Setup: my home network is long & skinny, and the FIOS-connected router is all the way at one of the apartment. At the other end, far away (and a floor higher) is my HD TV, which gets a cable-TV signal from a Verizon set-top box that is coax-connected back to the FIOS on-premises equipment. Wi-Fi won't work, the apartment is too stretched out, with old, thick walls and floors.

Goal: I think there are three ways to get ethernet back to where the HD TV is:

1) run a cable! this isn't crazy but isn't cheap either (my building won't let me do it, it involves hiring an electrician because the cable would run partly through the public hallway ceiling)

2) split the coax near the TV and put in... a MoCA device?

3) somehow tease the set-top box, which has an RJ-11 (ethernet) port on the back, to give me network access.

Question: any other choices? and, is one choice better than the others? #3 is by far the most desirable because it would involve the least wiring -- but I can't find any resources to help make it happen. #2 is a bit scary, I don't want to degrade service to the TV or anywhere else for that matter.