Working wireless connection into U-verse dvr?

[shiro]

I'm trying to decide between ATT's U-verse triple pack and Comcast's HD starter triple play right now, and there's one thing I'd like to know about ATT's U-verse DVR set top box.

I am on two floors, and would like to have the residential gateway in my room so I can have all my main internet devices connected via wires. I have a hd ready tv in here so I would set up a receiver for it here. I have another sdtv downstairs in the living room where I would set the dvr up. I wouldn't be subscribing to hd.

My question is, with the RG upstairs in my room, would I be able to set up a wireless bridge downstairs where it would be connected to the home dvr? Would there be any hiccups to sound or video when watching or recording programs? Would watching a program downstairs + watching a recorded program upstairs through home dvr be too much for the wireless bridge connection (which I guess would be 54mbps vs 100/1000 wired directly to the RG)? I kinda don't want to have ethernet cables wired from upstairs to downstairs, and don't want to bust open any walls or drill anywhere for internal wiring.

This is pretty much my only hurdle keeping me from getting the u-verse. Otherwise Comcast's triple play i think might be an easier install, since I think the set top boxes and receivers would be connected to the coax cables already in place, so I would pretty much be able to keep my existing set up, and would offer me far less trouble. It would also come with free HD service and a better On Demand line up. Just the downside to this is that the hd triple starter wouldn't come with dvr.

 

[keeleysam]

You can use the coax to connect the RG to the STBs.

 

[shiro]

You mean to use the existing coax cables within the walls to connect to the stb?
I thought the coax was connected to the RG from outside of the home from the NID, and then ethernet cables from the RG to each of the STB's?

If the existing coax cables within the walls are used to connect the stbs, how does one use the home dvr function where you can watch recorded programs on the dvr from any of the other receivers within the house?

 

[keeleysam]

It can be coax or cat5 from the NID to the RG, and the same coax can be connected to the STBs. It uses HomePNA. I have Uverse and two of my STBs are connected via coax so I didn't have to drop cat5 in those rooms. All the other ones are connected with cat5, and they are on the same network, and whole home dvr works. You can also plug ethernet devices into STBs connected via coax, and they will act as a bridge. I do this for an Xbox.

 

[shiro]

ok, if this is how I want to set up, will it work:

Since I have no phone/ethernet/coax outlets in my room upstairs, I run a coax cable from an outlet from a room down the hall. This coax cable connects to the RG, which then runs ethernet cables to all my main internet enabled devices (desktop, ps3, etc) as well as a non-DVR set top box. Does this mean that the U-verse dsl service also runs through the coax lines and not the phone lines?

So then for the DVR set top box downstairs, instead of running an ethernet cable down from the RG on the second floor, I could just connect it with the coax outlet that is down there?

As for the U-verse voice service, currently I'm thinking of just running another line back into the room down the hall for the wired phone. Either that of pick up a wireless bridge to stick in that room. I don't know how the U-verse voice connects though. What kind of phone would work best with it? Right now there is just a single dial tone wired phone connected to a digital answering machine connected to the phone line.

When you mention about plugging your xbox into the STBs connected via coax, does that mean that basically your xbox is connected into the stb, and the coax cables itself are networked with the RG/internet? If this is the case, then set up may be more flexible than I thought. Everytime I read people's reviews about U-verse, they go through some of the installation procedures and talk about drilling this and that, and I'm really not looking to drill anything for installation.