Budget Home Network Tour/How To 

I liked your setup so much that I mimicked it almost entirely. I have a few more devices that I put on some shelves in the rack as well. Thanks for the video.

Finally!! A straight to the point video tutorial that shows everything needed to run a simple home network. I think i'm gonna follow your model and build my home network. Thanks for the video!!

Just finished a new build house. This and your patch panel video really helpful. I now have very similar set up plus all TV/Sat connections. Looks so neat and professional and works reliably.

Nice walkthrough of the install. I went through this in my house with a budget of around 500. I had a few more criteria to hit, mainly i wanted a lockable cabinet because I plan to keep a surveillance nvr in there. I did use the same switch and patch panel.

Very good looking setup. I need to do something like this, but I have just thrown mine together. And, I'm still working out the bugs. But, glad you walked-through it and had the time to do it right !!! Good job ...

My budget is ask my boss if i can take stuff home that is being decommissioned. I love and hate the 3 year rule.

That's a marvelous job in cable management and setup. I appreciates you sharing this that way I can learn.

One element I picked up from watching pro vids on networks is the "service loop", a loop of cable that gives you the spare length if you need to fix something. There are other choices that can be used, though they cost more money, such as Keystone connectors which need very little untwisting of the twisted pairs. General electrical safety: keep your network cabling clear of mains power cabling. I'm in the UK, where we run at 240v, and maybe the electricians in my family made me a little over-cautious. Some things you show would be difficult here in the UK, because of different house-construction methods. The Keystone system is available here, with connector modules for aerial and audio connections, but there is a different size standard, working in a similar way, that also gets called Keystone by some. Again, different UK standards, but I would use a PDU that had standard UK power sockets, rather than the IEC types (which you can see on a desktop PCs PSU). It makes it easy to add a wall-wart to power something such as that wi-fi, or a PoE box, or just to provide a USB charging point for a phone.

Just a suggestion for others I recently found out about. They offer keystone compatible patch panels that make working on the patch panel more convenient. It also helps if a port dies because you can replace instead of just having to mark it as dead.

I've explored and watched numerous videos like yours, all in hopes for setup ideas... yours is the best by far. Thx

Appreciate the video! I'm getting my feet wet with RU-vid, and a dedicated home network has made things easier.

Your video was one of my few inspirations 2 years ago to build my home network.

Tip: Do not use zip ties. The sheathing on the network cable can swell and shrink based on temperature shifts which will cause the zip ties to cut into the cable. Instead spend a couple of bucks on a roll of velcro and cut strips of that to manage your cables.

Never thought of doing a wall mount rack. My setup is a mess. Thanks for the video.

I just finished my similar set up un my new house. Well the data part anyways. I have some coaxial cable I would like to find some rack equipment for and make just as nice. But this is a great start. Thank you foe showing me how to get this done.

I did this after watching this video in 2020.. Cant be happier! nice to have the whole house on wired and take the massive strain off the wifi with so many devices.

Love the neatness. I've done a bunch of office network cable installs and here are a couple of quick notes: 1. Run the cables from the hinged side instead (to the right in the video). This allow you to punch them down, tie them up, and then rotate it back into place with the cables fully mounted. 2. That seems like a lot of metal to mess with your wifi hotspot/router's antennas. Might be better to mount it somewhere away from the rack. The other walls inside the closet, for example. 3. Cable labels are your friend. :) Maybe they're done and I'm not seeing them in the vid? I won't do any kind of install without them anymore (not even car stereo). In very big setups we will write on the cable itself before heat shrinking on something more permanent once the final length is determined.

id like to do something like this myself. Very clean work, looks well organized and professional... i feel that will be my downfall (usually is, especially in PC building) where i start off strong with cable management but after several "undo's" and another hours worth of routing i get in such a rush near the finish line i just start stuffing in cables and cramming cover plates over stuff and turn the window towards the wall so nobody can see my shame. again, great looking build!

I really enjoyed this video. It also shows people they do not have to spend thousands of dollars to create a decent network, good work!

For future reference it’s easier to punch down on a flat surface if you take the patch panel off the rack and lay it down. Also wouldn’t recommend zip ties for two reasons. If you over tighten them you run the risk of messing with the UTP inside the jacket, and when it’s time to upgrade or add to your panel you’ll want to cut those zip ties and run the risk of nipping a cable. Velcro straps are relatively cheap. In your case it’s also not a bad idea to wire map, and verify your cables to make sure you’re getting good cross talk and that your pairs all match up correctly.

Really like the video, i always seek tech tips that are affordable and doable, kindly continue on producing such content also let us in about the research you did. also keep on making budget tech videos, do a budget solar panel or budget home plumbing or water system

Wes Cameron Your video was helpful and I was able to completed my task and it pass the wife test.

Pretty slick. Thanks for showing how to do, it's inspiring to tech newbies

I'm glad I found your video. You inspired me to make my own network! I wish I recorded it.

Dope setup, I totally need to run some Ethernet veins in my house

Great video, much appreciated. The music makes feel like I should sitting in a motorized chair making and making robot sounds with my mouth tho.

Simple and to the point. Now I understand this whole lab a bit more

This is great. Just found your channel. I will be looking for a home server video, but this is an excellent place for me to start. Thank you!

1 tip on the punchdown panel. You need to maintain the pair twist tolerance all the way from the jacket butt to the panel itself. Very important on Cat6 and up spec cables. Each pair is twisted differently to prevent cross talk. That few inches of untwisting the pairs can drop your network speed a lot. Same goes if installing a RJ45 connector.

good detailed video. I do that for a living and you hit all the bases. good explanation and pictures step by step.

Thank you for this video. Gave me a good grasp of what I needed for setting up my own home network when I moved into my new location.

My setup is almost identical but my rack is in the basement and the wifi router is in the stairwell so its more centrally located. Port one patches my cable modem to the router's wan port and port 2 patches a lan port back into the switch where its distributed throughout the house. I even use passive gigabit POE injectors so no outlet needed near the router.

4:28 you've got 110V in the same stud space as data cables. That would fail a code inspection since the 110V would induce noise in the data cables.

You mounted your switch with 4 screws on each bracket. I see you don’t like to live dangerously.

beautiful work . an inspiration to anyone who's looking to having there network set up done right .

Thanks for sharing your setup. Gives some great ideas for others on how they could go about getting their setup going.

F**KING amazing so neat and clean , love it , i give you a A++ in cable management and professional looking

well done sir

I’m in Canada 🇨🇦 so of course our prices differ but I am planning on a similar build. Everything’s sitting in my cart 🛒 on Amazon. I went with a “smart” switch, same rack, power strip, patch panel, 🤜 punch kit..... all to network my 🏡 house.... I’ll also being doing a video presentation like yourself. Thank you for the run through.

Far as that full length piano hinge goes- you can use a Dremel cutting wheel to cut down that strip into sections so whenever you need to just open one section, it's all separated for great ease of use! That's what I do with mine and my friends setups whenever helping them along, and it always works very well and goes off without a hitch

But did it pass the wife test? Thats the real question. XD

If you wanted to save a little money you could've just run 1 or 2 ethernet cables to your entertainment center and then added a switch. Also, I've repurposed old routers into switches by disabling DHCP and wireless capabilities if anyone wanted to save even a little more money.

Thanks Ben. Good food for thought - planning on doing something like this in my home.

Nav Rack was setup upside down (top is facing down), the smaller hole on rack should face up. Very Nice work and explanation of setup and gear.

If this was Linus it would've fallen and left a hole in the wall

2:01 "Does have a 12 inch depth, which should allow enough space for most any typical rackmounted equipment". (Looks to left to see my Dell PowerEdge 2950 server yet to be installed, which looks *at least 3 feet long*...)

Very neatly done. Would have gone with a managed 16 port layer 2 switch with PoE+ capability on some of the ports though. Gotta be able to run a more central ceiling mounted AP and VLAN support is a must. Can always buy another unmanaged 16 port switch later on the cheap for expansion. I like to create separate VLANs for my main, guest, kids networks, and a fourth VLAN for IoT devices and anything else that needs internet connectivity but has questionable security features. Thanks for sharing.

Thanks to your video I encourage myself to do the same.

Damm thats looking cool

I do not see any labeling on the cables, how did you keep track of where the cables was routed from?

Cable Labeling > Cable Management - I've been in "server closets" that look like buzzard nests, but the labeling was so precise it didn't matter much.

Now all you need is a ups and you are set. Good job!

I missed my old job as a voice/data/fiber installer.

"Wife test" LOL, obviously you never met me ;) I'm a woman who handles all of our networking in the house and buys the rackmount equipment. My husband would never meet my very fussy hardware demands when it comes to high-end networking equipment ;)

Good job. I like ur set up.

Good video, smooth description of process involved.

The rack is upside down, you can tell by the wall mounting holes.

How did you manage to pass the "wife test"? In my experience that's the most challenging aspect - easier to build a Mars Lander.

Awesome layout!! Pretty dang cool

Very nicely done and seem was to do! Thanks for the ideas mate

That time when I envy cardboard walls. I can't easily put network through my thick stone walls =\

Just missing a UPS :)

One of the better network/cabinet tours on youtube. Great video and nice setup. (our setup is like your before setup!) Where you say you cant swing out your patch panel, you could take a hacksaw and cut the hinge top and bottom of the patch panel so you could swing out just that section?

Dude I have to give you props on your set up..(👍nice!)

The network cables will eventually be TERMINATED.

No zip ties, use velcro....

Nice job man! Looks really clean.

Ah, you’ve educated me about undiscovered treasures, namely the volume and low price of used business rack mount components!

Cool video. But OVERKILL at its finest.

Official looking? "Professional"... the word you're looking for is "professional".

Thanks for this video and putting everything in simple easy to follow language!!

Really useful for learning how to set up a wired home network, my fam have always managed on WiFi but with the new setup we're installing we can use ethernet and we will have a better WiFi connection. It won't be quite as good as yours but it will definitely be a massive improvement, thanks for sharing your knowledge

So all of this is for better wifi? sorry I'm only 13 so I don't really know but interesting video

Please for everyone's sake change the intro. But the rest of the video is good

Excellent video. Really enjoyed watching. Well done.

Well done! Looks great! Thanks for sharing.

just one thing ... that would never pass an electrical inspection

that electrical wiring at 4:24 isn't up to code. the romex connector is stripped out of the compression slot which looks like you completely pushed out like a novice, and there are no staples securing the romex to the wall. i mean make a little effort.

Nice work. I did the same thing except I mounted my patch panel in the wall. My interior studs happen to be farther than 16" apart. I put a block of wood in the wall to mount the patch panel to. The panel is flushed mounted to the drywall. I then bought a rack mount shelf for my Cisco switch and also put my setup above the top closet shelf so my coat rack would still be free. The one thing I didn't think about was doing a coax patch panel for distribution in the house. All my coax runs to one location outside currently. Someday I'll reroute it to the closet and add a patch panel.

Love your videos very well explained. Thank you!

It's great to have a home network, and I think it's the best thing you can do on a budget.

I know how to do this but I like to watch this kind of videos.

Hi, there I would recommend a hair panel to run the cables inside a rack from the switch or router toward the patch panel But still very nice work !

Nice clean work. Thanks for the info, will help on my install. (Thinking about keystone style)

Omg under $200, that’s so awesome man 🙌🏽

Nice work. Awesome clean home setup!

Excellent job. Thx for posting

great video! we are building a new house and I plan to run my cables before all the walls are complete. Just an observation. You may have mounted the rack like you did for the swing out feature, but the mounting holes appear to make it look like you hung the rack upside down. Just wondered. Great information, and wish me luck with mine. Thanks.

Good video, but I will give you one tip that you may or may not know about... and that is to use smurf tube and ENT boxes for your network wiring. They even make it just for low voltage/AV/network in orange color. I use it for all my network runs - just mount the box and run the tubing. For simple wall drops I only run the tubing so it's just a few inches above the top plate of the wall. It makes running additional cable & changing cabling so easy. You can also run it between boxes - I use it this way to run wires between DVRs and wall mounted TVs as you can get it in large enough diameter to run an HDMI cable. It also comes in handy when going from the audio/video distribution panel to the various speaker locations. Yeah, there's some additional cost but it's worth it down the road if you ever need to add wires.

Thanks so much for this video, I know what i'm going to install next :)

I use two of the TP Link switches and are very reliable

Great vids, you talk well and very detailed . Thanks

From a physical point of view i like, two thumps up. From a software side of view its either not shown or lacking heavily, neutral. For example: I hope you have installed a good FW for getting the most out of your network, from your own ISP, security and throughput. Also its 100% viable if you want to purchase refurbished Cisco equipment or equipment thats no longer supported for your layer two and layer three, getting industry capabilities behind a strong FW for very very little.

looks awesome! thanks for the information.

I have to say my network is better than this now. BUT this is the video that pushed me over the top to actually run cat6a and set it up like this properly. Thank you.

Good job man.

loved it! very nice work!

I just purchased NETGEAR 12-Port Gigabit Layer 2 Managed Switch GSM7212 ,I researched and every Techie say you have more control over your settings. it is a 2006 hope it works for my needs. should have it today! setting and waiting.

I would recommend adding a ups I did to my very similar setup and it's awesome still having internet and wifi when the power drops

beautiful setup