How To Neatly Run PC Cables Via Your Attic (HDMI/DisplayPort, USB & Ethernet)

I got fed up of having computer cables running along my floor or skirting boards, so I decided to run three cables (an Ethernet cable, USB3 cable and a HDMI cable) into my attic – and then back down another wall, coming out by my workstation PC. This is to improve how things look, but also so that I could install a KVM switch.

Soin this videoI show off exactly how I ran cables through two different walls, and I also go into a bunch of tips along the way so you don’t end up with broken Ethernet clips and cables lost inside your walls.

If you prefer text over video, please read on for the guide/transcript version of this video.

Video Transcript

Hey everyone! Running computer cables is hard. The powers that be have made up loads of confusing terms like nogging, dangs, gibbs, and more, but that won’t stop us. We want a clean finish for our Ethernet and our monitor cables, right? We don’t want to walk into a room and feel cables under the carpet, right? The real solution is to squat down in the attic, make a mess, and then tear apart all of our walls, right? Well, maybe not.

In this video, I wanted to show you a few different ways that you can run cables throughout your house and also give you a few tips so you don’t end up breaking the clips on Ethernet cables and really annoying your spouse by making a mess of your entire house. Let’s get started!

The Plan: Running Cables Via The Attic

What inspired this video today is I’m going to be running a few cables from one part of my study to another: HDMI and USB cables for a KVM switch, and also an Ethernet cable. Now, you could argue that I should just run them along my skirting board, but I wanted a neater overall finish. Plus, I had already run some cables into my attic for my PoE CCTV cameras.

In terms of how I originally ran these cables to the attic, the first step is always to just have a bit of a dig around. I went up into my attic and I found roughly where the walls would have been in my attic by looking where the joists were and also measuring up. I then got lucky, to be honest, because there was an inspection hatch which gave me really easy access to drop cables down. If you don’t have something like this, don’t worry – I’ll cover the standard process of running cables shortly.

So in this particular case, I drilled a hole in my study corner, and then I dropped an Ethernet cable down from the attic. I used the hook to actually pull it through the hole. At this point, I then used this single Ethernet cable as a hook line. So I taped my other cables to it one by one, and then I used the slack on the cable to pull those other cables up into my attic. This worked well, and I then had four Ethernet cables in my attic for my CCTV system.

This is what I’ll do for these other cables too. I’ll just tape them to one of the longer cables and pull it up from the attic. But be about over there on the other side of my study – well, I rooted around my attic, and I knew that there weren’t any quick wins here. So I firstly planned out where the cable should run down the wall.

I knew that this particular wall was a stud wall with timber studs every 60 cm, and I found the studs by shining a light on the wall to look out for nail pops – basically, the tiny little nail marks that show up where the drywall was fixed to the timbers. I actually wanted to avoid these areas, so I decided to run my wires in the middle of two studs instead. If you have a solid wall though, you’d need to look at chasing out the wall, and a chasing tool is really useful for this.

A Safety Warning

So that I could find where this spot was in the attic, I drilled a really small pilot hole in my study’s ceiling. I should add a warning here though: you should never blindly drill because there could be electrical wires or gas and water pipes or something like that. However, I had already checked the area out both in my room and the attic, and I ruled out any pipes or wires being there. You should also ensure that you wear the relevant safety gear throughout and also ensure that you follow your country’s building regulations. For example, there are some areas of the house that you should never drill due to fire safety rules and things like that.

Drilling Stud Wall Top Plate

Okay, so I went back up into my attic, and then I found this pilot hole, and I knew where to start drilling as a result. There was a top plate, a wooden one, which formed the divider between the walls of two rooms: the study and the bathroom. So I had to drill through this to allow me to run my various cables down the wall to my PC area.

I looked at the widest cable I had and then compared this to my drill bits, ensuring I chose a wider drill bit. Otherwise, my cables naturally wouldn’t fit through. The drilling process itself took a long time, and it’s important to stop if the wood or the drill gets too hot. Sometimes you might even need to dip the drill bit in cold water to cool it down. But after a few minutes, I was through the top plate, and I could finally start running my cables.

This is where cable rods are really useful. They are bendy and flexible, and you can then screw them together to get a longer rod. I knew that I needed about 2 meters to run my cables, so I attached two together and then started feeding them through the hole. Unfortunately, though, I hit against a wooden-sounding object around a third of the way down a single cable rod, so probably 60 cm down. This is likely to be a nogging – a horizontal bit of wood that helps hold the stud wall together. I hate noggings! This job would have been much easier if this didn’t exist.

I’ll get back to this point later, but next, I wanted to show the process of pulling my three new cables into the attic in my networking corner.

Two Important Tips

Here’s a really important tip: before you run any cables to a hard-to-reach place, you should always test that the cables work first. There’s nothing worse than spending hours running your cables only to find that one of them is defective.

In my case, I tested the Ethernet cable worked onmy main PCfor a few days, and I also tested the HDMI and USB cables for my KVM switch. I checked that it worked as expected for my PC andmy NAS, which it did – it controlled them both. So that’s great. I can then power off my PCs and move my room around a bit to get the best access possible.

Another quick tip here is that you should always cover the ends of the cables before running them. This is for two reasons. Firstly, the ends of the cables can snag on wood and other things in the walls, and this is the most likely cause of actually breaking cables – snagging and pulling on the ends of them. Putting any original plastic caps on them can help, as can wrapping them or the end of them up in brown tape. This also helps stop dust and insulation from getting into the cable, potentially stopping them from working.

I also put some packing tape over some of the equipment I couldn’t easily move because I was going to be drilling in this area, and I didn’t want dust to get into them.

Pulling My HDMI, USB And Ethernet Cables Into Attic

Okay, so in this case, I had some slack from my existing Ethernet cables which I could use to help me pull my three new cables into my attic. But I showed this process earlier in terms of how I ran the original cables. It’s often just a mix of patience and using cable rods, pulling hooks, and whatever else you have at your disposal.

Once I had enough slack on my existing cable though, I attached my new Ethernet cable to it with some packing tape, and then the HDMI cable too. I sometimes pull one cable at a time, or I do multiple – I just gauge it. I then went into my attic and I started gently pulling onthe Ethernet cableto bring my cables up. It’s always worth going slow here and never yanking the cable too much. Sometimes the cables get kinked, and you need to sort this out before pulling more, but simply brute-forcing it will break the end of the cable.

Since my first two cables were coming up okay, I also attached my USB 3 cable to the chain, so to speak, and I pushed this through the hole in the study wall too. I was then able to start pulling from the attic again, but it’s worth clearing any clutter and unused cables away from your room first. If you have lots of things lying around, they can catch on the new cables you’re pulling and then cause them to catch or get stuck too. So clear the room as much as possible and ideally use a tripod or a bit of furniture to help you feed the cables through in a neat way.

I then pushed as much of the remaining slack into the walls as possible so that I could jump back into the attic and hopefully fish all three cables through, which took some time, but eventually, I did get all three cables. Woohoo!

Done On One Side? An IMPORTANT Tip

Okay, so at this point, we’re in a fairly good position because our cables are up in the attic, and they have enough slack on them. I can run them in the other part of my room, but there is a problem. If I keep yanking, for example, this gray Ethernet cable, what’s going to happen is it’s actually going to disappear up the walls. It’s going to get hidden here somewhere, especially since I’m going to be yanking the cable over there in a minute.

So what you should do once you’ve finished sort of running the cables and you’ve got enough slack and everything else, you should plug them in so they can’t disappear up your walls or something like that. So I got a KVM switch, which is partly why I’m doing this project. I’m actually going to plug this HDMI cable in here. It doesn’t really matter, obviously. I’m going to plug my USB cables in here. Same as the Ethernet cable – I’m just going to plug it into the wall over here. I could, you know, there are a few places I could plug it, but by doing that, it’s less likely that I’m actually going to accidentally yank it out.

But that is a really key point you’ve got to remember to do that before you go to the other side to start pulling cables. Otherwise, you’re just going to end up really, really annoyed because your cable’s disappeared, and then you’ll cry a lot.

Okay, so let’s move over there and crack on.

Running Cables Through A Stud Wall (Harder!)

Okay then, so this is the next part of running cables, and obviously, previously when I was running cables in my study corner, it was a bit easier because I had that inspection hatch or inspection area, whatever you want to call it. This is going to be harder because it’s obviously solid wall, and also there’s a nogging or something. Basically, what happened was when I was running this cable rod down from the attic, what I noticed is I hit something hard, and it sounded wooden, although it’s hard to tell.

So basically, luckily, I’ve got this sign here. So what I’m actually hoping is I can make a bit of a mess of the wall around here, and then I’ll just put the sign back to cover it up. Obviously, I will also try and improve the wall as best I can and make it good with polyfiller and paint and all that stuff, but yeah, I’m just going to make a mess and see what happens.

So I’m going to take these off. So I’m there. I’m trying to cut it as deeply as I can. I’m also trying to cut in at a little bit of an angle just so that it might be I can save this bit of plasterboard or drywall, as Americans would call it. I don’t know if I can, but I’m just going to try. So if you cut it at an angle, it should come out easier, and then you can put it back easier as well, in theory. But if this is attached to a nogging or something else, then I might not be able to save it anyway. It might rip when I peel it off, but that’s why I’m trying to be slow and careful.

Annoying Nogging (Horizontal Stud Wall)

Basically, cut into this as much as I can, as deeply as I can. Feels like there’s something there as well. We’ll find out. Good. Let’s go in. Something’s happening. Let’s have a look. Oh God, what’s that? Right, okay. So I’ve got as much of the drywall out as I can. Yes, it’s a nogging. Okay, and I was trying to cut screws. That’s why some of that wasn’t coming out.

Okay, so this is what I’ve got. So that I preserved as much of the drywall as I can. So once I’m done, I’m hoping I’ll be able to put this back, fill it in a bit, and then stick my tech overhead sign on top of it, and hopefully, my wife doesn’t notice. So yeah, okay. In some ways, I should have actually cut a bit further up, but whatever, it’s fine.

Okay, so I went up to my attic and I ran some cable rods, and I can see an end just there, but I haven’t really given myself enough room. So what I’m going to do is just drill a bit here, and I know I’m going to need to drill the nogging a little bit as well.

Okay, so I need to drill here as well. How thick is it? Oh, it’s really thick. Yeah, it’s really thick. I’m not actually going to – this isn’t a load-bearing bit of wood or anything like that, which is another thing you should check. I think actually, because of how thick it is, I’m going to use a different drill bit.

Okay, so I have now sanded this just to remove any rough edges, but I think that’s enough of the notch to actually run my cables. So what I’m going to do is jump into the attic, attach the three cables to this, and then pull them through. And then I’m hoping what’ll actually happen is there’s not going to be any more nogging down there. Otherwise, I’m going to have to repeat this process down there as well. But at least I know I can cut a smaller, you know, hole, and I can measure things up a little bit easier than squatting down in the attic and stuff. So let’s give that a shot.

Pulling The Ethernet Cable

Okay, so in the end, I decided to run just my Ethernet cable down here, and then I can use that because there’s quite a lot of slack on that to run my two other cables. I think it’ll be easier just to do one than try and do all three. So in theory, I’ve attached it to here, so if I pull, in theory, I should get my Ethernet cable at some point. Yes! No, go away, insulation! Who needs you? Who needs you? Right, there we are.

Okay, it’s there. Have I got the hook in my pocket? Yes, I do. Hook! You can also obviously attach it to here and, you know, to the cable rod and attach all your cables to this, but what I tend to find is this is a bit too flimsy. So I actually just use this to pull cables.

Right, so where’s that gone? Come here. Hook that. Yeah, I think I got it. Feels like the cable. Yes, so the Ethernet cable. So I’m going to unhook this lovely bit of brown tape.

Okay, so that worked. So now I’m going to try the same thing with the two other cables as well. Fingers crossed.

Epic Fail

Okay, so I’ve run those two cables up my attic. I’ve attached them to this. I’m hoping I can just yank this and the cables will come out without any snagging or anything. Yes, hopefully. Fingers crossed. Oh no, that’s not a good sign. I don’t think that’s a good sign. Oh, what’s happening? Oh! Oh, I don’t know where the cables are. Can I feel them? No.

I thought that was going to happen. I think it’s come off here. So I’m going to, despite what I said earlier, I’m actually going to now use the hook method. I’m going to have to go back up the attic and figure out what’s going on. This is fun.

Okay, so in the end, I just pulled the cables back out, and I secured them a lot better. As you can see, I wrapped a crazy amount of packing tape around them, and then it’s a case of just shoving them down the hole again so that when eventually the cables slip through, I can go back into my study and pull them. It was a bit of a tight fit, but they did go through eventually, as you can see.

USB And HDMI Cables Too

Okay, almost there. In theory, this should be fine now because I’ve tied it within an inch of its life. Yes, these come through! Yes, so these are my cables, and this should be enough slack up there. I can pull this a bit. Yes, look at that! Brilliant!

So I’m going to pull them down, probably as much as I can, and yeah, you can see they fit in the noggings. Apparently, these are called noggings in the UK. They fit in the noggings fine. So when I put the plasterboard back, there should be no issue.

Finishing The Cable Pulls

Okay, so I’ve pulled that as much as I can. I do need to take all this off, but first, I want to see if there’s another nogging, and I think there will be because this is a fairly new house. So let’s have a look. There’s a sound around there. Okay, that’s annoying. I thought they would be – I hoped they wouldn’t, but yeah, it looks like there is. So that is going to be – how much have I lost there? So, 36 – yeah, it’s about the same. It was around a third of the way down last time. So there’s another one 36 down.

Okay, so I’ve worked out that my nogging comes to around… there, which at first I was a bit annoyed about, but then I realized actually, I’m running these cables for a KVM switch. So actually, I probably want the KVM switch sitting on my desk, and my desk starts around there and ends around there. So this actually could be the perfect place to pop my cables out. So it’s not actually a bad thing after all.

I did previously put a brushed wall socket thing on the wall down here, which I’m just going to remove and then I’m going to move it up there. But basically, I’m going to drill a hole here, pull my cables through, and then I’m done, which – that is good!

Yes, that’s perfect! I can literally feel the nogging. It’s literally like a quarter of an inch down from where I drilled, so that’s completely perfect. It’s not completely center, but it’s close enough.

So I’m now going to use my cable rods to pull the cable into this location. The best thing I can do right now is actually use this cable with this masking tape. It’s a good thing I didn’t take it off, and then I’ll do the Ethernet cable after. So basically, I want to get this down. Oh, how are we going to – how are we going to pull it out? That’s the question. I don’t know. We’ll figure that out. We’ll figure that out.

So I’m going to pull this down and push this down as much as I can. Yes, okay, I can feel it now. It’s there. So these are flexible. I don’t know how flexible they are because they’ve got metal ends. It might be I need to drill another hole. That’s not going to – [Applause] – work.

Right, okay, so there we are. So let’s try and push that through again, and hopefully, I’ll see the cable. Yes! Yes, there it is! Okay, so now I should be able to pull this cable through. Yes, please, please, please! Yes, there we are, and see, it’s just coming out, which means I can run these cables now.

So at this point, it’s just a case of yanking the cables through, but I realize I may as well run the Ethernet cable now. Now I know it’s actually coming through and can come through, if that makes sense. So we’re going to put that there, and I just – I’ll put this down a bit so you can see better. It’s – right, okay, so – ah, please! Oh no, don’t mess up! Please don’t mess up!

There we are! There it is! There it is, and there’s my Ethernet! Look at that!

Okay, so that’s now running from one end of the room to another. I could have just run it on the skirting board, to be honest, but this will be a neater overall finish when I actually patch this up. And I’ve got 3 hours to patch up until my wife comes back!

Okay, so those cables are there. What I then do is just put this brushed plate back on. What you can do is, you know, because I’ve got an Ethernet cable, what I could actually do is get an RJ45 wall plate and splice the cable and actually do it properly. But the problem is it’s harder to do that with USB and HDMI cables. So I’m just twisting this, making an annoying sound. But the problem is, it’s hard to do that with USB and HDMI cables, so sometimes it’s easier just to get a simple brushed plate where literally you just run the wires through and it hides any mess you’ve got in the wall there. So that’s usually an easier way of doing it, and that’s what I’m going to do. I might finish this off with trunking as well, but for now, we are almost done, and it’s going to be a case of making good. So that’s brilliant!

Making Good

Okay, so now we’re in the ‘making good’ phase. We’ve made a complete mess of something, and now we need to put it back together before we get yelled at. In this case, I’ve kept the drywall, which would be pretty good. But sometimes you can put some wood there and then, you know, do multiple coats of filler and things like that. There are different ways of doing it, but I’m going to get started.

Firstly, I’m going to actually clip these cables in a little bit. I don’t need to do that, but it’s just going to be a little bit better. Okay, that’s not as neat as I would like. I don’t know if that – I might need to take that one out. Let’s have a look. No, that’s okay. Yeah, okay, so that’s good.

So what I can do now is I’m going to put this back. Because I’ve kept the screws, I can actually screw it in, which is good. Ah, where are we going to put the screws? Put one around there. Just going to mark it. Yeah, maybe around there actually. So I’m going to put one around there, and then the other bit can go here.

Okay, so that’s on there, and it’s flush. I’m just going to screw it in like I mentioned to hold it in place. An impact driver is usually best for that because although the drywall or the plasterboard is soft, the wood behind it is not. So it’s usually best to use something like this. My cables – I know they’re not there, so that’s okay.

Right, and I intentionally want to go into the plasterboard here just so when it comes to fill over, you know, you’re not going to have the head showing through. So that’s why I’ve intentionally gone in a bit. I might tighten that further, but for now, they’ll do.

So now I’ve got this one there. So that’s everything quite flush there. There’s not much movement. There is a little bit of movement there in the drywall, so that might end up cracking, but it’s kind of a good thing that I have the tech overhead sign because look at that! Although I’ve scuffed it a little bit there and I’m going to have to fix that, in general, it’s going to hide this quite nicely. That’s brilliant! That’s brilliant!

Okay, so in terms of filling things in, this isn’t a full-on DIY lesson, but there are different types of filler. This is kind of a bit of a harder one, and it sets really hard. This is a softer one. It makes it easier just to smooth things over the edges. I’m going to use the harder one for getting the edges as much as I can, and then later I’m going to come along and polyfilla things more, but I’ll do that separately.

Okay, so it looks a complete mess right now, but that isn’t too bad for a first coat. I will then sand it down and make it good with multiple layers of this and probably then a finer filler as well. But for now, I just need this to really harden up and set a little bit, and then I can especially make this a bit better.

But yeah, that’s really it. So as you can see, I exposed the area, ran the cables through it as I needed, clipped them back to the noggings or the timbers or whatever you call them – back to the stud wall, effectively – and then that is that. Then I’ll hide it before my wife comes back. So now down here, I’m just going to make this good as well.

Why I Did All This

Okay, so this is the final effect. You can see the brushed wall panel there. I need to clean the cables a little bit because they got a bit dirty, but effectively, there are now no cables at all. I’m still busy filling and painting this, but look – it’s magic! There are no cables. It’s a much neater effect, and the cables that I’ve run – Ethernet, HDMI, and USB – just pop out there.

And then on the other side, look around my room – there are no longer any cables running around there, which is really neat. Then you’ve got my home lab NAS area or my networking area, and yes, the cables are messy. I need to tidy that up, but the key thing is there’s a bunch of cables going in there and up into my attic, and that’s a neater overall finish.

Okay, so that wraps up this video, and now it might seem like an absolute ton of work I’ve just done to run internet cables and USBs and HDMIs from one side of my room to another, but in reality, all the concepts I’ve covered apply if you’re running a cable from one end of your house to another end of your house. Because once you’re in your attic, you can run cables really easily.

The other reason I wanted to do all of this is because I’m actually going to be running a KVM switch, which will control my home lab NAS and my Windows machine. Whilst admittedly, my home lab NAS is usually running in headless mode, allowing me to just SSH into it easily enough, I’ve also dual-booted Windows on there so I can do some really cool benchmarking, especially because that’sa DDR5-based systemand my workstation PC down there is DDR4. So I can do some cool benchmarking when I’m in Windows mode on both, and that’s where the KVM switch comes in.

As a result, I wanted to neaten up the cables and just hide as many cables as I can through the attic. I was fed up with many cables running around this room. When that video about the KVM switch comes out, it’ll appear here somewhere.

I hope you enjoyed this video. If you did, please click the thumbs up button and please subscribe to see more videos like this. Thanks for watching!

Tristan has been interested in computer hardware and software since he was 10 years old. He has built loads of computers over the years, along with installing, modifying and writing software (he’s a backend software developer ‘by trade’).Tristan also has an academic background in technology (in Math and Computer Science), so he enjoys drilling into the deeper aspects of technology.Tristan is also an avid PC gamer, with FFX and Rocket League being his favorite games.