Options for Getting Ethernet to my Home Theater Setup

4648 Views 37 Replies 9 Participants Last post by jedorf, Mar 6, 2012

jedorf

Discussion Starter · Feb 29, 2012

I'm curious if anyone could help a networking novice with some options to get reliable internet connectivity to my home theater setup. I'm intrigued enough by DECA, and feel I understand it's general concept, I'm just unsure of how to implement it.

Here is my setup, as I can best put together verbally.

Slimline3 dish
SWM8 splitter outside
SWM PI inside in front of an HR24-200 in basement home theater room
HR21-700 in upstairs bedroom
R22-200 (HD-DVR through software update) in main floor kitchen
H23-600 in main floor living room
Comcast cable modem (Motorola SBG900 wireless gateway) in upstairs office (this room is wired with Comcast coax)

No ethernet is readily available anywhere else in the house except for what can come out of the modem to a router.

I'm open to any and all suggestions, and sorry I'm so inexperienced that you'll probably have to start at square one with me. My main objective is to somehow tie my Panasonic plasma, Panasonic Bluray player, Denon receiver, XBOX360, and HR24 obviously to a reliable network for streaming HD, Pandora, etc.

If it helps, I'd certainly be willing to relocate the H23-600 from the living room (as it is VERY seldom used) to the office, if that will help anything for the DECA and being close to the modem/router. But is that feasible if that room is fed off of the Comcast coax?!

Thanks for any and all help, I appreciate the huge resources these forums are.

1 - 20 of 38 Posts

veryoldschool

· #2 · Feb 29, 2012

Sounds like a call to DirecTV to get the "connected home" upgrade is a good place to start.
This would get the DECA networking going, "and then" it sounds like you'd need to add another BB DECA running to an ethernet switch so you can feed the: Panasonic plasma, Panasonic Bluray player, Denon receiver, XBOX360,
The HR24 already has an internal DECA.

Captain Spaulding

· #3 · Feb 29, 2012

A very simple solution for me is using powerline adaptors. They work perfectly for my internet connected home theater equipment, including DirecTV DVRs, TVs and Blu-ray players.

veryoldschool

· #4 · Feb 29, 2012

Captain Spaulding said:
A very simple solution for me is using powerline adaptors. They work perfectly for my internet connected home theater equipment, including DirecTV DVRs, TVs and Blu-ray players.

Since they use the house wiring, results vary a lot.
Some have good results because they're on the same circuit, while other don't because they're not.

jedorf

Discussion Starter · #5 · Feb 29, 2012

veryoldschool said:
Sounds like a call to DirecTV to get the "connected home" upgrade is a good place to start.
This would get the DECA networking going, "and then" it sounds like you'd need to add another BB DECA running to an ethernet switch so you can feed the: Panasonic plasma, Panasonic Bluray player, Denon receiver, XBOX360,
The HR24 already has an internal DECA.

Thanks so much for the information. A few questions, and **warning**, I'm about to show my lack of networking knowledge.

If I go the route of the "connected home" setup, which would introduce the DECA network, along with an additional BB DECA for the home theater equipment, I would assume the ethernet from that 2nd BB DECA would go straight to the switch? But how does the DECA network talk to my home network? Wouldn't I need a DECA to tie straight to my modem/router? Or does that take place through the "connected home" setup, and all Directv coax is essentially capable of passing ethernet with a DECA hooked up?

veryoldschool

· #6 · Feb 29, 2012

jedorf said:
Thanks so much for the information. A few questions, and **warning**, I'm about to show my lack of networking knowledge.

If I go the route of the "connected home" setup, which would introduce the DECA network, along with an additional BB DECA for the home theater equipment, I would assume the ethernet from that 2nd BB DECA would go straight to the switch? But how does the DECA network talk to my home network? Wouldn't I need a DECA to tie straight to my modem/router? Or does that take place through the "connected home" setup, and all Directv coax is essentially capable of passing ethernet with a DECA hooked up?

I'm sure this would all make more sense with a drawing, but...

The idea here is to have DirecTV install the DECA networking [so you're using the coax for this] and have them install the Cinema Connection Kit, which bridges/connect the DECA networking to your router/home network.
Then you add another CCK [you'll need to do this yourself] that breaks the coax networking back out to ethernet, so you can then add a switch, and connect the other devices.
So:
internet/home network --> DECA ---all your DirecTV receivers and --> DECA --> ethernet to your "other stuff".

Alebob911

· #7 · Feb 29, 2012

I agree with VOS on this one. CALL DIRECTV and let them get DECA installed. It will be worth the money in the long run and probably save you tons in frustration costs! :lol: Then you can come back here and get VOS's suggestions about getting the other equipment needed for your other gear.

jedorf

Discussion Starter · #8 · Feb 29, 2012

veryoldschool said:
I'm sure this would all make more sense with a drawing, but...

The idea here is to have DirecTV install the DECA networking [so you're using the coax for this] and have them install the Cinema Connection Kit, which bridges/connect the DECA networking to your router/home network.
Then you add another CCK [you'll need to do this yourself] that breaks the coax networking back out to ethernet, so you can then add a switch, and connect the other devices.
So:
internet/home network --> DECA ---all your DirecTV receivers and --> DECA --> ethernet to your "other stuff".

I think I follow. So, get Directv out to do a Whole Home, which will include them installing a CCK to bridge the DECA to my home network. Then, the 2nd CCK or BB DECA that I add, will be in front of the HR24 via a splitter to break the coax back out to ethernet, and run over to a switch to hook all my components up.

I'm learning, sorry........ :eek2:

veryoldschool

· #9 · Feb 29, 2012

jedorf said:
I'm learning, sorry........ :eek2:

No, I'd be sorry if you weren't. :lol:

vict

· #10 · Feb 29, 2012

jedorf said:
I think I follow. So, get Directv out to do a Whole Home, which will include them installing a CCK to bridge the DECA to my home network. Then, the 2nd CCK or BB DECA that I add, will be in front of the HR24 via a splitter to break the coax back out to ethernet, and run over to a switch to hook all my components up.

I'm learning, sorry........ :eek2:

This would be one way to do it. However, it would seem that by going that route, you're now crossing your DECA (Whole Home) cloud with your regular network (that you would run your X-Box, etc. from). So, for instance, if you were playing an online game on your X-Box in the basement, and your wife was watching something in the bedroom that was recorded on the basement reciever, I can see you having issues. As both of these activities are running on the same network.

Perhaps another method would be to get one CCK to bridge your DECA network, then get a regular wireless bridge for the rest of your components. In this setup, your performance is only limited by your modem bandwith, not by other activities running on your DECA network. After running MRV on my regular network, I definitely had some issues when doing other things. Isolating the DECA network helped. Just my two cents.

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veryoldschool

· #11 · Feb 29, 2012

vict said:
This would be one way to do it. However, it would seem that by going that route, you're now crossing your DECA (Whole Home) cloud with your regular network (that you would run your X-Box, etc. from). So, for instance, if you were playing an online game on your X-Box in the basement, and your wife was watching something in the bedroom that was recorded on the basement reciever, I can see you having issues. As both of these activities are running on the same network.

Perhaps another method would be to get one CCK to bridge your DECA network, then get a regular wireless bridge for the rest of your components. In this setup, your performance is only limited by your modem bandwith, not by other activities running on your DECA network. After running MRV on my regular network, I definitely had some issues when doing other things. Isolating the DECA network helped. Just my two cents.

While sharing bandwidth can be a problem, it really comes down to how much, and if one MRV stream is going, there's plenty of DECA bandwidth left, and wireless is really only a good option for the DECA to router link.

vict

· #12 · Feb 29, 2012

I certainly know better than to argue with VOS :nono:

Richierich

· #13 · Feb 29, 2012

Too bad they don't have a Wireless DECA Bridge.

I have 2 WRT600N Wireless Gaming Adapters for sale cheap if you need to use them.

vict

· #14 · Feb 29, 2012

Richierich said:
Too bad they don't have a Wireless DECA Bridge.

I have 2 WRT600N Wireless Gaming Adapters for sale cheap if you need to use them.

Pre-DECA legacy?

jedorf

Discussion Starter · #15 · Feb 29, 2012

veryoldschool said:
While sharing bandwidth can be a problem, it really comes down to how much, and if one MRV stream is going, there's plenty of DECA bandwidth left, and wireless is really only a good option for the DECA to router link.

Would I have some feasible options if I went the wireless route? And more importantly, would that be reliable and consistent? I've just assumed that avoiding wireless was the way to go, but if it's a decent option for bridging the DECA to the router, maybe that would be a suitable option?

veryoldschool

· #16 · Feb 29, 2012

jedorf said:
Would I have some feasible options if I went the wireless route? And more importantly, would that be reliable and consistent? I've just assumed that avoiding wireless was the way to go, but if it's a decent option for bridging the DECA to the router, maybe that would be a suitable option?

I'm using the wireless CCK to bridge between the DECA networking and my router. This works well because when you're downloading from the internet, [one my connection is slower] it goes into a buffer as such, and if a packet is missed, then it's requested to be sent again.
This doesn't work with streaming, as there is very little "ask again" time, before it has to be ignored for the streaming to continue.
You can use it to link to your DECA, but it isn't going to help much going the other direction to bridge to your other devices, so the BB DECA and a switch would be better.

After re-reading your first post, a wireless CCK might work for you, but going with the DirecTV install, would mean they run a coax to your office [most likely] and hardwire a DECA to your router.
A possible upside to this might be you're set to add a receiver in your office later if you so felt.

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cenastyle

· #17 · Mar 1, 2012

Let me ask a question, as it relates to this situation. I'm in a similar situation to the OP, where there isn't an option to run ethernet throughout the house and I'm tired of having my wireless drop out in the middle of using a networked device.

A few times in the past, I've just unplugged the ethernet cable from my D* box (the one coming out of the DECA) and plugged it directly into my Blu-Ray player. Since I have the CCK, I have gotten internet access to that new device with just a quick menu change from wireless to wired setup.

Here's the question...couldn't I just take that ethernet at each of my D* DECAs and run it into a switch then back out to my D* box and other devices at that TV? I haven't tried it yet, but, was wondering if there would be any issues with going this route?

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veryoldschool

· #18 · Mar 1, 2012

cenastyle said:
Let me ask a question, as it relates to this situation. I'm in a similar situation to the OP, where there isn't an option to run ethernet throughout the house and I'm tired of having my wireless drop out in the middle of using a networked device.

A few times in the past, I've just unplugged the ethernet cable from my D* box (the one coming out of the DECA) and plugged it directly into my Blu-Ray player. Since I have the CCK, I have gotten internet access to that new device with just a quick menu change from wireless to wired setup.

Here's the question...couldn't I just take that ethernet at each of my D* DECAs and run it into a switch then back out to my D* box and other devices at that TV? I haven't tried it yet, but, was wondering if there would be any issues with going this route?

While this is COMPLETELY UNSUPPORTED, you mean something like this:

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cenastyle

· #19 · Mar 1, 2012

Yes...so, I'm assuming it works, just not officially?

veryoldschool

· #20 · Mar 1, 2012

cenastyle said:
Yes...so, I'm assuming it works, just not officially?

"Shall we say" if there is ever a problem with MRV, you'll know the first thing to remove. :lol:

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