Overclock.net banner

New house and Verizon Fios

3K views 14 replies 8 participants last post by  EniGma1987 
#1 ·
Hey there OCN,
I am having a house built and will be moving in December. The area I'm moving to has access to Verizon Fios fiber-optic Internet. I have been using cable for over 10 years. I always rented my modem from the provider. As you can imagine doing the math made me cringe and how much that cost me over the life of my service.
So, what I need is to know what can I purchase to run FiOS Internet. What router can I buy instead of renting their's. Also, I am in a perpetual noob when it comes to networking. what can I do to my house to make it better for Fios? It's being built so I can upgrade any cable or phone lines I want to something better.
 
#2 ·
Ask them for a straight lan connection from their box and run your own router/network options or buy a used/new Fios router.

I went with buying a used router since my place already had COAX.

Since you're building from scratch, you have a ton of options. Have fun, don't worry too much. :3
 
#3 ·
well the way fios works is the ONT has to communicate with their router to provide tv service, so unless you don't want a cable box, there is no other option.

pic for attention this is their *up to gigabit for $79/mo
 
#4 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by Cerberus View Post

well the way fios works is the ONT has to communicate with their router to provide tv service, so unless you don't want a cable box, there is no other option.

pic for attention this is their *up to gigabit for $79/mo
No TV no phone just just Internet
 
#5 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by SonofNoob View Post

No TV no phone just just Internet
Just like me.

Ask them to provision your ONT for Ethernet (standard is MoCA unless you have plan faster than 100/100) and then you can run an ethernet line from it to literally any router. At that point, the router you pick will be determined by your usage and speed plan.

Also, keep in mind that you can usually persuade them to "rent" you their router free of charge. Might take a phone call or two, but it also might be worth doing. Their current router is actually pretty decent, albeit with extremely locked down settings. If you can get them to give it to you for free it could be worth using, either on its own, or behind another router for use as an access point or whatever.

EDIT: I see you have their new "gigabit" service. You should already be provisioned for Ethernet. You can swap in any router of your choice and be good to go.
 
#6 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by SonofNoob View Post

Hey there OCN,
I am having a house built and will be moving in December. The area I'm moving to has access to Verizon Fios fiber-optic Internet. I have been using cable for over 10 years. I always rented my modem from the provider. As you can imagine doing the math made me cringe and how much that cost me over the life of my service.
So, what I need is to know what can I purchase to run FiOS Internet. What router can I buy instead of renting their's. Also, I am in a perpetual noob when it comes to networking. what can I do to my house to make it better for Fios? It's being built so I can upgrade any cable or phone lines I want to something better.
Since you are building the house, you have a golden oportunity to make where you live absolutely amazing for any computer type network now and in the future. Plan out and have the builder (or do it yourself) run Ethernet cable drops to every room in the house. Think about wat 2 locations in each room might have a desk at some point, not just 1 location but think of 2 possible ones. You want to leave yourself options for down the line and if the wife wants to re-arrange things. Run Cat6A S/STP cable (double shielded, a shield around each pair of wires as well as a shield around the whole bundle). Or, if Cat8 is availabl;e by the time the cable needs to be run then use Cat8 instead. If you go with Cat6A, you can use 10gigabit speeds everywhere in your house and you dont have to deal with wifi crap for your computers. You can keep the wifi stricktly for phones, tablets, and laptops. If you go with Cat8 cable, you may be able to reach speeds of 100gigabit to some areas of the house depending on how the spec comes out! Definitely a minimum of 40gigabit everywhere in the house though.

Also, you may want to run 2-3 Ehternet cables to the same location in some areas. For instance, I ran 3 cables to each location I knew I was going to have a TV. This lets me plug in a Roku (or other streaming device) direct hardwired for great 4k streaming performance, and lets me plug in a gaming console and the TV itself if I need to. I dont have to add a switch in at each location this way, I just have a big switch in the network closet that evgerything plugs into. It also gives some redundance in case a cable goes bad.

You can also utilize these instead of a standard keystone jack and wall plate:
https://inwall.ubnt.com/
They give you a wired outlet still and provide wifi access. So run your wires everywhere, and place 5 of those in wall devices throughout the house and you will have the best wired and wireless you can get, and the wireless will be fairly well hidden and out of sight.

As for router, you can basically use any router to replace the default Verizon one. You dont use a modem with fios in the same way you would be used to with cable. The verizon fiber comes to their "ONT" and gets turned into an Ethernet connection. You just plug an Ethernet cable between the ONT and your router and set up the WAN with the same settings their router was using. You can do this at any time once the installation is done and you dont even need to call them or anything.
If you never want to see their router at all, you can have your own beforehand and when the technician comes out to turn on the service and do the tests, have them configure the WAN section of your router instead of using theirs.
Either way, their router shouldnt cost you anything on your bill. Unless they changed that recently, it used to be actually free. No monthly thing like the modem fee from cable companies. At work we use an ASUS RT-AC87U in both our buildings, they work great with Merlin-WRT firmware. I went with these because they had great performance for the time and the firmware I use gets quick security patches. I would recommend basically any router that can run Merlin-WRT, and anything at the level of the 87U or higher will push gigabit speeds just fine. I usually got around 950mbps with the 87U, which is basically gigabit speed minus the overhead of Ethernet.
 
#7 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by EniGma1987 View Post

Since you are building the house, you have a golden oportunity to make where you live absolutely amazing for any computer type network now and in the future. Plan out and have the builder (or do it yourself) run Ethernet cable drops to every room in the house. Think about wat 2 locations in each room might have a desk at some point, not just 1 location but think of 2 possible ones. You want to leave yourself options for down the line and if the wife wants to re-arrange things. Run Cat6A S/STP cable (double shielded, a shield around each pair of wires as well as a shield around the whole bundle). Or, if Cat8 is availabl;e by the time the cable needs to be run then use Cat8 instead. If you go with Cat6A, you can use 10gigabit speeds everywhere in your house and you dont have to deal with wifi crap for your computers. You can keep the wifi stricktly for phones, tablets, and laptops. If you go with Cat8 cable, you may be able to reach speeds of 100gigabit to some areas of the house depending on how the spec comes out! Definitely a minimum of 40gigabit everywhere in the house though.

Also, you may want to run 2-3 Ehternet cables to the same location in some areas. For instance, I ran 3 cables to each location I knew I was going to have a TV. This lets me plug in a Roku (or other streaming device) direct hardwired for great 4k streaming performance, and lets me plug in a gaming console and the TV itself if I need to. I dont have to add a switch in at each location this way, I just have a big switch in the network closet that evgerything plugs into. It also gives some redundance in case a cable goes bad.

You can also utilize these instead of a standard keystone jack and wall plate:
https://inwall.ubnt.com/
They give you a wired outlet still and provide wifi access. So run your wires everywhere, and place 5 of those in wall devices throughout the house and you will have the best wired and wireless you can get, and the wireless will be fairly well hidden and out of sight.

As for router, you can basically use any router to replace the default Verizon one. You dont use a modem with fios in the same way you would be used to with cable. The verizon fiber comes to their "ONT" and gets turned into an Ethernet connection. You just plug an Ethernet cable between the ONT and your router and set up the WAN with the same settings their router was using. You can do this at any time once the installation is done and you dont even need to call them or anything.
If you never want to see their router at all, you can have your own beforehand and when the technician comes out to turn on the service and do the tests, have them configure the WAN section of your router instead of using theirs.
Either way, their router shouldnt cost you anything on your bill. Unless they changed that recently, it used to be actually free. No monthly thing like the modem fee from cable companies. At work we use an ASUS RT-AC87U in both our buildings, they work great with Merlin-WRT firmware. I went with these because they had great performance for the time and the firmware I use gets quick security patches. I would recommend basically any router that can run Merlin-WRT, and anything at the level of the 87U or higher will push gigabit speeds just fine. I usually got around 950mbps with the 87U, which is basically gigabit speed minus the overhead of Ethernet.
wow this is perfect! This is all the info I needed. I have to check with the builder or electrician to see what type a cat lines they have available. I currently have, in the plans, to have cable lines in all the rooms. Kinda traditional I guess. But I don't use cable tv, we are current use plex for movies, Netflix and Hulu (trying their live tv out now too) we are using firesticks, Xbox, and one active pc but I should have two active PCs by move in. I also wanted to use a Qsnap nas box to store my media for plex and possibly steam games. (Like I said I'm kinda new to networking so I'm learning as I go. Thank you for this glorious info!
 
#8 ·
I had a house built last year. To give you some ideas, this is what my papers looked like for the "low voltage guys" which is what the builder calls the company they contract through to run all the internet and cable tv lines:





Since you use streaming services (as I do, no cable service just rokus with netflix, hulu, and amazon) definitely have them run at a minimum a combo coax+ethernet wall jack with lines at each TV location.

Youll see on my layout I had 3 locations with Ethernet drops that are about a foot down from the ceiling, they thought this was weird and crazy but they are perfect for wireless access points. Some Ubiquiti APs blend nicely in with the walls and are up above all furniture for great coverage and really because they are white on white walls and up by the ceiling they are not that noticeable.
 
#10 ·
Never used a firestick, as I was on Roku before they came out. Firestick looks nice, but I always worry about Amazon starting to push ad's through it or use what I view through it to send more ads to my email. I know Roku doesnt do that and since I already have them I have no real reason to look at something else right now.
 
#11 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by EniGma1987 View Post

Never used a firestick, as I was on Roku before they came out. Firestick looks nice, but I always worry about Amazon starting to push ad's through it or use what I view through it to send more ads to my email. I know Roku doesnt do that and since I already have them I have no real reason to look at something else right now.
that is the way my house went, have chromecast and roku 4 on every large tv, chromecast on the smaller ones
 
#12 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by EniGma1987 View Post

Never used a firestick, as I was on Roku before they came out. Firestick looks nice, but I always worry about Amazon starting to push ad's through it or use what I view through it to send more ads to my email. I know Roku doesnt do that and since I already have them I have no real reason to look at something else right now.
once you go fire tv stick with kodi, the Roku sticks seem like a joke.

Honestly I have two roku sticks, and never use them. Fire TV is SOOO much better at pretty much everything.
 
#14 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by EniGma1987 View Post

You can also utilize these instead of a standard keystone jack and wall plate:
https://inwall.ubnt.com/
They give you a wired outlet still and provide wifi access. So run your wires everywhere, and place 5 of those in wall devices throughout the house and you will have the best wired and wireless you can get, and the wireless will be fairly well hidden and out of sight.
Those look pretty interesting and may be helpful in my situation. I'll be looking into them a little deeper when I have time.
When I went to check on a price, they are listed as sold out. I'm not sure if that's a good thing (high demand for a good product) or a bad thing (not enough demand to keep making them).
 
#15 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by Jack13 View Post

Those look pretty interesting and may be helpful in my situation. I'll be looking into them a little deeper when I have time.
When I went to check on a price, they are listed as sold out. I'm not sure if that's a good thing (high demand for a good product) or a bad thing (not enough demand to keep making them).
They just came out a month or two ago so Id guess it is high demand. They appear to be in stock again now at least on my browser.
 
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top