Quote:

Slight complication: the cat5 run seems to be too long for our switch to handle (WTF?), so we had to insert a hub into the middle of the run to amplify things.


Well, today I played around with some "wye splitters" that I wired up. Regular 100BaseT uses only two of the four wire pairs in a cat5 cable, and I've found that if I disconnect the two unused pairs, then the amplifier hub is not needed in the middle of that long run.

Bizarre.

I can only speculate that the two unused pairs must be inducing interference of some kind into the two used pairs.

Once we get our own DSL line working again (Friday, maybe..), this setup can be dismantled entirely, and I'll examine the wall jack and cable ends a little more closely. For now, it's working without the hub and I'm leaving well-enough alone.

Cheers