Prewiring your home for broadband capability during construction can help you meet the future without tearing out your walls or emptying your wallet. The future may come sooner than you think! Broadband is rapidly becoming an expected part of the infrastructure of a home.

Al Timm, an electrician with Olympic Wiring of Silverdale, says they prewire homes for all capabilities for future expansion. Using two CAT-5 e and two RG-6 wires, plus installing a structured media panel, will give freedom to add modules at a later date, Timm elaborates.

Another electrician, working for West Sound Electric, explains that the term broadband is a general term that applies to both high-speed Internet and to cable. Broadband has a higher bandwidth, which translates to more information from the source.

Broadband can carry better, higher speed Internet information through the phone lines than the older style lines do. Broadband can transmit Internet, camera, cable TV, satellite TV, and even stereo sound to speakers, all through low voltage wires.

CAT-5 e phone wire is made up of four twisted pairs, or eight conductors. This differs from regular four-wire phone wire. The older style is not twisted. Twisting helps gain higher data rate without cross-talk, meaning greater capability.

When prewiring a house for high-speed Internet, the feed line goes inside the structured media enclosure, somewhat of a metal can in the wall, which becomes the distribution point to each room.

If the new house is fairly isolated, and cable is unlikely to come to that area, then the distance from the phone switch becomes an issue. For DSL, the electrician says, one must be within 6,000 feet of the phone company’s switch, and advises the builder to call the local telephone company and make an inquiry.

An electrician must be licensed to run low-voltage (limited energy) wiring. The electrician must have either a specialty or a general journeyman’s license. For the specialty license, one must prove 4,000 hours of verifiable experience in that field, and for the general, at least 8,000 verifiable hours in a range of specialties.

Although an electrician may install telecommunications wiring, another specialist may also do it. To be licensed as an administrator under the electrical/telecommunication law requires passing a two-hour test proving that one understands the technical installation standards that apply, according to Doug Erickson with the Department of Labor and Industry. Erickson says the specific telecommunications wire is much more fragile than electric wire, so requires more gentle handling.

An older building that was not built in the ready mode for such modern instant communication may still be wired for broadband input. This involves fishing the wire into the walls from either the crawl space or the attic. It is labor-intensive, so obviously from a time management point of view, prewiring when the walls are wide open is much less extensive, therefore much less expensive.

Ron House, owner of West Sound Electric, says a typical prewire on a 2500-square-foot home would cost approximately $500, whereas wiring the same home, once completed, would be easily three times that amount.