complete new home network for a newbie

[newbie1konobie]

Hi guys.

Would love some advice on a complete new system for home networking for a newbie . im quiet good with picking tech stuff up so not afraid of doing install alone.

i have sky+,adsl broadband and phone (all with sky) poss to change to virgin so will need to take this into account.

i would like to install sytem in loft and cable from there. that way i can trunk outside to the rooms required with little fuss.

i would like to build system a little at a time and figure the cabling and what cable to use would be a good start.

requirments

living room to have sky+(or capable sky HD feed in future),telephone,adsl,freeveiw, and surround sound. 1 points at both ends of room.(will sound be availble through hdmi or will i need to feed sound aswell)

master bedroom,as above without suround.

2 childrens bedroom with adsl,freeveiw

what and how much cat5e to each point,how much ct1oo to each point. no run will be more than 15-20m

can i place 4 freeveiw boxes and 1 sky box in the loft and use a remote control?( 4 freeveiw boxes for each room to have own remote in each room)so to limit the amount of equipment and cables in each room. infact the more i can hide in the loft and the better, would like to set and forget

may add cctv 4 cams max and a recorder.again all to go in loft. Cams to be added just below guttering so no need to cable to rooms.

hope this info will help. i see the more cable i can get to each point is better but dont want to overkill lol

Thanks guys

[dalethecaptain]

This is quite an intricate request so I will try and help you with a few starter tips.

Cat 5/6 cable can be had relatively cheaply, but if you are intending to use it in the future for audio or video distribution you should put in the highest spec cable you can afford. I have always used this cable from this supplier with no problems running audio or video through it. That said, a suitable unbranded cable could be had for half the price for the same size 300 meter reel of cable, so as you can see the cost of cable is very small. You should expect to pay a similar amount for the CT100, about a hundred quid for a 250 meter reel.

It might seem like overkill, but I would recommend pulling two cables to every location in case you need it in the future or if one cable gets damaged.

Regarding sound over HDMI, I think with sky HD you need to have the optical cable connected to take advantage of the better quality sound, I am not sure on this so you need to trawl the Sky Sat forum for info on this.

You can place all your sources in the loft and send IR signals via suitable Rx/Tx equipment (e.g. Xantech) and this can be done over the same Cat 5/6 cable, obviously you need to pull at least two, ideally three cables to each location if you wanted to do this.

As long as you used dedicated speaker cable for your surround sound system you should have no problems, speaker cables are a bit of mine field and you would need to set your self a budget for this. Good stuff can be had for 75p a meter.

Sorry I cant help you with security camera cabling, no experience here.

[hornydragon]

Most CCTV cams will run on cat5e with baluns or coax without (need power supply)