Buffalo IR over Cat5

[TheCodeMan]

I ran a at least four cat5 cables to each room in my house. Unfortunately, I did not run cable for carrying infrared signals and I now find myself in need of having them. I would like to use my extra cat5 ports to carry my IR signals if possible. I am interested in the Buffalo IR connecting blocks and related accessories. They look easy to install and the price is right.

My plan is to put a connecting block in each media closet and connect it via cat5 to a homerun panel. This would feed the signal back to my network closet where I could tie the feeds together on a distribution block. My house footprint is 40x80 and my network closet is on one side. The longest run would be at the most 150 feet.

My questions are:

Would this work?

What could I expect as far as performance?

Is there a better way to do this without having the infrastructure already in place?

 

[electron]

I run a lot of stuff over cat5e, including IR (I use 1 pair), so I don't think there would be any problems.

 

[Guy Lavoie]

IR signals are low impedance and rather low frequencies (~40 kHz) and Cat5 is designed for over 100 mHz, so there is no problem whatsoever.

 

[smee]

I use cat5 to distribute IR using Xantech hardware - which is similar to Buffalo.

I use 1 cat5 cable to carry 3 zones - 3 pairs are signal/ground for the 3 zones and the other pair is power/ground.

No problems.

 

[AutomatedOutlet]

Good to go!

 

[Mike]

I use cat5 to distribute IR using Xantech hardware - which is similar to Buffalo.

I use 1 cat5 cable to carry 3 zones - 3 pairs are signal/ground for the 3 zones and the other pair is power/ground.

No problems.

I have a Xantech 4 zone system myself and have used cat 5e. CablesToGo has some keystone jacks that I used.

 

[az1324]

Yeah you may not even need to waste an extra cat 5 if you used a cat 5 run for phones.