Best drop (from terminal to NID):
-If aerial, single pair, untwisted, flat drop, spliced multiple times, and squirrel chewed
-If buried: red-green-yellow-black aircore quad untwisted drop, unbonded at the ped and at the nid, spliced 3 times underground, and the sheath rotted off as the drop comes out of the ground
-From NID to Modem: Old cloth-insulated bridal wire is preferred, but if not available, untwisted 4 conductor quad red-green-yellow-black wire is perfectly acceptable, with multiple pair copper splices using wire nuts
Disclaimer: The Drop/Service Wire from AT&T is the responsibility of AT&T, as all Telco Plant elements before reaching the Customer Side of the ONT/NID/Demarc are.
Any work required on the Drop/Service wire will be done by AT&T Technicians.
If on any xDSL variety of U-Verse:
For your "Drop"/Service Wire from AT&T, ideally you want a multi-pair UTP or STP Aerial or STP Buried Drop wire from AT&T.
If on any xPON variety of U-Verse:
For your "Drop"/Service Wire from AT&T, you will have an insulated/armored single Fiber. This "wire" is really not wire, as Fiber is really very fine glass strands. Because of this, for Buried Utility locating purposes, there is a metal Trace Wire attached to the outside of the Fiber Drop insulation.
For any U-Verse variety:
To meet these requirements, a new Drop Wire may need to be placed on installation day and/or for repair service.
If Aerial, the Technician will hang the new Drop from the Pole to the house, and make the proper attachments to the house.
If Buried, the Technician will lay a new Drop from the Pedestal to the house. It will be laid above ground on the day of installation, and buried by a contractor crew on a later date, typically within 2 weeks (if you are in a colder climate during Winter time, drops are not buried once the ground freezes, so drops in that case will not be buried until the Spring thaw). Again, all proper attachments to the house are made.
If there are any known potential obstructions in-ground (invisible pet fences, sprinkler systems, conduit to detached buildings/pools/etc), let both the Technician laying the drop and the Bury Crew burying the drop know this, and their approximate locations.
All drop/service wire will terminate to an AT&T NID/ONT, that hands off the Drop Wire to the Customer owned wiring. The main service entry ground/protector is also at the NID/ONT. A new NID/ONT may need to be placed.
Public Service Announcement 1: Please do not disconnect the main Telco service entry ground for any reason. If the ground wire or clamp must be removed, please call AT&T repair service.
Public Service Announcement 2: Especially if you are in a Buried Utility Area, but really even if it seems your Utilities are all Aerial fed, before you do any digging work in your yard, please call your local Utility Locating Service. Locating Services can be reached by dialing 811 in most, if not all, AT&T areas
Public Service Announcement 3: If your Drop Wire needs to be reconfigured, rerouted, removed, or replaced, please call AT&T repair service.
Public Service Announcement 4: For safety and security reasons: Do not attempt to access the Telco Pedestal or any Telco facilities on a Pole. Do not attempt to access the Telco Side of the NID/ONT. These areas are restricted to properly trained AT&T Technicians or authorized Contractors. The NID/ONT has an access screw labeled "Customer Access" that grants access to the Customer Wiring side of the NID/ONT.
I, whamel
,have accessed the pedestal before, and used a steel wrench to loosen to posts, and was I in for a SHOCK! I was electrocuted (it's low voltage but gives u a major sting). I do not recommend playing in the pedestal.
This is my bonded setup for power tier. Top photo, NID is inside my basement. YES, I have a circa 80's green air-core drop from pedestal...
Coming in on the drop is blue and green pairs for each "pair" from pedestal...Connected to the gep protector...which is in turn connected to the VDSL2 splitters (1 for each pair). Coming out of the last slot on splitter is the CAT 5e RG feed, using the orange and green pairs to the RG. Backfeeding on the same CAT 5e RG feed is the VoIP connection, which is then connected to 5 jacks spread throughout house.
Use the CAT 6 u have been using. I have tried using the "Superior Essex 3x22" shielded cable as a RG feed. Don't, easier using the tiwsted pair especially since the shielded drop is a thicker guage wire...it's impossible to make a RG14 jack with 22AWG wire...and I have found I get much better signal integrity on the RG feed using twisted pair vs. shielded pair. And that old RG shielded pair feed was an attempt to help my signal out. Weird bc it was leftover from the NEW pedestal to NID drop done when I got bonded setup. Had many techs out here and were baffled to find I got far better SN Margins using the old green air core vs new shielded gel core.
POINT being, don't connect the pedestal feed directly to the RG feed. MAKE sure u are NOT using the ceramic grounds, make sure u ARE using gep grounds with VDSL2 splitters. MAKE sure u are using twisted pairs for any connection past pedestal feed.
There will be a few different scenarios presented in this FAQ entry, due to the variety of situations that can be encountered. The quick summation of this whole entry will be, the Data feed from the NID/ONT, be it xDSL or Ethernet, needs to be on a home-ran segment of (ideally) Cat 5 or higher wiring.
For xDSL Varieties (be it ADSL2+ or VDSL2, Single Pair or Pair Bonded):
1) If your service is Line Shared with an AT&T POTS Phone Line, ideally a Whole House xDSL/POTS Splitter/Filter should be installed at the NID. The POTS wiring should then be reconnected to the Filtered POTS port, and the xDSL signal should be connected to the Filtered xDSL port or an unfiltered port.
2) The xDSL link from the NID to the Modem requires 1 pair (2 pairs for Pair Bonded) of Phone Wiring (IW). Ideally, Cat 5 or higher wiring is desired, but that is not always possible, with the typical exceptions being MDU buildings and Business buildings. On older U-Verse installations, if using Cat 5 wire, the "Green" pair used to be the de facto standard for single pair U-Verse installations, but any colored pair is acceptable, and is dependent upon how the installation was done. As of ~2015, the Blue Pair (or Blue+Orange for bonded) has become the standard, in conjunction with AT&T Branded Jack setup. However, ATT no longer uses green as the defacto DSL wire color. Now for any and all installations, Blue - Pair 1 DSL/POTS. Orange - Pair 2 DSL/POTS. In situations where VOIP is used, Green and Brown are used to backfeed VOIP from the RG to the NID which is then terminated to any IW phone lines.
That one pair should connect, with no added legs or breaks, straight from the NID to the Modem. Splices themselves are ok, as long as they are "straight thru" splices -- not adding any taps/legs.
This differs highly from how phone wiring was traditionally done, as voice circuits are typically tapped/legged either jack to jack to jack (a "Daisy Chain") or from a central wiring point, all splice together and break/leg out to each individual jack (a "Star"). Also, unless a relatively newer house, most houses are not wired with Cat 5 or higher phone/data wiring. So this typically results in the Installer placing new Cat 5e wiring between the NID and the Modem Location.
In the case that Cat 5 or higher is not available, then a single, isolated, available existing phone wiring pair needs to be found that can be "home ran" from the Demarc to the Modem location. In the case of apartments or businesses, this typically means finding any and all phone rooms/closets where any splices exist, as well as opening up all phone jacks at the location, to ensure the "home run" wire without any extra legs/taps.
3) Once the home ran data pair(s) reach the modem location, either a Jack can be installed to terminate the wiring, or an RJ-11 plug can be directly connected to the wiring itself to plug directly into the Modem. Typically, the Jack would be more common when the Modem is placed in a living area/room/office area, and a directly connected Plug would be more common if the Modem is installed in a Wiring Closet or Basement type of location, around other wiring elements.
Once you reach the jack, then an UTP Cat 5 RJ-11 terminated patch cord connects from the new xDSL Data Jack to the Modem's "Green" xDSL port.
For xPON varieties:
Background: The Link from the AT&T Network to your ONT is either BPON or GPON, that terminates the Fiber to the Telco side of the ONT. The Customer side of the ONT has no Fiber interfaces -- all copper. There are (typically) 2-4 POTS ports for POTS phone available, and also 1 RJ-45 Ethernet port for Data. U-Verse utilizes that Ethernet port to deliver service from the ONT to the Modem. There is also a set of Power Terminals for the Power Wire to power the ONT, as the ONT needs electrical power to function.
1) The Ethernet link from the ONT to the Modem requires 2 Cat 5 or higher pairs. For any speed tiers over 100 Mbps, the Ethernet link from the ONT to the Modem requires 4 Cat 5 or higher pairs. And now that speeds over 100 Mbps are marketed and sold, it is best to always connect all 4 Pairs, unless there is a need for another pair in a situation with a speed tier of 100 Mbps or less AND another Cat 5 cannot be ran
In theory, the pairs that should be used are the "Green" and "Orange" pairs if only utilizing 2, and if utilizing (typically all) 4 pairs, then the "Blue, Green, Orange, and Brown" pairs. A standard Cat 5 run has 4 pairs inside the jacket. The pin-out on the RJ-45 connector should follow either the 568-A or 568-B Pattern. The two patterns are co-standards -- either is acceptable - simply be consistent on both sides.
2) The Ethernet link needs to be "home ran" from the ONT to the Modem location. Any splices need to be kept to Ethernet twist standards, and there cannot be any taps/legs added to the runs. The Ethernet-using pairs must be home ran from the ONT to the Modem location. If new Cat 5e needs to be placed, the Installer will do that.
3) The Cat 5e wiring is then terminated to an RJ-45 Jack for patch cord connection to the modem, or the Cat 5e wiring is terminated to an RJ-45 Plug for direct connection to the modem. As noted in the xDSL section, typically the Jack is used in a living area/room/office, and a Plug would be more common in a wiring closet/basement area.
Once you reach the jack, a standard UTP Cat 5 RJ-45 Ethernet Patch Cord connects from the new RJ-45 jack to the "Red" ONT port on the modem
