Ethernet in the Bonus Room

Cross another bugaboo about our house off the list. First, we turned the worst bathroom we’ve had into the best, and now I’ve run ethernet networking to the bonus room!

In the bonus room, we have a number of devices that can connect to Wi-fi, but it sometimes seemed wasteful or glitchy to do so. The worst offender was the Apple TV, which we use to stream video to the surround sound and the big-screen TV. Whether it was movies from our iTunes library, Netflix or using AirPlay, I always felt that pumping the HD video over the Wi-fi was less that optimal.

But what could I do? I couldn’t conceive of a way to thread the cable into the room. It was only after we had the basement finished that I figured out a pathway, by following the cable TV cable that one of the previous owners had threaded to the bonus room: from the basement to the garage, and up into the bonus room. The problem was that the basement was now finished. Threading the cable from the fuse box or from the kitchen was going to be difficult.

Working with Miranda, I thought I had it figured out. So today, I went to Memory Express and picked up the cable, a switch and the necessary wall plugs, and to Home Depot to get a fish cable. Tammy and I worked for the whole afternoon and into the evening, but it’s  now done: there’s a network port next to the AV stand in the TV room and all of the devices are hooked in. The performance of the Apple TV is much improved, especially when streaming AirPlay.

Geek happiness.