I'm Cellular

Stash the Gear; Keep your Home Uncluttered

Prefer to stash the router and network gear someplace,
and leave your residence/office uncluttered?
Solution: Place the @Home Router anywhere you have a phone jack.

This has the benefit of allowing one to connect more than one phone to the router via existing, home wiring. I recommend it, as it leaves the gear tucked away where you want it, and keeps your home uncluttered.

How To Do It:
Basically, you get to choose where you’d prefer to have the equipment (DSL, @Home router, and any other gear such as a network storage, backup drive, Apple Time Capsule, whatever).

Let’s say you get Internet service using a DSL that comes into your home: you can choose to locate the DSL modem and associated gear anywhere that there is a telephone jack (for the “line” that carries that DSL signal). Let’s say that you want to place the DSL modem and related gear next to a wall jack that is in your basement (as I did), so that all of the gear is out of sight, but undisturbed. So just move it! Take your existing gear and plug it in a different wall jack … and it will work the same!

Just be sure to connect everything as it was originally. You may wish to label cables for where they attach, or you can get a friend to help you move everything without disconnecting anything (rather like group juggling).

Where you choose to locate your gear is up to you! You do not need to have the Internet connection wherever the installer placed it originally, with a single phone hanging off of the @Home “Phone” port. I moved all of my gear to the basement since it was cluttering and heating up my home office. Now I have all of the network gear on a table, with plenty of room (no ducking under desks to reboot or rearrange).

For suggestions about how to connect multiple phones, see the related page, “Multiple phones a ringin’.”