[ched]

Hi, I am having Tiscali TV fitted next Friday and am trying to decide where to have it fitted. My TV is in the lounge, but my projector is in the basement. In the basement I currently have my wireless router, but I am using all the ports plus 3 ports on my old router (using it as a switch).

So I am trying to find out if the TTV set top box plugs into a switch/router (rj45) port or plugs into the phone line via a filter????

It would be handy for me to have a cat5 cable running from my lounge to the router in the basement but would the installer do that????

Any ideas????

[MK_Brett]

TTV is supplied via Lan Port 1 on the supplied router.
As long as the route to the basement is simple, and you supply copious amounts of tea/coffee cake I don't see why they couldn't run the CAT5 for you, but this is entirly up to the installer. Talk to him and see what he says.

[ched]

Cheers for the reply. Its not an easy route for a cat 5 cable. It would have to go through a 14" wall then about 5 meters then through a window frame then another 3 meters or so. Thats why I havent put one in to add another access point to make wireless access a bit better on the ground floor. These Victorians certainly built these buildings to last!!!!!! All external walls are 3 bricks thick plus the cavity!!!

Thanks. I may be buying BIG cakes!!!!!!!!Maybe beer in place of Tea

[tgt]

Am thinking about getting the £19.99 TV+BB+phone line. But would like to get a few things clarified first.

My current set up -
Windows 98 (not SE) PC is across the room away from the TV-DVD-VCR area. PC connected via Ethernet cable to wireless BB router. (Don't want wireless, as Win98 not good handling USB (if using wireless dongle), and hard to do wireless WPA security scheme, if at all. Forget about WEP, it's hackable within a few minutes). There is another extension phone line going to the TV area, but is unused now (was used for Sky satellite STB).

My questions -
If the phone line goes into the Tiscali supplied router, which then connects by cable to the STB, which presumably has to be close to the TV, does this mean there has to be a line going across the room? That cross line must be either the one connecting new router to Tiscali STB, or router to PC?

Thinking about someone who only have the TV package without BB, and thus without a router, his/her STB must have a little dongle that acts as a modem.
So is this a feasible alternative? I.e. STB with local modem and not connected to Tiscali router. Then I can even just use my own router for BB?

Thanks in advance for your help.

[ched]

From what I can find out Tiscali supply a wireless router with Tiscali TV. This appears to be specially configured to receive the Tiscali TV so you cant use your own router to connect to broadband. I think the only way it can be done is that the new tiscali router is connected to your Tiscali set top box and to the nearest phone line via a filter. The Tiscali router has 4 rj45 ethernet ports, so 1 for the set top box and 3 empty. So you need to connect the Tiscali Router to your computer via either wireless or a cat5/ethernet cable (normal network cable).

When they come to install on Friday I will try and post an update on how my install went.

[tgt]

Originally Posted by ched

From what I can find out Tiscali supply a wireless router with Tiscali TV. This appears to be specially configured to receive the Tiscali TV so you cant use your own router to connect to broadband.
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Surely Tiscali would not supply the router for someone with just Tiscali TV but no broadband? In that situation the TV STB must be able to take a cheaper plug-in "modem" that connects to the phone line, just to get the TV feed? Can someone with STB but no BB please confirm.

And vice-versa, someone with Tiscali broadband but not TV can just use any router?

If both cases are true, then why can't Tiscali de-couple the STB from the router? I.e. supply an extra (at cost?) cheap plug-in modem for the STB, then the router can be used just for BB.

Sorry to go on about this, but I want to avoid wireless BB which is not easy, if at all possible, to do securely for Win98 PC. And I think the Ethernet/cat5 cable between router and PC should be kept short. So the only choice is to sling a long cat5 cable between STB (near TV area) and router (placed close to PC which is 15 feet away across the room), if the STB is happy about that.

[ched]

I dont think that you can have tiscali TV without broadband.
Cat5/ethernet cable can, if I remember correctly support cable lengths upto 100 meters without any repeaters.

So somehow a cat5 cable needs to be connected to the Tiscali router then to your computer and another cat5 cable from Tiscali router to the set top box.

I am having a similar problem in that I want the set top box about 25 meters from the router location.

I will post back on Friday after the engineer has carried out my install. Well providing my broadband is still working .
I am intending to have a chat with the engineer before he starts work so that I am happy with what he intends to do before he starts.

[tgt]

Originally Posted by ched

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I will post back on Friday after the engineer has carried out my install. Well providing my broadband is still working .
I am intending to have a chat with the engineer before he starts work so that I am happy with what he intends to do before he starts.

Awaiting the outcome with great interest.

Am also worried about the gap in BB switchover. Who's your current ISP? Mine is Virgin (ADSL, not cable).

[ched]

I shouldnt have a gap as my current isp is tiscali. To be honest the only reason I am getting it is that its cheaper than my current tiscali package.
I currently have 8Mb broadband, anytime phone calls + line rental I am paying about £30 a month. If I add Tiscali TV I only pay £24.99 a month!!!!! So I save £5 a month, how mad is that???? Tiscali didnt even try and sell me extra tv packages or movies or even a Tiscali + box. So I am a bit confused by why they are paying for an engineer to visit, give me more services and reduce my bill!!!!!

Tiscali are a bit funny in that you cant download at full speed between 6pm and 11pm each day without getting warning e-mails about high bandwidth useage. But they will give you Tiscali TV which will probably use 4Mb of your broadband bandwidth and thats OK??

I will let you know hopefully on Friday, although Friday might be a very busy day as I have double glazing being installed. Well its the second to last day of a 29 window install so hopefully it will be nearly finished.

[tgt]

Originally Posted by ched

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cant download at full speed between 6pm and 11pm each day without getting warning e-mails about high bandwidth useage.

You must be talking about P2P download such as bittorrent, otherwise I am not aware of any means to throttle the speed to d/l say a freeware program from site such as CNET.com.

But they will give you Tiscali TV which will probably use 4Mb of your broadband bandwidth
(cut)

I am thinking of getting the £19.99 TV+2Mb BB+phone rental. If the TV alone is going to eat up 4Mb already, won't it mean TV pictures will be degraded, and can forget about using BB at the same time?

[tgt]

Assuming that you can use your own router just to get BB (but not TV) -

Already have a phone line to the current (my own) router near PC. Also have an unused phone extension line in the TV area, was plugged into Sky satellite box but not anymore.

So let the Tiscali router use the phone line in the TV area, and let my own router and PC be as they are. This is to avoid slinging a cat5 cable between the Tiscali router and STB.

Ched - wouldn't a similar setup solved your problem having to route a long cat5 basement to lounge? Instead you just have to route a phone extension line which is much easier to bend/push through walls.

[ched]

Yes I do do a bit of p2p, linux distro downloads, but I also stream radio during the daytime, and I make great use of BBCi player (p2p) to watch TV when I want. So realistically I will now be able to use Tiscali TV's on demand service instead of BBCi player.

I cant seem to find out exactly how much bandwidth the TTV uses I was just guessing at 4Mb as thats the sort of bandwidth divx movies/shows need for realtime viewing. It maybe that TTV are using better compression than the divx normally use.

I will try and find out on Friday ow much bandwidth the TTV uses.