I have a router connecting my basement computer to the internet, but I also want to connect my PS2's (which is also in the basement) network adapter to the network through a wire (wireless access points for consoles are too expensive, and I don't know if the one I get now will work for PS3/Rev if the PS3/Rev's integrated WAP ever goes awry on me). Is there such thing as a splitter for ethernet connections, like how a coaxial cable splitter splits cable connections? I have 4 6-foot ethernet cables that I want to conjoin with 4 splitters or hubs if that's what I'd need (1 for the input connection from the ethernet cable coming from my router, the other 3 to connect the other ends of the 4 other ethernet cables). Would I be able to do this with such a splitter (or hub, you tell me, please)? The last question is can I do this [splitting] to ONE of the router's connections, and it'll still work? I don't have another ethernet cable long enough (100ft) to connect from just the router directly to the PS2. Please tell me where to buy these splitters/hubs if I can do this, or tell me where to get a well-priced 100ft ethernet cable if I won't be able to do this to one of my router's connections/clients. ALSO if I CAN do the hub/splitter option, tell me which would be cheaper: getting another 100ft cable, the splitters/hubs, or just a cheap WAP that would work well. BTW my router is the Linksys BEFW11S4 and it's wired+wireless, and just in case, the ethernet cable I'm talking about is the normal CAT5 non-crossover type. Thank you so much. *****I did not know whether to put this in the "Resource center" forum or this forum, so I posted on both. If this is a problem, please tell me which forum to keep this post and I'll delete the post from the forum which it should not be on******
A normal 10/100 hub wil allow you to join your 4 devics together without a problem. A hub will physically join the devices, so all of them have access to one another and can either connect to the router for outside network access, or to each other for management access etc... Ethernet uses CSMA/CD to avoid contntion problems when devices transmit, so a hub or switch will be your only options for hard wiring the units together. The max lenght of each cable will be 100 Metres if the cable is CAT5 twisted pair cable. Any longer and you risk getting data loss and corruption. Personally I would go for a switch, as then you avoid problems with every device having to look at the transmitd data fom one device. They learn the MAC address of each NIC connectd to them and by mapping this via an table only route traffic for the destination device out of the port it is connected to. Any future hardware you get with a UTP connector such as Gigethernet will be backwards compatible with 10/100 unless it has fibre connector which is very unlikely. A 100 meter CAT 5 cable will be quite expensive unless you know somewhere you can get hold of a reel and then the 8 pin RJ45 connectors and a crimp tool. The cables will also need to be straight through if connecting to a hub or switch, they would only be x-over if connecting directly between each device. You can get a cheap hub/switch for about £20 in the UK, but the cables could be as much as £40 for a 100 metre run.
Wait, can you elaborate? I won't be able to connect all 4 cables so they can reach my PS2 if I only use one HUB, and if one hub is more than 20 dollars USD, then should I just get another 100ft ethernet cable OR a wireless access point? PLEASE tell me there is a WAP that is extremely close to the price of a 100ft CAT5 normal cable? PLEASE? And are you sure the only way I should connect the 4 cables together is through hubs? What was the other thing you were talking about; how would a switch benefit me? Let me say it again (if I'm misunderstanding you, then my bad, please explain to me what your saying differently); I need a way to connect those cables so they all extend their whole length, but connect to eachother through some kind of connector (HUB/SWITCH from what you're telling me).
If you are using cables to connect, then you will need either a hub or a switch. A hub will take the transmitted data from an attached device and then repeat it out of every port, even the port it was received on. This means every device connected, even those which were never intended to get the data, will not only receive it but have to examine the data to see if it was directed to it. A switch will learn what devices are connected to each port, and when data is sent to a device, the switch will look at the destination address, and then direct the data out of the correct port. The only exception to this, is broadcast data which is transmitted out of each port on both switches and hubs. Because switches (switch the data out of the correct ports, it cuts network traffic down, enabling faster traffic). You can not connect the wires directly to each other, as the protocol used to connect devices over ethernet uses a mechanism called CSMA/CD, this ensures that not all devices can transmit at the same time and cause a network problem which spiral out of control and bring all the ports down. The exact science can be looked into later if you want to persue it, but the facts are a proper device is required to connect cabled devices together. There are plenty of cheap WAPs around but then you will need all the devices to have wireless connectivity which might mean extra hardware for each device.
