Calling Home Theater and Distributed Audio Geeks

Okay so it looks like we are having a house built in the next few months so we are trying to pin down what options we want. I really want to have speakers throughout the house and maybe even some video. I asked about doing the wiring myself but they were not open to that at first I am going to keep badgering them about that.

Regardless of all that I am not really sure what I should run for wires. I did a home theater for my parents 5 years ago and haven't really kept up with the technology since then. I setup a dedicated theater room with remote controlled lights, an overhead projector and a equipment closet with an RF harmony remote so there was no need for a line of site.

Here is my dream for the new house, I am sure some of this is not going to happen but I would like to see what can be done and maybe some cool things I don't even know about.

I want speakers in every room and a couple outside, I think I should do independed manual volumen controls in each room too. To control the music and equipment I would like to use an ipod/iphone as a remote to work over wifi. Also using the ipod/iphone to stream music as an audio source for pandora, xm radio app, itunes, etc.

Then I also want to distribue video to a few rooms, thinking about running ethernet and hdmi to all the tv outlets where there will be cable. One thing the builder will do is move a power outlet and RG6 outlet to a position so tvs can be installed on the wall. My concern with that was if i need a cable box or converter then where would that go when i have a tv mounted to the wall and the cable outlet is halfway up the wall?

I also wanted to add some security cameras and security features, don't know much about that topic so what could I do via wifi or ethernet?

If you were building a house what would you run for wires for future expandability and to do everything you wanted?

as another near-future home builder, this thread is relevant to my interests...

expect 92celica to speak up in 3... 2... 1...

Don't use HDMI. Use Cat6e and speaker wire, that's all you need. If you were ub3r l33t you could get away with just Cat6e but I'm guessing you'll want to use off-the-shelf stuff.

GameboyRMH wrote: Don't use HDMI. Use Cat6e and speaker wire, that's all you need. If you were ub3r l33t you could get away with just Cat6e but I'm guessing you'll want to use off-the-shelf stuff.

Okay cool that will save me some bucks, I figured I would do a couple drops to each tv since if I am pulling 1 cable what is 1 more.

4cylndrfury wrote: as another near-future home builder, this thread is relevant to my interests... expect 92celica to speak up in 3... 2... 1...

I don't know much about this particular area, sadly.

I am curious as to why one would use Cat5 or 6 over HDMI, though...

If just audio, i wouldn't use either, but i may not have the right answer.

When we built our house I ran Cat6e throughout the whole house. Every room has 2 strands. I also ran speaker wire into every room into single gang boxes in the ceiling. If I could do it again, I would run one box in every corner of every room. My living room is set up with 6 speaker outlets in the ceiling. Once they got my house rough wired, I went in with a ladder and some spools of wire and went to work. Got it all done in 2 days after work and only working on it for 2-3 hours a night. If you're there for a full day, you'll be able to get it all done.

I ran everything into the office as far as the Cat6e was concerned. All the speaker wire terminates in each room next to the coax outlet. I figured that if you've got the TV there, you're probably going to have the receiver there too. LOL I still need to get everything hooked up and a server setup to stream movies and all that in each room from the central computer.

The main reason I used Cat6 was because you can use that cable for ANYTHING. They make adaptors for Cat6 to HDMI, so don't worry about it. You just get that adaptor and plate to put in your wall and you plug the HDMI right into there.

Check out the build thread here...

http://grassrootsmotorsports.com/forum/off-topic-discussion/can-i-build-thread-my-house/42090/page1/

Cat6e can do everything and will be used well into the future, HDMI just does video and audio and will be phased out for the next hot new connector in a few years (which looks like it might be HDbaseT which uses...Cat6)

Ah ok, i wasn't aware you could get converters for Cat6e to HDMI, that answers that question.

So run speaker wire and cat6e to everywhere?

92CelicaHalfTrac wrote: Ah ok, i wasn't aware you could get converters for Cat6e to HDMI, that answers that question. So run speaker wire and cat6e to everywhere?

Yes! EVERYWHERE!! LOL I only wish I had put the speaker boxes in every corner of every room. I have them in all the bedrooms, 2 in the kitchen, in the master bath, in the office, and out on the back porch. If I were to do it again, I'd put them in every corner of the bedrooms and office. 2 in the kitchen are ok. 2 out back are ok. Just plan for everything and overprepare I'd say. The main reason I ran 2 cat6 cables is for redundancy. Be sure to leave slack too. Don't pull it tight, the house needs to expand and contract and it's easier on the wires.

You may also want to run extra cat6e cables if you plan to use them as anything but network data cables, remember an adapter puts a cable run out of use for any other purpose. So if you want to use HDMI-Cat6e adapters you might want to have an extra run just for this purpose. That said, the only reason to do that is if you must have video played perfectly synchronously in another location. Some kind of HTPC attached to a TV can stream video or play something different, much more useful and it doesn't use a cable all by itself.

I would take a serious look at designating one of your closets the main junction point for the whole system. Run a conduit of some variety from that closet to every room, so that if you need to make changes later, it's as easy as running cable down the conduit (i.e. no breaking into drywall). That would be the ultimate future-proofing IMO.

szeis4cookie wrote: I would take a serious look at designating one of your closets the main junction point for the whole system. Run a conduit of some variety from that closet to every room, so that if you need to make changes later, it's as easy as running cable down the conduit (i.e. no breaking into drywall). That would be the ultimate future-proofing IMO.

THIS!!!!!!

Be sure that closet has an AC register and return as well. Optimal would be a register in the floor and return in the ceiling... Maybe backwards... Either way, you are going to have a LOT of heat generated in that small of a space, so keeping it cool is a must.

szeis4cookie wrote: I would take a serious look at designating one of your closets the main junction point for the whole system. Run a conduit of some variety from that closet to every room, so that if you need to make changes later, it's as easy as running cable down the conduit (i.e. no breaking into drywall). That would be the ultimate future-proofing IMO.

Yeah that is what I want to do but I don't think I can afford to do that.

I've always wanted to do that but it would be very time consuming to run all that conduit, or incredibly expensive to have someone to it for you. So rather than waffling on making it perfect you should make it good enough. Speaker wire and 2 runs of Cat6 and you're good to go.

Just finished a similar project with a friend of mine. Ran over a mile of audio/video cable in a 1600sqft house. Fortunately? the basement was gutted due to water and termite damage so most of the wiring was done in the same fashion as new construction. The main floor was done using creative fishing techniques. My friend does A/V work professionally, so I will try to get him to weigh in on the subject and make specific recommendations regarding materials and sources. By the way, conduit is not required for A/V, so dculberson might be able to enlist the assistance of a helpful family member to wire up his new place without disturbing the existing drywall.

windsordeluxe wrote: Just finished a similar project with a friend of mine. Ran over a mile of audio/video cable in a 1600sqft house. Fortunately? the basement was gutted due to water and termite damage so most of the wiring was done in the same fashion as new construction. The main floor was done using creative fishing techniques. My friend does A/V work professionally, so I will try to get him to weigh in on the subject and make specific recommendations regarding materials and sources. By the way, conduit is not required for A/V, so dculberson might be able to enlist the assistance of a helpful family member to wire up his new place without disturbing the existing drywall.

Yes, please have him weigh in. I don't know what equipment to hook up but at this point I think I am going to do 2 speakers per room in every room and then 2-4 network drops into each room. 2 for rooms without a tv 4 for rooms with a tv. That should do the trick for wiring now I just need to figure out the hardware I want to use.

I really want to use a ipod/ipad to control everything and then be able to turn speaker on and off from it which is going to be pretty expensive if i go with a remote switchable amp. I saw some remote controlled speaker selectors that i could integrate using the harmony iphone app and ir transmitter. Not sure what to do.

Conquest351 wrote:

92CelicaHalfTrac wrote: Ah ok, i wasn't aware you could get converters for Cat6e to HDMI, that answers that question. So run speaker wire and cat6e to everywhere?

Yes! EVERYWHERE!! LOL I only wish I had put the speaker boxes in every corner of every room. I have them in all the bedrooms, 2 in the kitchen, in the master bath, in the office, and out on the back porch. If I were to do it again, I'd put them in every corner of the bedrooms and office. 2 in the kitchen are ok. 2 out back are ok. Just plan for everything and overprepare I'd say. The main reason I ran 2 cat6 cables is for redundancy. Be sure to leave slack too. Don't pull it tight, the house needs to expand and contract and it's easier on the wires.

I thought you need two cat6 cables for one HDMI connection? Considering there is 19 pins on a HDMI connection and only 8 on one cat6. All the HDMI extensions I see use two cables.

Yeah you do need two cat6e cables for an HDMI connection, unless you want to use the super-expensive converter boxes that can do it over one.