Splitting a connection

[igotdamaged]

Hello all.

First post, but I need some help please

I was originally a Telewest broadband customer who is now covered under the Virgin Media umbrella. I am currently on a "Broadband XL" package and I pay £37.00/month. I have cable broadband that arrives into the house via a Scientific Atlanta Webstar box, and I currently route the broadband into a Mac Airport Express wireless router, and spread the love around the house wirelessly. I use this Virgin Media cable connection solely for the broadband (not TV, satellite or phone etc).

Recently, I have converted our garage into an office, and now I want to extend the home network so that the new building is also covered. This is necessary because the garage is about 30m from the point at which the modem currently sits and the wireless signal is very weak. I tried adding a second Airport Express connection to extend the range of our home network which improved matters, but in all honesty isn't going to be acceptable.

I have come to the conclusion therefore that what I need to do is split the connection before it enters the house. Keep the original line going into the house as before, but at some point (ideally before the wire enters the house, split the cable so that a second wire can be run around the outside of the house and into the garage. At the moment, we have two boxes that are attached to the house (pictured below).


This one sits externally (I took the cover off to peek inside)


This one is mounted to the wall inside the house

So that is the background... my questions are this:

1. Is this going to be possible?

2. Can I split the cable before it enters the house (photo 1), or does it have to go into the box inside the house (photo 2) and then be split?

3. What type of connections do I need to split the signal, what are the bits called and what type of cable do I need?

4. Assuming I can split it, do I need a second “Scientific Atlanta Webstar” box to put in the garage, or are there different types of modems that will convert the cable wire into a traditional network (ADSL) type connection that I can plug into my Airport Express?

Thanks very much

[BenMcr]

To answer your question straight away, no it is not possible to split the Virgin connection. Virgin also only supply one modem per property (and you cannot buy them legally from anywhere)

What would would have to do is split the connection past the ethernet socket on the back on the modem.

If the Airport Express has a wired connection on it, you could run a ethernet cable to the garage and put a Wireless access point on the end.

If not you are going to have to use another type of wireless router

[TraxData]

Originally Posted by BenMcr

To answer your question straight away, no it is not possible to split the Virgin connection. Virgin also only supply one modem per property (and you cannot buy them legally from anywhere)

What would would have to do is split the connection past the ethernet socket on the back on the modem.

You could then run a ethernet cable to the garage and put a Wireless access point on the end, if the Airport Express has wired connections on it

You can have 2 modems per household as long as they are under different names.

As posted by Ben, it would be easier easier to just run Cat5 to your garage with some form of protection.

[BenMcr]

You CANT HAVE TWO MODEMS. Especially if you are ex-tw

In ex-ntl it was possible to achive on the billing system. In ex-tw it never has been.

Now that the whole of Virgin are on the ex-tw billing system, you can now not do it in ex-ntl areas

[TraxData]

Originally Posted by BenMcr

You CANT HAVE TWO MODEMS. Especially if you are ex-tw

In ex-ntl it was possible to achive on the billing system. In ex-tw it never has been.

Now that the whole of Virgin are on the ex-tw billing system, you can now not do it in ex-ntl areas

Wrong.

I know various people in both ex-tw/pure/ex-ntl areas with 2 modems in one household and until a week ago i had 2 modems as well.

[BenMcr]

*sighs*

Ok so maybe it was possible in ex-tw as well then. That was in the past.

You cannot have two modems NOW unless the property is flats or an agreed student property

[Toilet-Duck]

Ben is wrong, you can get a splitter which will split the cable from 1 main into 2 terminals which allows you to have 1 cable into the house and another into the office, this is what VM use to split the signal to allow multiple boxes in the same house.

Somthing like this for example which is what we kinda have on our property:

http://www.homedepot.ca/wcsstore/Hom...c6ed5586_4.jpg

However you would need to check the signal before and after to make sure you havent signifcantly altered the SNR and power levels, you may need to add a device whcich increases or decreases the levels you can get these cheap for about 99p of ebay...

Then simply buy cable from ebay that allows you to attach your modem to the other terminal!

[BenMcr]

Originally Posted by Toilet-Duck

Ben is wrong, you can get a splitter which will split the cable from 1 main into 2 terminals which allows you to have 1 cable into the house and another into the office, this is what VM use to split the signal to allow multiple boxes in the same house.

You can split the cable all you like but unless you have something on the end then all it is is a bit of split cable!

And Virgin don't do multiple modems

Somthing like this for example which is what we kinda have on our property:

http://www.homedepot.ca/wcsstore/Hom...c6ed5586_4.jpg

However you would need to check the signal before and after to make sure you havent signifcantly altered the SNR and power levels, you may need to add a device whcich increases or decreases the levels you can get these cheap for about 99p of ebay...

Then simply buy cable from ebay that allows you to attach your modem to the other terminal!

From what i read he doesn't want to have to unscrew the modem from one cable and put on another bit, he wants to be able to use it everywhere all the time. So what you have described doesn't work

[Toilet-Duck]

Originally Posted by BenMcr

That wouldn't help him at all as he would have to then cart the modem from one place to another, as Virgin won't supply him with another modem

I dont think he wants another modem he wants to MOVE the modem hes got.... He wants to split the cable so that he can put the modem along with the router in the garage so the signal is better he needs to split it in order to put it in the garag....

I have come to the conclusion therefore that what I need to do is split the connection before it enters the house. Keep the original line going into the house as before, but at some point (ideally before the wire enters the house, split the cable so that a second wire can be run around the outside of the house and into the garage. At the moment, we have two boxes that are attached to the house (pictured below).

[TraxData]

Originally Posted by BenMcr

*sighs*

Ok so maybe it was possible in ex-tw as well then. That was in the past.

You cannot have two modems NOW unless the property is flats or an agreed student property

Again, your wrong, as long as its under 2 seperate names then you can have 2 modems in one household.

[Toilet-Duck]

And yes 2 modems on seperate accounts at the same address works fine for us....

Read other topic....

[igotdamaged]

What I was hoping to do was to use something like this:


At some point in the system to split the cable in two directions.
One going into the house, and the other going off to the garage...

?

[BenMcr]

Originally Posted by TraxData

Again, your wrong, as long as its under 2 seperate names then you can have 2 modems in one household.

Not any more. As from the 05/05/08 unless the address is phyiscally split on the billing system (Which is only done for flats and somtimes student properties) you cannot have more than one modem per property

Doesn't matter if they are the same name or different names

---------- Post added at 15:03 ---------- Previous post was at 15:02 ----------

Originally Posted by igotdamaged

What I was hoping to do was to use something like this:


At some point in the system to split the cable in two directions.
One going into the house, and the other going off to the garage...

?

But for that you would need two modems. Which you are not going to get

[igotdamaged]

Originally Posted by BenMcr

But for that you would need two modems. Which you are not going to get

How do you mean "won't get"? Surely I can just buy another one off ebay?

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Scientific-Atl...QQcmdZViewItem

[BenMcr]

Oh here we go.

ONLY VIRGIN MEDIA CAN ISSUE YOU WITH A MODEM. YOU CANNOT BUY ONE LEGALLY