MachRider
join:2006-01-11
Wilson, NC
 ·RoadRunner Cable
4 edits | Greenlight (fiber) internet - pre-install wiring advice?
Hello everyone,
Well it has been a while since I've posted last but at the time of last post, I was basically just ranting about TWC and "moving to Wilson NC" was something we were still mostly thinking about -- but not quite sure if we'd pull it off.
Current day: We are on the verge of buying the house we want and are days away from being able to tell TWC to take their service, clueless support, and nebulous bandwidth consumption tiers and stick it somewhere dark and smelly. I can't wait. 
I guess the purpose of this post/topic is twofold:
1) to find out any tech tips from any existing Greenlight customers as far as installation/CPE (customer premise equipment)/wiring issues go ;
2) to provide as much information as possible to benefit those coming along after us once our Greenlight installation is a "past tense" event. I'll provide as many tech details as I can to help anyone else who wants to know.
A Little Background On Us
Former Sprint contract DSL tech (worked Wilson for ~3 years actually). Now an official Linux hacker by trade.
A Little Info On Our Setup
We will have multiple computers using the service, and the "router/firewall" will be a Fedora Linux box. I won't need any Linux advice, just pointing out that our "router" host is a computer rather than some nice little compact router.
I am planning to run network lines and use a patch panel once I figure out where the best "central" location for the switch and patch panel will be in the house.
We will be getting a package with TV, digital phone, and internet. So a punchboard inside the house somewhere may be in order, perhaps in the garage.
Questions for anyone who already has Greenlight service
We do have a couple of questions. Greenlight says they can bring the fiber service right to your computer, all you need is an ethernet connection on the PC. Of course, the devil is in the details...
I am mainly wondering where that fiber link turns into an ethernet jack. We saw one house while house-shopping that I am pretty sure had a Greenlight connection -- because I recognized the power meter, gas hookup, and phone NID (remember I used to be a DSL tech) -- but also saw a beige-colored NID-type box on the outside wall that I didn't recognize, with a line coming up out of the ground protected by PVC or metal conduit. It wasn't a TWC CATV NID.
Does the fiber stop and become an ethernet link in that beige-colored box? If so, and since we'll most likely be using a patch panel anyway, I wonder if it would be a good idea to run a CAT5 run from the utilities connection area of the house's exterior to wherever I will install the patch panel, so I can control how that CAT5 run gets run and terminated. Then from there I can use the patch panel to connect the Greenlight service to whichever patch panel port goes to the firewall server. (I know about there being length limits on CAT5 runs).
Or do they actually run the fiber all the way into the house and terminate it somewhere near "the PC" with some kind of fiber/ethernet interface installed inside and run a patch cable from that to your PC?
There's a decent chance we'd move the firewall machine and other PC's around a bit in the house, so I don't want to be "locked in" to a firewall location. It's a house I'm not familiar with yet. This and just having the ability to rearrange things is why I want to do a patch panel.
Any advice anyone has who currently HAS Greenlight service -- or knows how wiring for fiber to the home is generally installed -- would be greatly appreciated. I'm not getting any of my questions answered via their web form, but want to be as ready as possible for a termination solution that makes things easy for them, but also meets our needs (which will be a bit non-garden variety)
Thanks,
MachRider |
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MachRider
join:2006-01-11
Wilson, NC | OK I changed the topic and cleaned the post up a good bit, hopefully makes a little more sense.
Thanks,
MachRider |
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w4ncr
join:2000-10-27
| reply to MachRider
Lucky you moving to FIBER TO THE HOME AREA.
What these other companies in the south do not want to deploy
Keep me posted how living in Wilson and if there are a lot of desirable rentals there, my mom once lived in Rocky Mount and drove to Wilson each Sunday to shop as because of blue laws at that time all the stores in Rocky mount were closed on Sundays. |
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MachRider
join:2006-01-11
Wilson, NC
·RoadRunner Cable
| Ah thanks. Well the house we placed an offer on fell through. Owned by some finance corporation that partners with a relocation company and they didn't disclose any info about the house until we gave an offer that they wanted to see. Mold. Moisture. Crawl space door conveniently painted shut so you can't open it and look under the house. Roof (which I'd already decided they were going to replace if they wanted to sell us the house). Plumbing leaks. Roof leaks into the attic which they hid by "flooring" the entire attic so you couldn't see the stains in the insulation. Unbelievable. And you had to agree to add roughly 10 pages of their terms (basically "you are buying this house as is") in YOUR offer to THEM.
We walked.
Anyway we'll find something else.
I worked some in Rocky Mount too. Pretty big town.
Do like the area. Will be glad to get there.
Cheers,
MachRider |
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w4ncr
join:2000-10-27
| Your house to buy is the reason I only rent, and my mom onced lived in Rocky Mount and she liked it there she lived in Englewood on Amherst road my brother and sister attended Rocky Mount Academy and I wasnt born at that time.
John High was a great builder of new houses at that time.Enclosed is a article you might have seen this.
»www.indyweek.com/gyrobase/Conten···3A397982 |
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MachRider
join:2006-01-11
Wilson, NC
·RoadRunner Cable
1 edit | said by w4ncr  :Your house to buy is the reason I only rent Since last posting we've looked at multiple other houses and finally settled on one. First house we've been interested in that the MLS data listed by the realtor claimed the house was in excellent condition that it actually WAS in excellent condtion.
said by w4ncr :and my mom onced lived in Rocky Mount and she liked it there she lived in Englewood on Amherst road my brother and sister attended Rocky Mount Academy and I wasnt born at that time. Pretty sure I worked a few DSL orders in Englewood in Rocky Mount. Nice neighborhood if I remember correctly.
Thanks for the link!
MachRider |
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MachRider
join:2006-01-11
Wilson, NC
·RoadRunner Cable
4 edits | reply to MachRider
BBU, ONT, and Return | 
Zoomed in a bit | 
ONT (GPON?) | 
Return Device | 
Zoom-Out Wiring View |
As mentioned before, once I found out some information about how Greenlight premise wiring/termination is done I would share what I could find out.
In the course of more house-shopping over the last couple weeks I stumbled across a house that has already had Greenlight service in the past. This gave me an opportunity to take some pictures, and I think I have a little better understanding now of what kind of prep wiring may need to be done to prepare for my installation.
Hopefully these pics will be helpful to others with the same curiousities. |
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MachRider
join:2006-01-11
Wilson, NC
·RoadRunner Cable
2 edits | I have to admit I'm not particularly experienced with fiber networking. But I've been doing some reading trying to find out what kind of ONT this is. I'm guessing its a GPON ONT. They do sell service up to 100mbps symmetrical for residential customers, if that matters.
I don't know that this is what they're using everywhere in Wilson. On the house these pics came from, it looks like it has been there a while. I saw what looked like a metal box attached to another house some time back.
Anyway, I guess the bottom line is, I need to make 2-3 runs of CAT5E or CAT6 between wherever I decide I want my indoor punchboard for phone and networking patch panel, and somewhere close to the power meter where it looks like they will want to attach the ONT and its battery backup unit.
Unfortunately the phone co. NID (where the station wire runs are) and CATV NID are not located very near the power meter outside the house we're buying. Ah, well.
Cheers,
MachRider |
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w4ncr
join:2000-10-27 | Thanks for the photos of the boxes Wilson is using.
Wish I lived there, keep me updated on how you progress. |
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MachRider
join:2006-01-11
Wilson, NC
·RoadRunner Cable
4 edits | reply to MachRider
Alright, well here's a bit of an update.
First of all, everybody I've gotten to talk to at Greenlight has been really helpful. Heck, the guy that answered the phone in tech support actually does field tech work and knows installation/wiring/etc! How cool is that?
The ONT takes care of splitting off dialtone, CATV, and internet. It has a CATV "F" connector for TV service, POTS connections, and an RJ45 jack for internet that is "straight ethernet".
The grey outdoor-style ONT like the pics above show can handle up to 4 different phone lines.
The internet service is connected to your computer simply by running a network line between the ONT and wherever you want your internet service at, whether its the NIC on your computer, the WAN port on your router, or the internet NIC on your firewall server (I'll be running mine to a Linux firewall/NAT box). The residential service uses standard DHCP to obtain your internet IP.
The "single wire return device" (SWRD) handles anything outbound on the CATV service cable -- like pay-per-view orders, etc., when you have something more than just their basic TV service with RG6 cables screwed directly into the back of your TV('s). They offer DVR units, HDTV units, and means to watch on-demand stuff. So the SWRD takes any outbound traffic from these things and puts it on ethernet back to the ONT so it can go back out to their network on fiber. Evidently you only need one of these regardless of how many TV's and RG6 runs you need for them, as it was explained to me. Which would indicate that SWRD goes in front of any signal splitters used to feed >1 TV.
I also found out that I can get them to bring the fiber in aerially to our house. Based on my conversation with the tech support line gentleman, I believe that is because the power lines etc. on our street are fed aerially, rather than buried in the ground, but this was really good news to me. Not sure if that would be an option if power distribution on your street in Wilson is via buried lines.
I also found out talking to their installation supervisor that I can get them to run the fiber all the way into the house -- brought in at the roofline and through the attic -- and the (normally installed outside) outdoor-style NID can be mounted in a closet inside the house. The house has an alarm system which I do intend to activate monitoring service for, so having the inside POTS wiring feeding the alarm and phone jacks mounted in a box outside where they could be cut to circumvent the alarm seems counter-intuitive.
All in all we are really excited about getting set up. It is SO refreshing to be working with an ISP that actually cares what you want and need. And tech support people that don't have to read from a script to "handle" calls. They weren't really fazed at all by my wanting to have the ONT inside the house where it is protected. They have done it before. It probably helps that I told them I would be taking care of any and all inside wiring needs myself and setting up a demarc-style punchboard.
They told me a standard installation is FREE. Standard as in, they can re-use your existing wiring for CATV or phone jacks, and you don't want any jacks or TV's moved. Nominal charges apply if you need things moved and I think also if you want them to make wire runs for you.
We got word today that the seller of the house we are buying plans to fix all items we provided in the repair request list (even a few things we didn't list). This is great because the response we got to our repair request list was the last thing that might have made us decide not to buy the house. So it is definitely a GO now, and we just have to wait the 2 weeks until closing.
Can hardly wait!
Cheers,
MachRider |
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w4ncr
join:2000-10-27 | Cool, thanks a lot for all the INFO.
Keep us updated all the best |
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midstatepc
Premium
join:2006-02-26
Oxford, FL | reply to MachRider
Congrats on the new home. Man, I wish I lived in that kind of area. I'm having to be the ISP in order to get what I want! |
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MachRider
join:2006-01-11
Wilson, NC
·RoadRunner Cable
| said by midstatepc :Congrats on the new home. Man, I wish I lived in that kind of area. I'm having to be the ISP in order to get what I want! Yeesh. Well I guess that could have its own advantages especially if you are ready to deal with all the stuff that goes along with it. Which I am admittedly pretty ignorant of.
I have a feeling there are going to be more places doing this. I don't really see the "incumbent" broadband ISP's changing to keep up until they absolutely HAVE to to try to compete. The residential sales rep I talked to several times mentioned there are other cities/municipalities in different places asking Greenlight how to set this kind of thing up. |
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midstatepc
Premium
join:2006-02-26
Oxford, FL
| I'm seeing the same thing in my area. Plus, the larger providers have more of a decision making process to go through, so it adds to the timeline of bringing up advanced services. and then there's the personal issue. I know from the past, when I called the isp to setup service in another home, it wasn't really a personal, friendly experience. I'm developing relationships with my customers. I really think it's a better way to go all around. |
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MachRider
join:2006-01-11
Wilson, NC
·RoadRunner Cable
| reply to MachRider
Speedtest I ran earlier today:
Recognizing of course that the test was run to Greenlight's own speedtest.net speedtest server right here in Wilson, testing to other locations does yield slightly slower results, but it does show what the service can do without "external interference".
Cheers,
MachRider |
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