Hardware

unless the switch has an uplink port which requires Xover, you use straight through.

you can just drop 3 lines from the router [ which I assume has a built in 4 port switch] to each PC or if it has only 1 LAN ethernet, to the switch.

Why get wireless if your running wired?

If you want to eliminate 2 of the 3 drops, if they are rather long, then yes put a switch on the end, and then you only have to run the cable from each pc to the switch.

I wired the house upstairs using a wired router but it failed and the only one I could get at the time was a wired/wireless. Now the pcs are going downstairs the signal for the wireless keeps dropping out so I am looking at wiring downstairs too.

A simple Hub should suffice and if it's one of the new ones you will not need a Crossover lead in the mix as they are no longer needed by the new Hubs/Switches/Routers that are currently available.

The rest is totally correct fly leads from the Hun/Switch to the individual computers although they could be CAT 5E it really depends on the network configuration and you'll need to buy the hardware accordingly but as I haven't seen too many Gigabit Wireless routers you could most likely get away with one of the cheap 100 T Base hubs unless you actually need a switch.

Col

Hi,

Several points:
Why Cat6? The cheaper Cat5E would do the job OK, even at gigabit speeds, which I don't think you are contemplating.
With the latest switches it doesn't matter if you use straight or cross over cables, the port autodetects the type of cable. Straight would be my choice.
As mentioned by others you could run three cables, one to each PC and save a switch, or one cable with a switch and three short fly leads to connec t the PC s to the switch.

Yes, you are correct. You need to connect the cable running through the floor to another switch in order to "split" the bandwidth.

So, you have a switch upstairs and a switch downstairs. The best practice would be to make the connection between the switches as fast as possible. For instance, if I have 90 users in one suite and 24 users in another, I would use 2 48-port 10/100 switches in the larger suite, and one 24-port gigabit 10/100/1000 switch in the other. Then, I'd run two independent lines, one from each 48-port switch, to the 24-Port switch to limit bottlenecking.

In your case, since you're talking about only a few computers, 3 10/100 machines squished through one 10/100 link to the other switch isn't going to make a whole lot of difference unless you're all gaming over one cable-modem.

The wireless access point can be attached to either switch on either floor at that point.