Top tips for internet setup when building a new home

Digital plumbing is sort of the Stanley Tucci of home renovation or building. He’s not in every movie. But the ones that he’s in? It just elevates the entire film.

For the unconverted, digital plumbing can feel optional. It’s not as sexy as choosing bathroom tiles or kitchen hardware. But internet cabling may be just as important. Plus, it’s cheaper (and less annoying!!) to install during the build than after.

You’ll thank yourself so much more if you consider it. Trust us. Decorating is as much about what you can’t see as what you can. You’ll see.

What is your digital plumbing?

New builds or renos are stressful enough. Then add the time pressure. Zoom in, and you’ll find there’s a short window where running cables costs almost nothing and takes almost no effort. Hint: It’s when the walls are still open, the driveway is already dug up and the sparky is on-site anyway.

Once the plaster goes on, that smart home wiring window closes forever. And the cost of getting nbn® connection in a new house after the fact, the drilling, the fishing through insulation, the patching, the swearing, the crawling in the wall, is dramatically higher than just doing it, well, now.

The "Star Wiring" concept: Home network cabling

What is “star wiring”?

Star wiring, or a star network, puts your central unit at the heart of a network. Think of it like the sun of your nbn® connection in your new house. A source of ‘power’ that flows through wiring, giving your smart home that smooth, smooth internet.

All Ethernet cables need to be able to run back to a central "hub" location where the nbn® box will live. The garage or a utility cupboard is usually a popular spot to install this.

What is so good about it?

Easy troubleshooting and maintenance

If something is wrong, you don’t need to audit all your devices and wonder where it all went south. Troubleshooting your internet connection in a new house just means checking your central hub.

It’s also easy to maintain. If one device fails, it shouldn’t affect the others, keeping everything flowing smoothly.

Scalability and flexibility

You can use your central hub to manage data traffic and reduce bottlenecks. If you’re a creative working from home, this can be a godsend if you’re trying to simultaneously upload and download from the cloud…. But your Xbox has decided that now is a good time to do that game update.

Any potential cons?

Your equipment might be holding you back

If you have old equipment, that fast internet connection is kinda wasted. It’s like having a top-of-the-line car designed for premium unleaded and putting ethanol-blended or regular unleaded in it. Without it, the central hub can’t handle the load. This can slow down your network.

Run a Lead-in Conduit (LIC) from the street

What is it?

A Lead-in Conduit (LIC) is the underground telecommunications conduit that runs from the street to your home's external connection point.

It's what lets nbn® connect your new house to the network without needing to dig extra pits between the street and your front door.

Connecting your new house to nbn®

Don’t forget about the location of your nbn® connection box. Ideally, it should be positioned as centrally as possible in your home for better Wi-Fi coverage or near your star-wiring hub, if you’re using Ethernet cabling throughout the house.

Smart home wiring: Run CAT6 cabling (or better!) to all the areas that matter

Wi-Fi has limits that Ethernet doesn't. Most households won't hit them for basic streaming and Zoom.

But hardwired connections are more stable, lower latency, and not affected by interference from neighbouring networks. As more devices compete for bandwidth over time, a stable connection becomes even more important.

Here’s a practical approach to cabling in your home network:

• Living room: At least two drops near where your TV and entertainment unit will sit.

• Study or home office: Two drops to the desk wall. If you ever work from home seriously, you'll use them.

• Ceiling points: This is the one most people skip and later wish they hadn't. Running a cable to the ceiling in key rooms (hallway, living area, open-plan kitchen) lets you mount a wireless access point flush and out of sight — far better performance than a modem sitting on a shelf.

• Roof corners: Leave a bundle of cable in the roof at two or three corners of the house for future security cameras or smart home expansion, whether that’s doorbells, fridges or washing machines.

Once you’ve run the cables, you need a network that actually does it justice. Superloop's eero Pro 7 mesh modem delivers Wi-Fi 7 performance across every room. It’s built for the smart home you designed, not the one you settled for.

Connect it all together with the right internet plan

The counterarguments are understandable. Wall jacks aren't pretty. Furniture layouts change. You've survived on Wi-Fi for years without complaints. It’s fair to be sceptical.

But take it from people who've been through it: just do it.

Once the build is done, the last piece is an internet plan that actually delivers on the infrastructure you've put in. Superloop's nbn™ plans, including multigigabit Hyperspeed, are built for exactly this kind of forward-thinking that future you will thank you for.

And for more tips on moving your internet to your new house, here’s the one tab worth keeping open while you pack.