noob needs some handholding with shopping list for modest system

Hello all, I'm new here and a bit overwhelmed by all the information. But this looks like a great place to get help. We are just about to undertake our basement remodel, and I'm trying to figure out what we need to buy, and what sorts of outlets/connections we need to put in.


We have now: XBox360, Wii, DirecTiVo receiver (which I imagine we will need to upgrade to a newer high def one).

We are going to get a 46-52" flat panel tv. (We'll figure out exactly which one once we're ready to put one in.)

Am looking at 5.1 channel with subwoofers.

Imagine we will get a blu-ray disc player later on. Right now we just play DVDs on the XBox.

Writing this out, it doesn't seem too bad. I guess the A/V receiver is the thing I have no clue on.

Questions...

1) So I guess I need an a/v receiver for the 5.1 Channel sound + subwoofer, with RCA inputs for the Wii, HDMI input for the XBox360, HDMI? input for blu-ray dvd player. Anything else I should keep in mind? Any recommendations?

2) Having the receiver means I only need an HDMI cable and a power cable to the tv, right?

3) Speakers - I think in our setup that two in-wall speakers behind the couch, and then two shelf speakers for left/right in front. I'm not sure where we'd put the center speaker unless they come in a narrow size so that it will fit under the tv. How small do these things get? Also subwoofer - can it fit under the couch?

4) Circuits - Going by my list of components, will one dedicated circuit suffice?

I'm sure I'll come up with more questions later. I will keep you posted on our progress.

Well, I was hoping the "modest" in the title would describe the budget. But I will go ask about receivers and speakers in their respective forums. There's still a few general questions in there though.

Hi Jay - yes, I totally know where you're coming from. But we're not actually trying to create a home theater, per se. Just something in between that and our current 19" tv. Playing Rock Band on that sucker is no fun at all. If there's a section for "not really a home theater system, but better than a sucky 19" tv", then maybe someone could move my post over there.

Okay, so after getting some help in the speakers forum and perusing the receiver options, I am looking at getting the Onkyo TX-SR606 ($369), which will have plenty of inputs for the things that I want. Probably a lot more receiver than I need, but all the 5-channel ones didn't seem to have the HDMI qualities that I may want. If anyone has any other suggestions based on my original post, let me know. Speakers I can get the Klipsch synergy series, B3-SS.5-SC.5 for about 450 bucks all together. I think those will work together? Subwoofer I will get later if I think I need it. They do have under-the-couch ones, I've found.

We've started our demolishing. Our downstairs is that lovely 70's wood paneling, and it is all coming down. While we have the walls down, we will add some more circuits and wire for everything. (Hence the circuit question. I guess since I have models in mind now, I can just crunch the numbers).

Last night we started removing the rock facade off the fireplace. It started off as just a little experiment to see how easy it was to chisel off the rocks. Found out it was incredibly easy and two hours later, fueled by excitement and caffeine, it was mostly done. Then I crashed, exhausted. Maybe not quite so easy. lol! I will put some pics up soon.

Just a few simple pics of the "before". Notice our crappy 19" tv. (We got rid of all our furniture in anticipation of this remodel, which is why it looks so sad and pathetic.) My cute husband is in there too. Tomorrow I'll head to city hall to get my remodel permit. Then we'll start tearing out the paneling/drywall.







We will be putting the big tv over the fireplace (ducks the tomatoes). Let me get my arguments out of the way. 1. Space is limited. The half of the room that you can't see is where we have our computers, and toy storage. We spend a lot of time in here. 2. I want to have a big sectional so the whole family can snuggle up and watch movies together. 3. Putting the tv anyplace else makes it so you can't see the tv from the computer area, or makes a dead space behind the sofa, or puts the fireplace behind the sofa. I have a about a billion sketchup layouts trying to fit the tv anywhere else and it just doesn't work. 4. My dad has the exact same dimensions on his tv/fireplace setup, and it is quite comfortable, and his sofa is even closer than ours will be. 5. More people will have a good line of sight to the tv this way.

The first thing to take care of is the fireplace. This is the trickiest part of the whole plan. We are putting gas inserts into both of our fireplaces at the same time. I need to figure out the best plan for getting the wiring to the tv, probably building out the top half of the fireplace to make access. But then I'll need to build out the bottom half of the fireplace to match. I need to ask the city about this - there is a limit to the depth you can have to the flue. But I think because we removed the rock facade, we have at least that rock depth that we can build out the brick. I'll find out more how to proceed this week. Once we have this part figured out, I think the rest will be fairly straightforward.

So the plan - demo the walls, get the fireplace done, get the wiring/lighting done, put new drywall up, put in some built-ins surrounding the fireplace, and then it's all the pretty stuff.

Oh, and here's my sketchup plan. Never mind the colors/aesthetics. I was simply trying to see how things fit. The tree by the window is for a parrot. Not sure about the shelving in white - I just wanted to see how much storage I could get into that corner.

update 10/9

Computer access is a little sporadic, as we've just torn out our downstairs living room (where the computers were). Pictures wil be a long time coming, but I will post them when I can later.

My FIL and I ripped out pretty much all of the drywall in one day. Holy crap was I worthless today I was so beat (and hungover from the after-work beers). My husband got off easy because he was working from home and his only job was to keep our son busy. But tomorrow our dumpster arrives so I'll be making him do the dirty job of loading the huge piles of drywall into that this weekend.

Our speakers and receiver arrived today. I got that Onkyo 606 that everyone seems to love. I got some Klipsch synergy series speakers - bookshelf, center, and rear surrounds that can hang on the wall. Holy moly for being relatively smallish speakers, they sure seem like they are huge. I bet they sound great. That receiver is a beast! I didn't realize they were so big and heavy until I had to lug it from the doorstep. My husband and I were debating between a 46 and 52" lcd, but now that we have these beefy accessories, I'm thinking we'll have to get the big one because it will just make more sense! We are really going to love watching movies at our house.

My FIL is computer network saavy, having worked in IT for many years. He brought over a giant spool of cat5 cable and we ran our network. We have two network cables going to where all the tv stuff is going to be, figuring we can use one for the xbox and one for the directv or something. Then we ran the cables from where our router will be to where the two computers will be. (We do have a wireless router, but I just wanted a regular cable as it seems to be less finicky and we have the wall open so its easy).

Next is just to clean up the drywall mess and then start doing all the outlet wiring that I want to do.

Another addition to our plans: we are going to swipe some closet space for a niche for shoes, cell phones and keys. Hopefully that will help me keep track of that stuff. Friends of ours just built a house with a shoe niche (basically a hole in the wall at floor level) and I thought it was genius. Shoe piles are a common sight at our house. It'll be nice to tuck them out of the way.

I'm also thinking that since this center channel speaker I've got is bigger than I thought, I think a perfect place for it is within the fireplace mantel under the tv. I think I can pull that off.

Hope no one minds my rambling. I like reading other people's project threads because it helps me coordinate the details. So maybe this will help someone else. This forum has been a great resource for learning about this stuff. Thank you for that.

Still no pictures, but hope to have them soon!

After a couple weeks of frantic work, our basement is totally rewired. We added 5 new circuits to the house in total (one for the new electronics, one for the computers, one for the ten bizillion recessed lights I just added, one for the microwave, and one for the bathroom). I used almost a 1000 feet of wire. My poor hands. They got so trashed. And I really need to not talk to people while I'm slicing wire sheathing with a utility knife. I'm loving all my new lights and their dimmers, though. It used to be so dark down there. We also have all the speaker wire run in the walls, and network cabling from the computer area to the tv area.

All is done to code and has been inspected, no worries. Also had our gas line run for our new gas fireplace inserts.

Now we're putting up the drywall. Most of it is up and on the walls, but we still need to put in a ton of screws. And then mud of course. Oh, that will suck. It is a lot of walls.

The complicated part is trying to finagle the wires over the masonry above the fireplace. We have to fur out the fireplace to accommodate everything, and of course you have to do it with noncombustibles close to the opening. So it will be metal studs and cement board on the lower half, wood studs and drywall on the top half. I have a Power Assisted Tool (PAT) to help with bamming the furring onto the cement blocks (though I'll make my husband do that since that thing makes me nervous!) I want to place some sort of conduit for the hdmi cable from where the tv will be to the cabinet where the receiver will be. I need to figure that out still. That'll be the last piece of wall that goes up.

Yeah, I'm the handy one in my family. My husband is very patient and understanding of my many projects, but he doesn't know jack about wiring or plumbing, so I get stuck with that stuff. He's good for the heavy lifting, though, which is why he's in charge of the drywall portion of this remodel. (We did rent a drywall lift, too, and it was totally worth it.)

Speaking of, I think we've got 1/4-1/3 of the screws in the damn drywall. Ugh, it is so much work. I only weigh about 110 pounds, and it's very hard for me to get any weight behind these screws to sink them when they are being stubborn. So I am doing the ones on the lower half, and my husband can do the ones higher up, because I just cannot get the leverage. It's frustrating.

yeah, we could definitely use a better cordless drill! We have a corded and a wussy cordless, and my FIL loaned us his dewalt. Anyhoo, it is all moot because my husband and our friend Bob took care of most of the screws last night - woo hoo!

I finally have a couple of pictures to post of the mess we made tearing out all the old paneling/drywall.





I'll get some more recent progress pics up soon, now that I have found my camera cable.

My other news is that I got a little note in the mail from Directv giving me a free HD-DVR receiver upgrade. I'd sent them an email a while back, asking if they had any special deals for me since I was a longtime loyal customer, and I didn't hear back from them which made me a little sad (I'd remembered all sorts of free stuff that they used to send to me long ago - coupons for free pay-per-view movies, stuff like that). But in the mail came this little thank you note. So that'll save me 200 bucks - yay!

So by now I'm probably past halfway with the drywall mudding. I have to say, it goes a lot easier when you thin that stuff out with water! How did I not know that before??

Our gas inserts are in and running as of today! Yay! We have fire! These things are nice and toasty. But you know, as blazing hot as it is right in front of the fireplace, it really isn't all that hot above the fireplace. And think with the mantle deflecting the heat even more, the tv won't be so bad off. I am loving this fire at the flip of a switch.

I tested out my speaker and network wires that are in the wall, just to make sure that they all work before I get too far gone with all the mudding, and they do work, thank goodness. I had a little anxiety with one of the network cables, but it was just the end that had a loose wire and it is all good now.

Getting ready for the tv...

So we are putting a big tv above our fireplace, furring out the wall to accommodate all the wires. The bottom half of the fireplace wall is furred with metal studs turned sideways, with hardiboard on top. The top half of the fireplace is furred out with 2x4's on their sides and will be drywalled. The fireplace is hollow cinderblock, which made this furring thing take DAYS.

Originally our plan was to use PAT fasteners (which is something like a gun with little bullets and makes me so nervous, but it is great for attaching studs to concrete), but they did not work for this particular application. First attempts, the charge was too small and did not penetrate the stud+cinder block. Second attempts were with the largest charge and it got the fastener in there just fine, but basically disintegrated the cinder block so the fastener was loose.

So we moved on to tapcon screws which worked fairly well, but sometimes were a little too loosey-goosey for me to be confident about them. We ended up using the tapcons only for the perimeter furring strips, but where the tv was going to be mounted, we used some really beefy sleeved anchors on the 2x4's (The kind that when you tighten them, they wedge themselves in from the back). Those things are not budging. So that's a relief. They will be anchored even more when we put the mount on and double the amount of fasteners going through the (4!) studs and cinder block. I do NOT want the tv coming off the wall and falling on one of my kids. So I am totally overdoing this. Yes, I am paranoid.

Anyhoo, our goal is to get the drywall finished, primed, and textured by this weekend. I think we can pull it off. Then I get to paint!

Yep, we used Liquid Nails also, forgot to mention that. I think my husband thought that it was overkill, but "overkill" is my middle name. And the plans call for a lot of breathing room for the receiver, so we should be good!


I think the tapcons would probably work better in just straight concrete rather than the crumbly cinder block. Ah well.


So we got a new mount, the Sanus VMDD26 (I think those are the right letters/numbers). I found a pretty good deal on ebay, and also used the msn search/ebay/paypal cash back deal to get like 80 bucks back. That was sweet. The mount is VERY beefy. Omg. But I will feel a lot better with that mount.

The drywall is all mudded and textured, and now all it needs is some paint!

The texturing was a total nightmare. We have done this before, and we've never had as difficult of a time as this time. We kept getting the settings on the sprayer wrong, or the consistency wrong. And we'd spray some and then scrape it back off, try it again, and it still sucked and we'd scrape it off again. Finally we got it worked out and were able to get everything. Holy crap what a mess, though! We had plastic down and there was still tons of texture everywhere and embedded into our soles. We'd walk around and the plastic sheeting would stick to us. Ugh, it was awful! lol! Oh! and we also ran into technical difficulties when the coupler holding the compressor hose to the spray gun came off and exploded into several pieces, and which apparently have an infinite number of possible combinations to fit back together, but only one works.

I'm so glad it's over. And I'm especially glad that I can now clean the rest of my house without the threat of drywall dust returning.

Oh, we also ordered our new tv. We got a 52" samsung ln52a80 from Best Buy during their thanksgiving sale. Ordered it online, though, to avoid any trampling. It will be here in a couple of weeks. It comes with free installation, even though we don't really need it.

This is my inspiration pic, out of Lowes "Color" book. I love the dark wood, the green walls and blue accent in the built-ins. So this is the same feel I'd like to achieve.


More "before" pics...

a view into the crappy old bathroom as it's being demo'd


looking down the hallway:


my 4-year old drawing on the newly put-up drywall. "But it's my masterpiece!" he says. I'm just glad that the walls weren't done yet.


Drywall getting it's first coat of mud:



more...

Other side of the room with the drywall getting mudded...


This is our attempt at dealing with the fireplace. The pvc is for the hdmi cable, and you can barely see it, but there is a yellow wire running above that from the left for the outlet which will end up above the mount. (which is why the studs don't run all the way up and down.) The gap in the center is how I'm going to finagle the center speaker into the mantle. I'm sure this is all clear as mud. lol! EDIT: The pvc that we got was too skinny for the HDMI cable. Serves me right for not getting the cable ahead of time. So we scooched the pvc pipe over a bit for a clear path and now the HDMI cable is just loose in the space next to the pvc pipe. Maybe the pipe will come in handy in the future, who knows.


Now I've got the ceiling painted, which is also the same as the base coat on the walls. Next the walls will get a green wash on them like the inspiration pic. Mostly in the next photos I am showing off all my new lights. The room previously had 2 center lights, now it has 20! Plus 3 lights in the hallway.




These are our old computer desks. Eventually I will do a built-in double computer desk for us. You can see the network cables hanging out near the top of the wall, that is because we will be keeping the router out of sight on the upper cabinets. There are network cables that run from there to behind each computer, and also over to the tv area.


few more pics coming, I think...

More of just the general state of things. Computer built-ins will be on the right, and then Chad was thinking of making some sort of study nook on the left for the kids.


Our new niche in the hallway. There will be a counter in there for keys/purses/cell phones. There is an outlet in there for phone chargers. I'll put in shelves and that's where we'll tuck our shoes as we come in the house. Someday I will put a mirror in there and some fancy tile (I make handmade tile) but for now it's just going to be painted.


How the tv area looks at the moment. We left off the drywall to the left of the fireplace, and will back the built-ins all the way to the studs. This way just worked out better for how we had to snake the wiring over the cement blocks in the fireplace. It's a mess right now though. I haven't cut my hole in the drywall for the hdmi cable yet, but I know approximately where it goes - we just wanted to get the mount up there so we can cut it exact. The outlet that you can see will be above the mount. Later I will cut a recess in the drywall/cement board for the center speaker once I figure out where the mantle will be exactly.


So next I just have a lot of green paint to put on...by hand...in two layers. Ugh. I'll likely just do one wall at a time. Then after that, there is a TON of woodworking in my future. My FIL is lending me his table saw. But it will be a while yet, I need to make some tile to get my tile business up and running so I can pay for all this! lol!

Thank you, Greg!

A couple more pics since I got a third of the walls painted. Apparently my camera sucks because they look way better than the pictures indicate. I think I got a pretty good match to the inspiration pic's wall color. The pics from my camera look lime green - blech! It is not even close to that! I'll have to try again when the sun is shining in.

Doing the base color in off white was not a good idea, because when I washed the green over it, the white showed through as yellow. So I had to restart. I painted a base of light green (Valspar Lyndhurst Spring Eve), then glazed with a darker green (Valspar Prairie Brush) using a brush and rag, then a second glaze layer that was 1/3 light green, 2/3 dark green mixed with glaze and water very thinly (1 part paint, 2 parts glaze, 1 part water). Just to blur out the color wash.

Now I have to do the other half of the room, but we put up our tv mount (tv is being installed tomorrow!) and I put up my rear speakers, just because I could.

Chad testing out the mount. (Though he is not quite big enough to be much of a test.)


My new little rear speakers. Did you know that I am capable of detecting less than 1/4" difference in speaker height? Gawd, I really AM anal retentive.

We used 6 big sleeved anchors instead of the lag bolts. They go all the way through the studs and into the cinder blocks. We used those because the studs are on their sides, so lag bolts wouldn't have that much to grab into.

We got our tv!! And it's on the wall!! No thanks to the Geek Squad though - who didn't bother to show up! Or even call!! Bastards! My poor husband was climbing the walls in anticipation, and finally starting hooking everything up himself and recruited our friend to help heft it up to the mount on the wall. I still need to call Geek Squad/Best Buy and bitch them out and get some sort of credit for the service that we paid for.

It's a little nervewracking to put such a huge thing on an articulated mount, even when you've overdone the bolts. I think it will have to be hanging up there for a year before I'm done being nervous about it.

But we hooked up the speakers and the receivers and OMG it is AWESOME!!! We've already watched a few movies on it and of course tons of video gaming. There are all kinds of things that you can hear that we didn't hear before. I know it's a little "modest" system, but I think it sounds WONDERFUL and it is perfect for our family's needs.

The next thing I need to do is one more glaze coat on the unfinished walls (which is what I'm supposed to be doing right now). Then I will take a break for a while before getting into the project of building the built-ins and doing all the wood trim. Right now the speakers are sitting on the floor, or the hearth, but they will just have to stay there for a couple of months.

Will post some more recent pics a bit later...