[jpkreddy]

Thanks to all the gurus out there for great posts. I have been reading through the forums and it has wealth of info but wanted to post a thread to request some suggestions specific to me.

I am building a new home (2 stories with Basement (unfinished)) and I would like to achieve the whole home audio video distribution with a central media closet if possible.

I am planning for a 5.1/7.1 audio setup for my living room (first floor) and a 5.1 setup for loft in second floor and a stereo setup for my master bedroom.

I will be working on finishing the basement in future and have a home theatre.

I am new to this as its my first home and want to pre-wire the home with all the required wiring and also would like to design for the central media closet where I can share the devices between multiple TV's.

I live in an apartment and have a 7.2 channel setup with cable, XBMC, Blurry player, WDTV and XBOX.

Please suggest the different devices I would need to achieve the centralized media closet to switch audio and video between multiple tv's.


Any help would be greatly appreciated. Also please suggest some ideal locations for media closet.

 

[jautor]

Don't worry about the gear yet - concentrate on the pre-wire plan. Do some reading of any number of threads here on new construction pre-wiring, distributed video, HDMI matrix switches, and whole house audio (WHA).

And note that with set-top boxes, WDTV and other inexpensive streaming devices, "distributed video" is probably not the right answer. Rather, replicating those client devices per display will be cheaper, simpler, and more functional. Remotely locating equipment in a central closet location is relatively simple (see HDMI extenders and HDBaseT)...

You only get one chance to pre-wire - the equipment will come and go (and in six months, when you're ready to start actually buying gear, everything may have changed!).

Jeff