building a home theater system...help before they close up the walls

All I would suggest is to add "pull strings" in the conduit. You never know if you want to add or change a wire/cable down the road. Makes it simple.

kind of new to most home theater setups, but what have you done for ethernet wiring, to get internet to the HT room ? Hard wiring is best, CAT5e in the wall and back to the entry point for cable, DSL, or whatever means you will have for internet access. Movie streaming, internet radio, a/v file sharing with other computers in the house are all becoming part of an HT setup.

What wiring are you running to the TV ? Where is it's AC power coming from ? Primary connection between TV and a/v electronics is HDMI ? Did you run a spare HDMI cable, just in case ? CAT5e to the TV, if it can use it for streaming and widgets ?

I always make sure there is a surge suppressor in the power line somewhere. If it can't be installed at the breaker box (whole-house protection) I install surge suppressor outlets (replaces the normal receptacle), which will go easily behind wall mounted TVs in in projector outlet boxes. I use high quality suppressed plug strips for the more "economy" oriented installs for other gear. This is NOT the same as a "power conditioner", which may include surge suppression, and also filtering. The benefits of all that power-conditioning voodoo are questionable, but keeping power spikes from damaging your investment is of proven value. I do install power conditioners in higher-end systems because of visibility and client confidence, though I will honestly inform the client of the science behind it all, and the lack of evidence behind the claims of exotic conditioner manufacturers.

Most flexible conduit systems have pull stings in them when you buy them. When you pull in new wire, pull in new string too. The world is wired with Cat-5e, it's used for more than just network, things like IR repeaters, and even audio/video, so it's not a mistake to have a bit of that available and uncommitted.

Plan for a well-executed remote control system. Even simple systems with a TV and a receiver are clumsy to use with the remotes that come with the gear. On even simple systems I suggest that clients budget for a graphical remote of some sort, on my custom installs I market an iPad-based highly customized control system. If the user can't easily use what's installed, what has been accomplished? The budget for a controller often exceeds that of the receiver, and that's entirely realistic.

^^^

i'd find the money to run the cat5... i sure wish i had it run when my house was re-wired back in the 90's...

Run cat5/6 and pull strings.

I would think yes.

Absolutely agree.

When I added to mine, I ran about 15 spare cat5e runs from the basement at the cable box point to various locations around the house, every room in the house also has spare telephone, thermostat, speaker runs (two per room), the bedrooms have coax for tv..I still have an awful lot of cat5e left..edit: in fact, I had one of the techs at work use 6 lengths of 25 feet to make me a 4 ohm cable for driving a very fast load..still, the box has wire...

Buying all the wires in bulk paled in comparison to the material costs of sheetrock, insulation, baseboard heat, and radiant heat (I did all that install, but hired a spackler...I hate spackling.. )

A thousand foot box of cat5e was only 60 bucks if I remember correctly.

Cheers, jn