RJ11 PHONE cable, or is it RJ45 ethernet?

By "broadband hub" -- is this what's otherwise called a "residential gateway"?
By that, I mean a combined modem/router? With 4 (or more) ethernet ports on the back?

What kind of service do you have RIGHT NOW?
Is it a cable modem?
Is it some kind of DSL?
Or... something else?

Fiber will have the optical cable coming inside the house to an ONT (optical network terminal).
ONT might have 3 outputs:
- RJ45 ethernet (your connection to the ISP's wide-area-network "outside")
- RJ11 phone (which you connect to a wired phone system)
- MOCA (can send signal over "cable" RG6, to where it can be converted back to ethernet in the room)

With my fiber, the ONT (and power supply) are located halfway down the basement stairs.

From left-to-right, the connections are:
- RJ11 (phone)
- RJ45 (ethernet)
- Power supply
- Optical IN (green tipped cable)

From there, there's a single category 5 (might even be 6) ethernet cable running from there to a jack in the living room on the first floor, where the router is located. This is the only connection visible "upstairs":

I still have wired phones (VOIP now), I put in the jack myself and the fiber installer just plugged in my RJ11 cable and the phones were live.

 

[MarkC426]

OP wrote:
"I currently have a long phone cable from downstairs socket to the broadband hub in upstairs office."

Could you clarify:
By "long phone cable" -- is that an RJ11 PHONE cable, or is it RJ45 ethernet?

By "broadband hub" -- is this what's otherwise called a "residential gateway"?
By that, I mean a combined modem/router? With 4 (or more) ethernet ports on the back?

What kind of service do you have RIGHT NOW?
Is it a cable modem?
Is it some kind of DSL?
Or... something else?

Yes long cable is RJ11 phone cable.
I think it’s a combined modem router, with 4 Ethernet ports (which Mac’s are connected to)
ADSL broadband (on copper wire currently)

To clarify, the RJ11 actually goes from another upstairs room, as there is a phone socket above where the main incoming is in the room below (but this will become redundant when changed to Fibre)

 

[Fishrrman]

"Yes long cable is RJ11 phone cable.
I think it’s a combined modem router, with 4 Ethernet ports (which Mac’s are connected to) ADSL broadband (on copper wire currently)"

That's what it sounded like from your original post and it's why I asked.

All of that stuff will come out for the new install.
With DSL, the "modem" and "router" were combined into one unit -- the residential gateway.
With fiber, the ONT and router are separate units.

You need to decide:
- where you want the ONT to be located
and
- where you want the router to be.

ONT is probably best to locate somewhere "not out in the open". You won't really need to access it much, if at all. If the fiber is coming into the basement, it might be down there.

The ONT location also depends on where available 110v power is. The power supply that came with my ONT had a maximum cable length of about 12'. You could use an extension cord for more length, I reckon.

As I mentioned above, you will probably have RJ45 ethernet "coming out of" the ONT, and you want to run that to where the router is going to be.

If you're going to have phone service via the fiber (VOIP), you need to figure out where that cable will run, as well.

The installer should be able to handle all this.

I got fiber through Frontier. They were offering an EERO router as a "free upgrade", but I have no way to actually control the EERO (which has to be done through an app, and I don't have a smartphone). So I asked for -- and got -- the "older style" Arris router, which works well enough (ethernet speeds of 940 and wifi [downstairs] right above 500).

The router is user-replaceable if you want. But again, the one they gave me seems fine for now.

Do you know what kind of router you'll be getting?
I asked because the mesh type (like EERO) often have only 2 ethernet ports.

If you needed more ports, you could get a "dumb" gigabyte ethernet switch for about $20 and use that...

 

[Boyd01]

ONT is probably best to locate somewhere "not out in the open". You won't really need to access it much, if at all.

I thought that too and had it installed on the wall, under my work table. FIOS was rock solid since I got it 7 years ago, but last month I had two mysterious outages that turned out to be somewhere beyond my property. As part of the standard troubleshooting, one of the first steps is resetting the ONT. Had never even looked at it before, but crawled under the table, then had to get a flashlight to see what I was doing. The reset button was on the bottom side, about two inches off the floor where you had to find it by touch! 🤣

I got voice service included by Verizon even though I didn't want it, FIOS was part of a plan to replace all the analog wiring in my little rural town of ~1,500 people. I was curious as to how they would implement the analog transition and thought it was actually pretty clever. They just cut the old analog cable to the house and connected the existing analog household wiring to their new fiber box outside. So, any existing analog phones (which I didn't have) would have continued working with no changes. Now, if you need some kind of digital phones, that would be different of course.

As for the router, they included one but it didn't have 802.11ac wifi, so I just ran an ethernet cable from it to my existing time capsule router which was already cabled with gigabit ethernet to my computers. I use the 802.11ac wifi on the Time Capsule for my phone and iPad.

Overall, kind of a no-brainer installation for me. Just plugged their router into my existing network.