When you have familiarized yourself with the basic components of a home telephone system (“Telephone Cords, Wires & Jacks”), you are ready to develop a routing strategy. Start by mapping out your home’s floor plan, showing the current locations of all jacks. Then add where you would like to place new jacks. This will aid you in determining the simplest system to install.

Wiring Systems
There are basically two ways you can wire a phone system, each with its own merits, so think about which method will work best for you.

Daisy-chain wiring. This method connects several telephone outlets to one circuit. In this system, the wiring begins at a wire junction connected to your phone service provider’s network interface jack and then runs from jack to jack. A daisy-chain wiring system is easily and quickly installed.

Home-run wiring. This system of telephone wiring connects each jack separately to a common wire junction. Installation is a little more labor-intensive and requires more hardware than daisy-chain wiring, but it has two distinct advantages: damage is confined to a single jack so a problem is easily identified and fixed, and the system can be easily upgraded as your evolving needs require.