new contstruction structured wiring

[cardio75]

This has been addressed in old posts, but I'm hoping for current information and opinion (there is a surprising lack of information on this available).

I'm building a new home and I want to incorporated a structured wiring system to include video, data, and possible audio. I am inclined to use cat6 cable (although some posts say 5e for cost and 6a for future proofing), coax for video, and potentially some speaker wire for separate home audio.

I see alot of people using Levitron, i can get On-Q from a local Lowes hardware.

I guess my questions are:
1. what type of data cable should i use?
2. what type of components should i use (levitron, On-Q, does it matter)?
3. If I wire for a separate home audio and do home runs with speaker wire to my control box, what do I connect the speaker wire to? is there a component to control input and what rooms get audio and what rooms don't?

I'm happy to post my floor plans if this would be helpful

thanks

[giddonah]

Our standard for a tv location:

2 Quad-shield RG6
4 Cat5e

Cat6 (or Cat6e) is pointless in a home imho. I still have yet to see anyone max out a gigabit network, and the hardware for 10g networks is still insane. Save yourself. Futureproofing is only done with conduit. You can not predict the wiring for a future network standard. Fiber maybe, but that's really risky. Just stick with the Cat5, you'll be fine.

For distributed audio, run a 14-4 (stranded) and a cat5 to a keypad location. From there, run either a 14-4 to one speaker with a 14-2 jumper from one speaker to the other, or two 14-2's to each speaker from the keypad location.

This gives you the option of using a simple volume knob in each room, or a keypad to control a dist. audio control system such as Niles, Zon, Control4 (although, these keypads are hard wired for power and will need to be near a power source like a light switch or above an outlet).

Home run everything. Make sure you have PLENTY of slack at the locations. If you're going to do wall plates, come out of the wall two feet. If you're going to do hoods and go to the equipment, the wires will need to run out of the wall, into whatever cabinet/rack you'll use, plus be able to be hooked into equipment that can be pulled out of the cabinet with the wires attached. This can be upwards of 15ft. When wiring a cabinet, I place the receiver on the floor in front of the cabinet and run all the wires to it. Then, you velcro the wires into an umbilical and place the equipment into the cabinet. Now, when something goes wrong, you grab the thing, pull it out, and you can see all the wires (still plugged in) and service the thing without swearing.

The components don't matter so much. Leviton, Panduit, On-Q, no difference really. We use Panduit, but it's a little pricey. Leviton is expensive in my opinion too. Heck, you can use a bulk wire plate and just run the wires directly to the equipment. All that really matters is that the wires are in place and are in good condition (no shorts or breaks).

As far as what equipment you use for amps and whatnot for your distributed audio, it all comes down to budget. Niles is a good low end. Their ICS stuff is pretty good. For ultra custom and reliability, look at crestron. Control4 is in the middle. There are lots of companies that make distributed audio solutions, those are my favorites.

[cardio75]

Thanks.
I'm going to get some quotes to see what a professional charges. The information available on the web either seems hard to find or dated.
After the sticker shock from the quote, I may try to do it myself.

[giddonah]

If you are willing to do it yourself, I'd recommend that. I've seen too many jobs totally screwed by people who either don't understand LV, or don't care. I've seen places just a total mess of wires. Insanely difficult to troubleshoot problems.

The best option? If it's a two story, and you have attic access to the second floor, give yourself plenty of conduit from the mechanical room to the attic. 4-6 2" conduits (in addition to what you pre-wire). If it's going to be difficult to reach the area after finish, run a 2" conduit. Next to that, run a bunch of cat5 and two coax (if not three).

It's amazing how many times we are limited in what we can do because of wiring. An extra $50 in wire now will save you thousands later (make that a $50 in cat5, so useful).

Think of your house finished. What walls and ceilings will you not have access to after it's finished? What surfaces will you not want to cut into to have patched? (faux paint is a PITA to refinish and painters curse us when we cut into it). Conduit needs to be there. Lots of cat5? You can use baluns (a cheap example (http://www.smarthome.com/7805HD/Component-Video-Digital-Audio-Balun-500050/p.aspx)) Baluns can be used for HDMI too, although it requires two cat5 for one HDMI run (and the good ones can be a few hundred dollars).

Just remember: Cross high voltage (anything over 100V) wires at 90 degrees. If you have to run parallel, maintain 18" spacing (some say 12", but I like Cisco's safety net of 18"). If you have to go closer, just try to limit the LV wires' exposure to the high voltage wires (they will pick up the 60Hz frequency and speakers will hum, phone lines will have static, and ethernet could have packet loss). Most of this depends on the electrician keeping their wires neat. NOT GOING TO HAPPEN. They run their wires in the shortest paths possible. Buy them some coffee and donuts. Ask them to keep their wires neat so you have paths for your LV wires.

BTW, it's amazing what some food will do for the spirits of the subs.

[Mike44]

If you are willing to do it yourself, I'd recommend that. I've seen too many jobs totally screwed by people who either don't understand LV, or don't care.

Too true! At my work, the guys do a good job at line voltage wiring, but when it comes to low voltage, as you said, they just don't care!! It drives me nuts! Whenever we rough in, I try to do all the low voltage runs so they actually get run in their own holes. One of the other guys told me just to run one of the RG6 feeds through the line voltage holes since it would be a shorter run to get the panel......by only like 15ft if I were to go through the dedicated LV holes. Which is, what, like an extra $0.50 probably of wire? I would certainly pay that to guarantee a clearer signal!

We DO run cat6 - not sure why I guess after reading what you were explained. Funny thing is, we also use it to run phone lines - for that super fast dial up!! :mrgreen:

And, for true future proofing conduit (as Gid said) conduit would be best. I would suggest smurf tube (or smurf blue) or whatever they call it. Super easy to install because it's flexible. There's essentially no measuring or cutting involved really. Just run a conduit from each box to your media room.

And using a box and face plate like this gives you lots of room to hold excess wire and a place to install your conduit (if you choose to do it). I'd still suggest this 2-gang box though with the 1-gang plate even if you don't pull conduit.

http://www-personal.umich.edu/~csev/hng/book/06wiring/smurf.jpg

Mike

[giddonah]

we use smurf a lot. We don't bother with the metal boxes though. We use LV rings (they have strap holes for mounting frames for rj45 or coax inserts) but they don't have a back. I don't like the orange ones from HD because the side walls are 2" thick. The ones we use are very thin, and work very well:

http://www.ace4parts.com/images/products/LV1_medium.jpg

We'll then run the conduit down the stud to just above the ring and drive a screw through the inside of the tube into the stud. Fishing wires after the fact with a box is insane. We just rip out the boxes and replace them with rings.

[peterselby7]

Nice stuff!