[buck_I]

I'm "lucky" to have the opportunity of starting from scratch.


We're making a centrally located rack closet to take care of all of my AV components. DirectTV. PS3, AppleTV, etc.


That being said I'm going to have my whole house re-wried. My original thought was to run coax, 2 HDMIs, and speaker wire, to each location in my house. But, after researching on the forums here It looks like Cat5-6 is the way to go. That is 2 CatX wires per HDMI.


However, I'm not sure is if this is overkill. My longest run is about 35'. I went ahead and tested with HDMI, and didn't seem to have any problems.


Then again I just tested the 1 HDMI wire. Not 2 with coax...and obviously not all locations running.


Most of the threads I read about the "handshake" issue were somewhat dated.


Any thoughts of sticking with HDMI vs. CatX? Any other suggestions on what else to run given the opportunity?


Home is about 1800SF and am going to have 7 nodes.


Looking forward to what you guys have.

 

[Kei Clark]

I think you're in the wrong forum. But to answer your question, why not just run both while the walls are open?

 

[aaronwt]

You can't have too many twisted pairs, the more the better since you are running them from scratch.

If I could go back and do mine I would have at least four twisted pair cables to each room and at least six to my main area. Plus the same amount of coax as well.


better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it.

 

[Kei Clark]

I would personally run some fiber while I could, if it was my house. Especially if you have centralized rack.

 

[AV_Integrated]

The things to run are at least 1 HDMI cable, and 3-6 cat-x cables. You can run unterminated cat cabling and terminate it when you need it, so about $100 for 1,000 feet of cat-6 raw cable.


With such short runs of HDMI, just hit up Monoprice and get their premium cables in the lengths you need.


I would make a point to pull wiring to places you may think you just 'might' want it as well. With open walls, now is the time!


Also worth considering is running some 1.25" conduit to the critical locations from your head end. For example, I ran conduit to several of my TVs as well as a basement to attic run. Many of my runs are over 35'.

 

[buck_I]



Quote:
Originally Posted by aaronwt /forum/post/20853836


You can't have too many twisted pairs, the more the better since you are running them from scratch.

If I could go back and do mine I would have at least four twisted pair cables to each room and at least six to my main area. Plus the same amount of coax as well.


better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it.

So the consensus is CatX > HDMI?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Kei Clark /forum/post/20853851


I would personally run some fiber while I could, if it was my house. Especially if you have centralized rack.

One of my friends mentioned that too. Can fiber be ran that far? The longest I found on monoprice was 10m. Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't fiber video only? If so, CatX and/or HDMI = more cost effective?

Quote:
Originally Posted by AV_Integrated /forum/post/20854639


The things to run are at least 1 HDMI cable, and 3-6 cat-x cables. You can run unterminated cat cabling and terminate it when you need it, so about $100 for 1,000 feet of cat-6 raw cable.

Agreed. Was thinking of the 2 HDMI to get me by for now, and then "upgrading" to terminate Cats when need be.

Quote:
Originally Posted by AV_Integrated /forum/post/20854639


With such short runs of HDMI, just hit up Monoprice and get their premium cables in the lengths you need.

Yep. Was thinking of "cheaping out" with the 24awg as opposed to the Pro 22. Think that will still get me by?

Quote:
Originally Posted by AV_Integrated /forum/post/20854639


I would make a point to pull wiring to places you may think you just 'might' want it as well. With open walls, now is the time!

Not exactly open walls, but raised foundation with lots of work room

Quote:
Originally Posted by AV_Integrated /forum/post/20854639


Also worth considering is running some 1.25" conduit to the critical locations from your head end. For example, I ran conduit to several of my TVs as well as a basement to attic run. Many of my runs are over 35'.

I've been thinking about this more and more.

 

[buck_I]

A little more on my situation...


I'm coming at this from the angle that I wouldn't need to have a direct TV box at each location. Instead of having 7, go with 3. 2 for the main rooms and 1 that will be shared on the aux rooms. (via HDMI matrix/router/splitter, etc.).


Coax is a no brainer. I was hoping to get by with that plus 2 HDMI for the other inputs.


After reviewing here and seeing possible problems with HDMI I researched the 2 CatX = 1 HDMI solution. This seems ideal if money is of no concern. Problem is that all of the "Cat to HDMI" boxes seem much more expensive that the "HDMI matrixes". My apologies if my jargon is poor.


I think I'm going to end up doing this....


(1) Coax (not even sure if this is needed since the directTV boxes in the closet will be coming out of the matrix via HDMI....better safe than sorry. After all, it's cheap)


(2) HDMI: One for directTV and the other for alt source. I still haven't decided on my receiver, router, switch, and matrix setup yet. I might make it that The second HDMI is all I need for all other sources. Depends on what I end up with in the closet.


(5) Cat6: Can use 4 of them for 2 HDMI if I have issues. The 5th will be for the future... Security? Cameras? etc.


(1) Set of speaker wires: Duh

Yay? Nay? Other suggestions or problems you might see?