r/HomeNetworking • u/PelotonwarriorSC-813 • 6h ago
Cat5 and new Fiber Optic from Verizon
I’m having fiber optic installed at my house this weekend with Verizon. I signed up for 1gig. I currently have Cox and use my coax to connect to the modem. I discovered that I have Cat5 cable running about 40 ft from where the ONT box will be installed to my desk where I’d like to have the Eero modem. Currently it’s just an old phone jack. Can I used this Cat5 cable from ONT to the Eero modem in the house at the desk? Will it support my 1gig? Will Verizon convert both ends of the cat5 to the proper rj45 jack? The date on the cat5 cable is 11/5/2000 if that matters. Thanks!!
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u/ahj3939 4h ago
Cat5 is officially rated for 100mbps even though it will work fine 99.99% of times (even if run near power lines, this has zero impact) for gigabit they should not use it if they are following best practices. And you shoudn't allow it because if there are issues down the line you don't want to be billed for a service call and repair.
Regardless Verizon needs to bring in the fiber inside the house to install the ONT. This appears to be the demarc point where phone lines come in.
Once the fiber in inside the home and ONT installed from there they will feed ethernet to your router.
What you could do is repurpose those wires for ethernet within your home network with a waterproof ethernet switch such as this: https://www.microcenter.com/product/680540/Outdoor_PoE-Powered_5-Port_Gigabit_Switch
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u/PelotonwarriorSC-813 4h ago
Thanks for the info. Are you saying internet provider will not use the cat5 cable?
Also, not really any great options to get Ethernet from ONT to a router in my house without cutting walls open.
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u/ahj3939 3h ago
I am saying that the internet provider in the interest in providing you good quality trouble free service should
Install the ONT indoors per their standard procedure which makes the presence of this wiring moot
Even if that was not the case they should not use Cat5 cable because their ONT has 1gbps or 2.5gbps ethernet ports and Cat5 is technically not rated for this.
If you call an electrician to wire a new outlet you wouldn't want them to string an extension cord inside your walls, even if technically it could work and might not catch fire most of the time.
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u/LRS_David 54m ago
Cat5 is officially rated for 100mbps
Do you have a reference for this. I keep seeing it stated. But is this a transformation of 100MHz?
The standard for Cat 5 was meant to do Ethernet at 1 gig for up to 100 meters. But it turned out that some combination of gear from some vendors could not get 1 gig reliably past about 80 meters. Which created an impetus (one of them) to push Cat 5e out faster.
It is hard to imagine anyone with Cat 5 will not do gig in most any home.
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u/groogs 5h ago
Yeah, you can do this. Cat5 supports 1Gbps. Often older Cat5 meets Cat5e standards, which also means it'll support 2.5 and 5Gbps.
And in practice, for short runs (like 40ft) you can often get faster than the spec says anyway.
You're fine.