Rewiring media wires

Mick said:
I would not recommend a multi switch for a domestic, its just another fault potential.

Also, you can keep it simple with a 8 opti LNB (that can run 4 SKYHD boxes)

I would also for what its worth run all cables into a single location, then distribute everything from there.

If it was me and I had the chance to wire the house I would:

run 2 or 3 cat6 to every point (hdmi baluns etc), and 2 x coax.

10 x coax to the roof and 1 cat6 (cat6 for motor controls if ever needed) 8 coax for the LNB, 1 for freeview, 1 for dab.

Even if you only use one skybox you have just future proofed your house.

Speaker cables to every room, wall plates, floor standing speakers, ceiling speakers, in wall speakers - dont forget RCA where necessary (sub woofers).

for speaker cable I would recommend 4 core to wall plates/ceiling speakers so you only need to run one cable and loop them. (QED losmh is nice or InvisionUK do an ICE cable but you will need to be trade).

Regards
Mick
Click to expand...

That was EPIC!! Exactly what I came on to ask about today!!

If I was to run everything to a single point to distribute from, what would it all connect to? For example, 1 coax coming from the dish, comes to my central point, then does it connect to anything, or do I just do a straight join onto the coax coming from the bedroom?

So the 2 x coax you said I should run to every point, is that 1 coax for satellite and one for freeview?

I think you've given me everything that I needed as I was sitting there thinking how I could futureproof it all while I was doing the cat6 wiring.

I will need to find a way to hide/protect the cat6 to the dish as I don't know when or if ever i will be using a motorised setup.

Kind of lost me with the speaker looping thing there. I will probably just do surround speakers in the living room (ceiling ones).

I am gonna mount my tv to the wall and hide the wiring away, but can't drill through the ceiling flush to the wall, so gonna have to think of another solution where the tv is all alone and the wires run to the media shelving. it's plasterboard wall, but will probably run downwards in trunking and hide it all in the skirting. How does that sound?
 
Last edited:
Mick - Just realised that I don't need to run 3 ethernet wires to each room since I will be positioning routers at most rooms to combat the wi-fi signal drops. So if I ever went down the route of HDMI baluns, I could just run 2 wires from each router into the balun and the routers themselves will all be connected.

That sounds about right doesn't it? Otherwise I will have so many wires running to a single location and it will end up being overkill.
 
Pimped said:
Mick - Just realised that I don't need to run 3 ethernet wires to each room since I will be positioning routers at most rooms to combat the wi-fi signal drops. So if I ever went down the route of HDMI baluns, I could just run 2 wires from each router into the balun and the routers themselves will all be connected.

That sounds about right doesn't it? Otherwise I will have so many wires running to a single location and it will end up being overkill.
Click to expand...

Just to confirm you are putting switches, not routers in the rooms.

And your HDMI baluns have to be a direct connection, you can't run them over a router/switch. The data is not being transfered using IP and the switch won't know what to do with the signal. So yes you will need 3 ethernet cables to each room.
 
Yes mate it is an octo :) (i forgot its name)

Basically I would run 2 coax because one might not work get crushed etc, I am a strong believer in backup solutions.

You can distribute the skybox and freeview on the one coax cable if you wanted too.

You will need 2 cat6 (cat5 min - cat6 preferred) cables if you ever wanted to distribute the hdmi from your sky box (or any hdmi source)

And the 2 cat5/cat6 will need to be direct from the source as HDMI baluns do not work over your LAN.

That is the reason I recommended 3... so you could use 2 to distribute hdmi, and one for your LAN.

Its better to have too much than not enough!

example 4 bedrooms

Loft 2 x cat6 (1 redundancy) for a wifi repeater - draytek!
Each bedroom would have ceiling speakers B&W ccm80's - 1 x 4 core QED from the AV location too the Speaker.
Each bedroom would have 1 double socket (47mm) with 2 x coax and 3 x Cat6 - decent grade cat6 / min ht100 coax but HD100 webro preferred.

Kitchen 2 x cat6 next two a double socket on the worktop space.

Main TV room / Living:
would have 8 x cat6 and 4 x coax run into 2 double sockets (47mm)
Onkyo Amp nr809 (very nice amp!!!)
Sony Blue ray player or PS3
Sonos Connect (ZP90)
B&W M1 speakers in a 5.1 config (speaker cables goto the onkyo amp)
B&W 200W sub (RCA cable goes to the onkyo amp)
depending on choices either a 55"/60" LCD or a projector (epson range)
Harmony 1100 remote - with rf module

AV Location
All cables would be run to this location EXCEPT the local cables involved in the home cinema setup.
4 x sonos connect Amps (zp120) to run the bedroom speakers (iphone/ipad/ipod APP controls these)
1 HD Skyboxes
1 x hdmi switch (1in 4/6 out)
1 x 16 or 24 port netgear 1000Mbits switch (quite cheap these)
1 x 48 port patch panel
1 x 27u Server rack
1 x draytek 2780 router
1 x 10way TV booster (with 2 x attenuators 12db and 6db - you will need them lol) magic eye compatible

Extras that would be nice
a small UPS for the draytek router so that if you had a long power cut you could still use wifi on your phones etc
2TB nas drive

That is off the top of my head and its quite budget in terms of AV but will deliver!!!
 
Last edited:
oneman said:
Just to confirm you are putting switches, not routers in the rooms.

And your HDMI baluns have to be a direct connection, you can't run them over a router/switch. The data is not being transfered using IP and the switch won't know what to do with the signal. So yes you will need 3 ethernet cables to each room.
Click to expand...

I first thought that, then thought because it's one at each end, I thought that it could work over IP.

Yeah, I'm putting wireless routers that act as wireless repeaters. I've wired them up and tested already :)
 
Mick said:
Yes mate it is an octo :) (i forgot its name)

Basically I would run 2 coax because one might not work get crushed etc, I am a strong believer in backup solutions.

You can distribute the skybox and freeview on the one coax cable if you wanted too.

You will need 2 cat6 (cat5 min - cat6 preferred) cables if you ever wanted to distribute the hdmi from your sky box (or any hdmi source)

And the 2 cat5/cat6 will need to be direct from the source as HDMI baluns do not work over your LAN.

That is the reason I recommended 3... so you could use 2 to distribute hdmi, and one for your LAN.

Its better to have too much than not enough!

example 4 bedrooms

Loft 2 x cat6 (1 redundancy) for a wifi repeater - draytek!
Each bedroom would have ceiling speakers B&W ccm80's - 1 x 4 core QED from the AV location too the Speaker.
Each bedroom would have 1 double socket (47mm) with 2 x coax and 3 x Cat6 - decent grade cat6 / min ht100 coax but HD100 webro preferred.

Kitchen 2 x cat6 next two a double socket on the worktop space.

Main TV room / Living:
would have 8 x cat6 and 4 x coax run into 2 double sockets (47mm)
Onkyo Amp nr809 (very nice amp!!!)
Sony Blue ray player or PS3
Sonos Connect (ZP90)
B&W M1 speakers in a 5.1 config (speaker cables goto the onkyo amp)
B&W 200W sub (RCA cable goes to the onkyo amp)
depending on choices either a 55"/60" LCD or a projector (epson range)
Harmony 1100 remote - with rf module

AV Location
All cables would be run to this location EXCEPT the local cables involved in the home cinema setup.
4 x sonos connect Amps (zp120) to run the bedroom speakers (iphone/ipad/ipod APP controls these)
1 HD Skyboxes
1 x hdmi switch (1in 4/6 out)
1 x 16 or 24 port netgear 1000Mbits switch (quite cheap these)
1 x 48 port patch panel
1 x 27u Server rack
1 x draytek 2780 router
1 x 10way TV booster (with 2 x attenuators 12db and 6db - you will need them lol) magic eye compatible

Extras that would be nice
a small UPS for the draytek router so that if you had a long power cut you could still use wifi on your phones etc
2TB nas drive

That is off the top of my head and its quite budget in terms of AV but will deliver!!!
Click to expand...

My god that's a dream set up! I won't be able to afford that :(

I'm gonna take some ideas from it though. I will run

3 x coax to each room (2 x sat and 1 x freeview)
1 cat 6 to each room (possibly 2 if I have enough wire left over)

In living room, I will have the router set up and all rooms will connect to there.

The sat wires will all come out of an Octo lnb.

Do you think this is good to split a freeview signal: 4 Way Outdoor TV Aerial Splitter Freeview Aerial Splitter Labgear, Free F Plugs (5050171049648) | eBay

or will I need to use a mains signal booster?

Liging room will have speaker wires coming to av area.



In regards to your set up suggestion, would each room have their own independent control of sky channels or will each room see the same thing (as you've only put one sky box there)? Same goes for the speakers in each room, why have 4 amps if you've got one sky box? Unless each room gets its own independent video and control?

I'm absolutely shattered, so apologies for the short response. i really appreciated the thorough and detailed example :)
 
Speakers are for audio not for TV :)

Why would you run 3 coax, in case you had a sky box in that location?

Personally you can run one or all from the AV location because you can use a single coax feed to produce the MAGIC EYE (sky remote) and the freeview at the same time.

Save money with 2 coax and run 2 cat6/5 instead of 3 coax its a waste.

Example if you would have sky in a room you would never use freeview would you?
however you could have 3 coax for a return... but if you was to have a central location that would defeat the object.

For what its worth in a small house with not so much meters to run you could run cat5E quite cheaply and still get 1gbits speeds.

Again lol, for what it's worth there is a cat5/6 balun for almost everything you can imagine! take advantage of that and run plenty of cat5/6 mate :)

Regards
Mick
 
Hi guys, I'm back at it again! Is it a good idea to have an Octo LN|B and to have one of these (possibly one with more outputs): 4 Way Outdoor TV Aerial Splitter Freeview Aerial Splitter Labgear, Free F Plugs (5050171049648) | eBay for the freeview?

I'm gonna run 2 x coax and 2 x ethernet to each room. The coax's will go directly outside to the aerial/satellite instead of to the A/V area. I think this is manageable within my budget (otherwise I would have to get the chess multiswitch, which although is a good idea, would mean that I have tonnes of wires coming out of the A/V location, but if this is a better solution for futureproofing and maintenance, then I will do this).

Excuse the incoherent nature of my post, just at the house right now and need to get lots off my mind before it goes blank!
 
To be honest mate, it depends on what you want to do.

If you know you are going to be putting sky boxes in each room then your way is the one to go for.

However, could you not run these cables so they pass through the AV location leaving say a 2/3 meter loop... In the future you might want a central location?

and you would have the best of both worlds as your cables would run direct to the rooms, and if you ever wanted to put all the boxes in the av location you could.

It's always nice to have boxes out of site and just a tv on the wall... but again this boils down to you mate and what you are going to do with the sky boxes :)

Mick
 
Thanks for the info Mick. The main aim of this project was to just re-do the wiring I had done poorly before and hide it all away neatly under the floorboards.

I would love to have all boxes in one location, but the thing is, it's unlikely we'll have any more than 2-3 boxes (all linux based, no sly ones).

I think for the sake of futureproofing, just in case I change my mind in the future, I may change my wiring so that everything goes through the AV space in the living room. This will mean that I will have to fork out a bit for the chess multiswitch. How would it work then? Just a single wire coming down from the antennae while I have 4 (or more) wires coming from a quad (or octo?) lnb to the multiswitch and then double coax running to each room?

So, for four rooms for example, would I need a multiswitch that has 5 in and 8 out? Is it safe to be left powered on in an AV are which is just shelving in an unused recessed section of the room?
 
Okay so the way I'm going to do this is run 8 x coax from sat location to AV area and run 1 x coax from aerial to AV area. Then I'll run 2 x coax to each room from the AV area (possibly one for freeview as I've had issues in the past where sat has gone down, so no need to fiddle with wires to switch to use freeview ;) ) and I'll run 2 or 3 x Cat 6 wires.

If I want to run directly from rooms to sat dish, I can just put a joiner to join the wires from sat and rooms so no need for a multiswitch.

How does this sound?

In summary, there's be a "loop" in the AV area until I buy a multiswitch :)
 
Personally I'd bring it inside if only on the grounds that it's easier to get to if it croaks...
 
Him Her said:
Personally I'd bring it inside if only on the grounds that it's easier to get to if it croaks...
Click to expand...

Thanks HimHer. So a powered splitter will not cause interference with freeview going forward?
 
Can't see how it would M8 given that you could have fitted a masthead amp and the power goes up the coax on them!
 
This is what I've done so far:

8 x coax from dish to av centre
1 x coax from terrestrial aerial to av centre
4 x coax from room 1 (2 x sat, 1 x aerial, 1 x cable)
3 x cat 6 from room 1 (2 x ethernet, 1 x telephone)
4 x coax from room 2 (2 x sat, 1 x aerial, 1 x cable)
3 x cat 6 from room 2 (2 x ethernet, 1 x telephone)

Still got 3 more rooms to do. Every one of the rooms have telephone wiring now.

The sat wires will go straight through the rooms directly, but there are only 8 sat wires coming in and each room has 2 x sat wires and considering there are 5 rooms, that makes a need for 10 sat wires. Maybe I should invest in a chess multiswitch thing?

Just put in cable wires just in case, I wont have them connected as I don't want to reduce the performance of my broadband :)

I think I should have taken mick's suggestion and ran hdmi wires to each room and had some sort of magic eye for each unit. Oh well, next time lol :D

I've learnt a lot about my house and this wiring so far ;)
 
With small runs, you should take a HDMI to each room, but hey there will be a new standard sooner or later lol.

That is why is probably more important to run the cat6 mate, as these will probably allow you to use some kind of balun in the future.

They make a single CAT6 HDMI balun too... so you could still have a single point of install (IE magic eye/RTI remote etc) AV location.

But I think you have done well with what you have done to be fair... I do (lmao) think you have gone crackers with the coax... I personally would of run 2 coax to each room, and more cat6 (4/5), but you are on the right track mate it will be fine!

Good luck, are we gonna get any pics?

Mick
 
Mick said:
With small runs, you should take a HDMI to each room, but hey there will be a new standard sooner or later lol.

That is why is probably more important to run the cat6 mate, as these will probably allow you to use some kind of balun in the future.

They make a single CAT6 HDMI balun too... so you could still have a single point of install (IE magic eye/RTI remote etc) AV location.

But I think you have done well with what you have done to be fair... I do (lmao) think you have gone crackers with the coax... I personally would of run 2 coax to each room, and more cat6 (4/5), but you are on the right track mate it will be fine!

Good luck, are we gonna get any pics?

Mick
Click to expand...

It was hard work doing what I did so far coz it's all under floorboards and I had to navigate around concrete blocks and other annoying hurdles.

I've got 2 x cat6 running to each room. I guess I could add more if the builders haven't boxed up the ceiling in rooms 1 and 2 ;)

Yeah I went bonkers with the coax, I didn't wanna take any chances with rooms 1 and 2 as I only get one shot at those rooms so wanted to get them out of the way first and then learn/change tactic as I went along. So far I think I've done well :)

Like I said, I'll learn from this and use it as a stepping stone to a better av centre in the future.

When I stick the tv on the wall, I will need to either make my own hdmi run or get a long enough hdmi cable. Want to try and keep it as tidy as possible, but need to try and find a way of passing cabling down a plasterboard wall otherwise I will have to use trunking :s anyone got any tips on this?

Pics will be uploaded soon, you'll be impressed I reckon :D
 
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