Ethernet to a Garden Office

[An angry badger]

I'm building an office garden which will need to have an internet connection. I have some questions about how to do this. We are planning to dig a trench from the house to the garden office to provide power and I would like to use that to run an ethernet cable.

1. What cable should I use? The cable will be connected to the side of the house and then buried. Do I need cat 5e direct burial? Cat 5e runs throughout the house so using anything higher spec than cat 5e would be overkill.
2. How do I protect against lightning strikes? Do I need to earth the cable in any way? If so how should I do this? I live in the south-east of England where thunder storms happen a couple of times a year every summer

Any other advise about a project like this is appreciated. I would describe myself as a tech enthusiast but have limited networking knowledge.

[Chris Greene]

2 minutes ago, An angry badger said:

I'm building an office garden which will need to have an internet connection. I have some questions about how to do this. We are planning to dig a trench from the house to the garden office to provide power and I would like to use that to run an ethernet cable.

1. What cable should I use? The cable will be connected to the side of the house and then buried. Do I need cat 5e direct burial? 
2. How do I protect against lightning strikes? Do I need to earth the cable in any way? If so how should I do this? I live in the south-east of England where thunder storms happen a couple of times a year every summer

 

https://www.amazon.ca/Outdoor-Ethernet-Network-Heavy-Duty-Gigabit/dp/B07ZNSMWTP/ref=asc_df_B07ZNSMWTP/?tag=googleshopc0c-20&linkCode=df0&hvadid=335118530598&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=16656427395619252393&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9001495&hvtargid=pla-919724186808&psc=1 I recommend grabbing this I got a similar one for our security systems on my farm and its still working to this day and one of our best investments

[Donut417]

6 minutes ago, An angry badger said:

How do I protect against lightning strikes? Do I need to earth the cable in any way? If so how should I do this? I live in the south-east of England where thunder storms happen a couple of times a year every summer

Technically speaking its a copper cable and will carry electricity. Im not 100% sure how you ground the cable, I think there is a way just dont know how. Another option is to run Fiber optic cable and use media converters on each end to convert it back to Ethernet. Fiber cant carry electricity. 

[mariushm]

Yeah it would be much safer to have a fiber cable and a media converter at the end to convert from fiber to regular ethernet cable.

 

One other option could be powerline networking, where you basically can send the network data through the power cable and you don't have to deal with extra cables. It's not as perfect as ethernet and/or fiber, you get higher latency and you won't get the maximum speed a direct cable can offer, but if all you need is for watching videos, or browsing the webs, it's good enough.

 

 

[HanZie82]

Run a pipe where you run the cables in, 1 ethernet (I would advice Cat6 since almost same prices as5E and more future proof).
Then also the power cable in there, make sure its rated also for length. Since for longer runs that matters a lot!

And then also a seperate ground wire in the pipe, just in case of something does strike it has an easy path so it 'skips' your important cables.

[Falcon1986]

3 hours ago, An angry badger said:

What cable should I use? The cable will be connected to the side of the house and then buried. Do I need cat 5e direct burial? Cat 5e runs throughout the house so using anything higher spec than cat 5e would be overkill.

Any outdoor-rated, shielded and insulated ethernet cable (Cat5e or better) will do fine. I'd go a step further and run it through a separate buried conduit in the same trench. However...

 

3 hours ago, An angry badger said:

How do I protect against lightning strikes? Do I need to earth the cable in any way? If so how should I do this? I live in the south-east of England where thunder storms happen a couple of times a year every summer

You can use ethernet surge protectors on both ends of the cable, i.e. terminate at the wall outside the home with a surge protector, run the buried cable, and terminate in another surge protector in the garden before hooking up to your devices. However, I wouldn't trust any surge protector when it comes to a high probability of lightning strikes.

 

If you have a lot of thunderstorms in your area, then consider @Donut417's advice about running fiber instead. Measure the distance you need and order cable in that length with compatible transceivers for both ends.

[An angry badger]

15 hours ago, Falcon1986 said:

Any outdoor-rated, shielded and insulated ethernet cable (Cat5e or better) will do fine. I'd go a step further and run it through a separate buried conduit in the same trench. However...

Would a cable like this be suitable?

 

I think I'll use surge protectors for some piece of mind.

 

15 hours ago, Falcon1986 said:

If you have a lot of thunderstorms in your area, then consider @Donut417's advice about running fiber instead. Measure the distance you need and order cable in that length with compatible transceivers for both ends.

Thunderstorms are not common, happening once or twice a year.

[Falcon1986]

1 hour ago, An angry badger said:

Would a cable like this be suitable?

 

I think I'll use surge protectors for some piece of mind.

Yes.