Powerline Ethernet, inconsistent performance

On Sun, 7 Oct 2012 21:29:19 -0500, VanguardLH wrote:

"Loren Pechtel" wrote:

VanguardLH wrote:

"Loren Pechtel" wrote:

My former boss had his house wired with Cat-5 to a pair of jacks in
every room. It could be used for phone or data. I thought the
jacks were a truly horrible idea, though--they could take either
RJ-11 or RJ-45. What happens if you plug your computer into the
phone jack and it rings??

So, did YOU ever try to plug a RJ-45 (CAT5) connector into a RJ-11
(phone) plug? If so, how big a hammer did you use? What happened
when you tried to plug an RJ-11 (phone) connector into a RJ-45
(CAT5) plug? If you did, what kind of tape did you use to keep that
undersized RJ-11 connector stuck in the larger RJ-45 plug? And just
how did you manage in either highly forced configuration (RJ-11
loose inside RJ-45 or RJ-45 smashed into RJ-11) to get 6 contacts
for phone to match up with 8 contacts for CAT5?

The plugs in question would accept either and make proper
connections. They were neither RJ-11 nor RJ-45 but something whose
number I don't recall that was designed to take both. I'm having no
luck with Google, the market probably got rid of it.

A workaround (that is hazardous) I can think of is wiring one Cat5 plug
in the wall plate to the Ethernet network and wiring the other Cat5 plug
in the wall plate to the phone service. You would have one wall plate
with two Cat5 plugs where one marked "LAN" was for your computer
(network) and the other marked "TEL" was for the telephone.

The requirement would be that the telephone cord (or an adapter cord to
the telephone) would need to have its RJ-11 connector snipped off and
replaced with a Cat5 connector. You would then plug the *******ized
telephone cord with its Cat5 end into the "TEL" marked Cat5 plug in the
wall plate.

This is highly dangerous because telephone wiring carries 48-50 VDC
which spikes due to the superimposed 90 VAC during ringing; see
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tip_and_ring. Telephones don't need their
own power source to work because the phone company provides that power
on a separate grid with battery backup (and why telephones continue to
function during a power outage). One Cat5 plug in the screwball wall
jack configuration has high voltage on it. The other Cat5 is just the
no-voltage wiring for the Ethernet network. You plug the Cat5 cable
from your computer's network card into the "LAN" Cat5 plug in the wall
jack. But what happens if you plug the computer's Cat5 cable into the
"TEL" Cat5 plug in the wall plate? Zap, bzzzt, phffft!

With 2 Cat5 plugs in the wall plate where one goes to the phone service,
you have an energized (high-voltage) Cat5 plug that will kill your
network card. That's why RJ-11 and RJ-45 plugs and connectors are
deliberately designed not to interoperate. The two DIFFERENT sized
plugs in the wall plate prevent accidentally plugging your computer into
the plug with high voltage on it meant for phone service hence why I
asked how big a hammer you used to smash a Cat5 connector into a smaller
RJ-11 hole.

I can't see why anyone would use a dual Cat5 wall plate and wire one of
them into the phone service. Well, yeah, I suppose a boob would do
that. I remember hearing of a guy suing Searc because the manual for a
lawn mower didn't tell him that it couldn't be used as hedge trimmer and
wanted money for his lost fingers. The Red Green show is entertainment,
not an educational video; however, I suppose there are morons that might
contrue the skits as instructional. Hooking one of plugs in a dual Cat5
wall plate to the phone service is a trap ready to fry any computer that
gets plugged into it. Maybe long ago there were no RJ-11/RJ-45 combo
wall plates available and this is what they had to do but that had to be
a very long time ago (which got abandoned after lots of computers got
fried), or someone was stupidly cheap and got a deal on dual Cat5 wall
plates, or the RJ-11/RJ-45 combo plates were a hell of a lot more
expensive (considering the added expense of snipping off RJ-11
connectors from phone gear and replacing with Cat5 connectors).

I remember when Ethernet hadn't yet been labelled Thicknet where you
routed thick and stiff cabling that had a minimum bend radius and you
used vampire taps to add a workstation; however, even back then I don't
remember anyone using dual Cat5 wall plates where one was wired to the
phone service. 50/50 russian roulette (3 rounds in a 6-round wheel)
doesn't sound like a sound business practice. If the labels fell off or
were mislabelled, or the user didn't look before shoving in cables,
you'd have a 50-50 chance of frying your NIC, or do worse damage. Back
then workstations cost a hell of a lot more than they do now.

Your boss, or whomever he had do the wiring work, was a BOOB.

As I said, I thought it was a terrible idea. The builder did the
wiring, it was right off their option sheet, I'm sure they did some
other houses just as insane. I think the idea was flexibility--after
all, they had jacks specifically designed to take either a RJ-11 or
RJ-45--both clicked in without difficulty. It was no doubt designed
by some moron with no experience in the trenches.

As flaky as they used to be I never bought 2, always 3. And as you can
probably guess, after the spare was used there had been an upgrade and
the next replacement required both again.

On 08/10/2012 7:48 PM, edfair wrote:
As flaky as they used to be I never bought 2, always 3. And as you can
probably guess, after the spare was used there had been an upgrade and
the next replacement required both again.

I've never had a problem where they died permanently. I've been running
them for years. However, our power company runs very noise-free most of
the time, so it might be related to the jurisdiction you live in.

Yousuf Khan