Serious Gamer 'Upstairs' and No Ethernet - What to Do?

[allanc]

Let me set the scene:
A client has a 2 story 7 year-old house plus a finished basement. - about 3,500 feet.
The Internet access, like his cable TV, originates in the basement.

Unfortunately, there is no Ethernet cabling or jacks on the main floor or the top floor where the bedrooms are located.
His son, in his mid 20's, is a serious gamer and finds that the wireless signal in his bedroom is inconsistent and even drops out.
The client absolutely refuses to have any additional Ethernet run in any way, shape or form.

I think that reliability is his first priority with budget being second.

Thank you in advance for all advice.

 

[nlinecomputers]

Powerline Ethernet?

 

[allanc]

Powerline Ethernet?

I was thinking that also.
But, I have read so much bad rep here (in a general way) that I am worried about reliability.
Should I be?

 

[nlinecomputers]

Depends. It is not a perfect solution. Noisy wiring can degrade performance and you have to be on the same circuit to work. Lots of basements are on a different circuit. The only way to know is to test it on the fly and see if it works to his satisfaction.

 

[allanc]

Depends. It is not a perfect solution. Noisy wiring can degrade performance and you have to be on the same circuit to work. Lots of basements are on a different circuit. The only way to know is to test it on the fly and see if it works to his satisfaction.

What would your second choice be?

 

[nlinecomputers]

There really isn't. IMO pay the cost to put in a wired connection or shut up.

 

[allanc]

Depends. It is not a perfect solution. Noisy wiring can degrade performance and you have to be on the same circuit to work. Lots of basements are on a different circuit. The only way to know is to test it on the fly and see if it works to his satisfaction.

Sorry - can we clarify?
Do you mean on the 'same circuit breaker' in the electrical panel or just in the same panel?

 

[Metanis]

A properly located Netgear Nighthawk X6 wireless router with a matching AC1200 Wireless Adapter would probably do the trick. Just try to ensure the Nighthawk is located on top of any substantial metal ductwork that runs through the basement.

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

About 10 years ago I moved to my current town, and rented an old farmhouse as I looked for a home to purchase. OLD! And rental grade...you could see various "cheap" electrician work, additions, splices, totally crappy typical rental grade maintenance.
3 story house. Cable modem/router on ground floor by TV, and...up on the 3rd floor, my son and myself..had our gaming rigs in that "attic office".

My first person shooters (various Battlefield series at the time) did not tolerate wireless. Especially during fast action moments. I tried various wireless options....was using high power wireless, DD-WRT, Tomato firmware, various wireless adapters. No difference..some games demand fast steady streams of packets.

So I grabbed the (back then) generation 1 Linksys ethernet over powerline bridges....problem gone! Low steady pings..just like on CAT5.

About 7 years ago moved to current house...and a few years ago when I was still gaming...used the same Linksys bridges...ran like a champ. And my current house has 3x panels, and was built in'71. They still work.

It's not about "throughput" of them...as some people here have mentioned that the network transfer rates aren't what they hoped. Online gaming is about steady low latency with lots of small packets. You don't need a gigabit connection or a hundred meg connection...you just need a clean steady low latency connection. (so that gets rid of wireless). Heck a nice 10 meg NIC would be fine. When you're in the middle of gaming you're not using much bandwidth at all....not even a meg of throughput.

 

[BlackLabTechs]

Depending on bandwidth needs, I'd put a "repeater" closer to the kids room.

Or not after YeOld's post. lol. Repeater won't help your latency any unless it's just the disconnects causing issues.

 

[allanc]

It's not about "throughput" of them...as some people here have mentioned that the network transfer rates aren't what they hoped. Online gaming is about steady low latency with lots of small packets. You don't need a gigabit connection or a hundred meg connection...you just need a clean steady low latency connection. (so that gets rid of wireless). Heck a nice 10 meg NIC would be fine. When you're in the middle of gaming you're not using much bandwidth at all....not even a meg of throughput.

How about?
- Disabling son's wireless
- TP-LINK AV1200 powerline in the son's gaming room
- Ethernet out from powerline adapter to input to ASUS - RT-N56U (no DHCP) wireless router in the son's room. The client would be OK with the 2 * 3' n/w cable hidden behind the computer.
- Ethernet cable from RT-N56U to the son's computer
- Other 'I' devices in the bedrooms upstairs would use the WiFi from the RT-N56U

 

[mraikes]

Let me set the scene:
A client has a 2 story 7 year-old house plus a finished basement. - about 3,500 feet.
The Internet access, like his cable TV, originates in the basement.

Unfortunately, there is no Ethernet cabling or jacks on the main floor or the top floor where the bedrooms are located.
His son, in his mid 20's, is a serious gamer and finds that the wireless signal in his bedroom is inconsistent and even drops out.
The client absolutely refuses to have any additional Ethernet run in any way, shape or form.

I think that reliability is his first priority with budget being second.

Thank you in advance for all advice.

Well, based on your bolded statement above, reliability is not his first priority. Or he doesn't understand that max reliability means hard wire. And that it isn't (or shouldn't be) expensive or terribly difficult to run a single line from the basement to the top floor in a house. It shouldn't be that big a deal for a "serious gamer" that can afford a newer 3,500 square foot house.

But like everyone else has already said, throw a powerline adapter on there. It will probably work, and if it doesn't return them for a refund and he'll have to go ethernet, or accept the wifi latency and instant spawning deaths.

 

[nlinecomputers]

Sorry - can we clarify?
Do you mean on the 'same circuit breaker' in the electrical panel or just in the same panel?

It depends on the wiring. If they have multiple feeds to the house, multiple grounding lines and so on. You can't get a 100% certain answer here. Only a true cat5 or better line is going to be 100 certain. Any other fix will be a cludge. Sometimes part of this job is telling people it can't be done except one way.

 

[allanc]

Well, based on your bolded statement above, reliability is not his first priority. Or he doesn't understand that max reliability means hard wire. And that it isn't (or shouldn't be) expensive or terribly difficult to run a single line from the basement to the top floor in a house. It shouldn't be that big a deal for a "serious gamer" that can afford a newer 3,500 square foot house.

But like everyone else has already said, throw a powerline adapter on there. It will probably work, and if it doesn't return them for a refund and he'll have to go ethernet, or accept the wifi latency and instant spawning deaths.

Of course.
It is reliability after being qualified by other factors thrown into the equation.
The fact that he does not want one or more Ethernet runs has nothing to do with the cost.
That decision is made by his wife.
BTW - the gamer is his mid-20's son - not the client himself.

 

[nlinecomputers]

That decision is made by his wife.
BTW - the gamer is his mid-20's son - not the client himself.

Well done right it is no more than a plug outlet on the wall. Hardly something to complain about. I'm betting that she just doesn't want infrastructure put in to support the loser son who should be out in his own home.

 

[allanc]

It depends on the wiring. If they have multiple feeds to the house, multiple grounding lines and so on. You can't get a 100% certain answer here. Only a true cat5 or better line is going to be 100 certain. Any other fix will be a cludge. Sometimes part of this job is telling people it can't be done except one way.

Well, it may be able to be done more than one way with trade-offs.
I totally agree that wired is the best way.
He already knows about powerline and I can't honestly say to him that the chances of it working are 0% or even close to it.

 

[allanc]

Well done right it is no more than a plug outlet on the wall. Hardly something to complain about. I'm betting that she just doesn't want infrastructure put in to support the loser son who should be out in his own home.

I don't know the client very well so I am not going to probe.

 

[Mainstay]

Thinking in a different direction...

Often phone jacks are just CAT5 with only four of the lines terminated.

It may be possible that there is a line running to his room in the form of a phone jack.

You could convert that phone jack into ethernet jack.


Alternatively, move the 20-year-old to the basement for his gaming rig.

It's actually not a bad way of testing to make sure that it's not there WAN connection that's the problem.

 

[allanc]

Thinking in a different direction...

Often phone jacks are just CAT5 with only four of the lines terminated.

It may be possible that there is a line running to his room in the form of a phone jack.

You could convert that phone jack into ethernet jack.


Alternatively, move the 20-year-old to the basement for his gaming rig.

It's actually not a bad way of testing to make sure that it's not there WAN connection that's the problem.

I just ordered the TP-Link AV1200 that was mentioned in one or more threads here.
I will test it at my office first.
I think the son is very comfortable upstairs with his closed door, etc.
I wonder if he has a bar/pop fridge up there.
I did not think of looking for one at the time.
Tks for the idea of the built in wiring ... I may need it in the end.

 

[trevm999]

Thinking in a different direction...

Often phone jacks are just CAT5 with only four of the lines terminated.

It may be possible that there is a line running to his room in the form of a phone jack.

You could convert that phone jack into ethernet jack.

When I was an electrician apprentice we always ran two CAT5 lines into the phone jack box, but only terminated and put a RJ11 plate on the box. Check the phone jack.