I’m renovating the upstairs of the house and turning it into a separate apartment. While I’m at it, I figured this was a good time to run an Ethernet cable up from downstairs and get things ready for an access point.
An old house has its advantages, but thick walls don’t do Wi-Fi any favors. I also wanted wired connections for the computers, so with the renovation already underway, it made sense to sort out the network too.
I bought some back boxes and Ethernet outlets and played network technician for a bit.
A Small Trip Back to Technical School
Wiring up the outlets turned out to be very straightforward. I bought ones that don’t need a separate tool to terminate the wires. You arrange them according to the color markings, close the mechanism, and the outlet makes the connections for you.
The whole thing reminded me of technical school. I wired up plenty of these during one semester, except back then each wire had to be punched down individually with a tool. Next color, another punch, next wire. With enough outlets to get through, it kept you busy.
Here, that part practically took care of itself. You still have to arrange the wires, but terminating them comes down to closing the outlet. A small change, but a very welcome one when you remember doing it in class.
It was nice to come back to something I used to do a lot and discover that this particular bit of work had gotten easier.
It Works. The Looks Can Wait.
Everything is still unfinished. The walls where I’ll eventually mount the back boxes aren’t there yet, so the outlets are waiting for their permanent home. The photos give a pretty good idea of where things stand: the cables are there, the connections are there, and I’ll deal with making it look tidy later.
The network already works.
It was a small job in the middle of a much bigger renovation, but a satisfying one. Some hands-on work, a few memories from technical school, and one part of the future apartment that I can already call functional.
Now I just need to build some walls around it.
And if AI ever takes my programming job, at least I have a plan B: back to cables as a network technician. Good thing they’ve made the outlets easier since technical school.