media server or "traditional" wiring - what's the pros and cons

[drod]

Hi All,

I've just moved into a house that requires renovating and plan to make one room into a home cinema. I'd also like to distribute audio and video around the house and am wondering which is the best way to do this. I'm rewiring the house and also installing structured cabling, so shouldn't have any problems with power or network etc.

I'm not sure if I should I look at using a media server (windows, mythtv etc), or should I stick to "traditional" wiring and look at distributing that over the network instead?

It seems that the media server route has a lot to offer with the ability to easily distribute media over the data network, however I'm not sure about having a PC in every room, both from a cost point of view and the usability (keyboard, touchscreen etc)

What's the pros and cons of each system?

[M.D. Klapwijk]

Build a media-server, place a diskless HTPC in the living, place an asus O!play in the bedroom and buy squeeze boxes where you need audio.

[wysinawyg]

You can definitely achieve much the same result with traditional cabling, use of 6x6 matrix switchers and the like mean you can have different rooms all watching different sources or some of them watching the same sources. AFAIK they aren't much cheaper than server + clients once you start going down that route though (especially if you're trying to do it over network cabling rather than coax/HDMI).

The big benefit is in terms of live TV, I just don't think HTPCs match SKY+ (for example) in terms of reliability/usability.

I'd go for a mix of both with DVDs/music etc. handled by networked server/clients but with some sort of dedicated whole house TV wiring (even though its only RF I wouldn't be without the distributed coax which means you can watch and control the Sky+ box from any TV in the house, maybe think about HDMI or component if you're going HD).

[drod]

Thanks for the responses!
Re media server clients; the O!play looks really neat, but what devices do people use currently?

One of the reasons I'd liked the idea of the media server was that I'm familiar with PC's networking etc, and so have no problems in setting them up. However, going down the "traditional" route opens up a whole can of worms for me!

I've read about using 2xcat5 cables to enable HD video distrubtion. Some people have warned against using coax, so in my recabling plan I'm including 4xcat 5 and 2xct100 cables to each room to make sure I'm covered.

If I look at the traditional method, so I be conecentrating on coax/HDMI rather than cat5?

[wysinawyg]

Originally Posted by scooby_doo

How would two different rooms watch the same DVD but with one room 10 minutes behind the other? Would you have to have two DVD players and two copies of the same film? How would you choose a DVD from the TV? What about music?
I very quickly dismissed the "traditional" route but perhaps I was a bit hasty.

The important wording was "much the same". I don't have matrix switches etc. (far too pikey for that) but my understanding is that yes if you wanted two people watching the same film at slightly different times you're looking at two copies and two DVD players (or some other wizzy proprietary tech).

OTOH if you wanted the same film playing at exactly the same time and pausable on either TV (so you can wander between the kitchen and living room for example whilst watching something) that is AFAIK pretty hard to do with server/client type set ups.

Music I think used to be done with CD changers and I'm sure you can get massive DVD jukeboxes with on-screen controls these days.

The more interesting question is if you're considering more direct hybrid approaches, so rather than having a separate client for each room hook up two or three in a central rack to a matrix switch and then people have the choice of either starting something new off one of the unused clients or just tapping directly into one thats already running. It could end up cheaper and has other benefits like taking the noise, heat and objects out of the individual rooms. So a family of four with TVs in all the bedrooms, lounge and kitchen might have just three client computers rather than 6 and would be able to synchronise stuff much more easily. You also more easily get wall controls and things for music so rather than faffing with remotes to get your squeezebox/sonos working when you walk into a different room you just have a wall plate and flick to "Channel 2" to carry on listening to what you had been playing on channel 2 in the other room.

Unhelpfully to the OP I've got not much idea on practicalities and costs of any of this, its just something I'm aware of and thought worth highlighting in what was otherwise looking a fairly one sided debate in favour of pure networked solutions.

You can get HDMI over CAT5 baluns, but some of them are very pricey and no idea how well the cheap ones work (although I have a pair I keep meaning to test). No idea what wires people are pulling either, advice always used to be millions of coax runs (3 for component, 1 for TV and 2 for audio I think, at least) but thats almost certainly overkill and out of date in these days of SKY HD boxes without component outputs. So you need to get signals to the loft (so an "up" run from wherever your sky/virgin etc. box is) and then I think 1 or 2 CT100 down to each room is fine (one for the TV/magic eye signal and 1 for digital audio in case you wanted that).

I'd be tempted to run 6 CAT5e cables to each point though and just leave two unconnected. I basically did 4 CAT5 + 1 or 2 CT100 and if you then start thinking it might be nice to distribute a HDMI signal out of a room (2 CAT5 gone) bring another HDMI signal in (2 CAT5 gone) and suddenly you realise you can't have a network in there anymore...

Not saying you will want to do that, just that 4 CAT5 starts looking a bit anaemic when you start using pairs for HDMI and you'd be annoyed if you decided in 6 months you did want to and couldn't.

[drod]

Originally Posted by wysinawyg

I'd be tempted to run 6 CAT5e cables to each point though and just leave two unconnected. I basically did 4 CAT5 + 1 or 2 CT100 and if you then start thinking it might be nice to distribute a HDMI signal out of a room (2 CAT5 gone) bring another HDMI signal in (2 CAT5 gone) and suddenly you realise you can't have a network in there anymore...

Not saying you will want to do that, just that 4 CAT5 starts looking a bit anaemic when you start using pairs for HDMI and you'd be annoyed if you decided in 6 months you did want to and couldn't.

Good point, thanks, although the 4 cat5's are these just for video/audio - I also got another 4 cat5's for data and phone in the room.

The media server way is looking very tempting, but just to clarify a few things. When it's mentioned about having a mixture of both does that mean having an AV receiver coupled to 5.1 sound, dvd etc, in my "home cinema" room, then hooking in a media server besides it, or would you completely replace the AV stuff with a media server?

Does a media server provide the same quality as a set of seperates?

Thanks

[M.D. Klapwijk]

Originally Posted by drod

Good point, thanks, although the 4 cat5's are these just for video/audio - I also got another 4 cat5's for data and phone in the room.

The media server way is looking very tempting, but just to clarify a few things. When it's mentioned about having a mixture of both does that mean having an AV receiver coupled to 5.1 sound, dvd etc, in my "home cinema" room, then hooking in a media server besides it, or would you completely replace the AV stuff with a media server?

Does a media server provide the same quality as a set of seperates?

Thanks

No the media server is used to store your movies and music, it can also be used as an DVR etc. You still need an AV-receiver to distribute the sound 5.1 or 7.1 and connect your xbox, wii and snes in the main movie/game room.

Using a media server might be a bit more complicated than a disked HTPC in the movie room (which acts as an media server for all other rooms) though.

Quality is dictated by budget...

[drod]

Originally Posted by M.D. Klapwijk

No the media server is used to store your movies and music, it can also be used as an DVR etc. You still need an AV-receiver to distribute the sound 5.1 or 7.1 and connect your xbox, wii and snes in the main movie/game room.

Using a media server might be a bit more complicated than a disked HTPC in the movie room (which acts as an media server for all other rooms) though.

Quality is dictated by budget...

Why would it be more complicated to use a media server rather than a HTPC? Perhaps I should be thinking of going the whole way and building a HTPC instead?

[M.D. Klapwijk]

Originally Posted by drod

Why would it be more complicated to use a media server rather than a HTPC? Perhaps I should be thinking of going the whole way and building a HTPC instead?

Setting up a media-server (dvr,fileserver,upnp,dlna,cardsharing,etc.) is imho a level above the HTPC.

At this moment I'm making the transition from an HTPC with an external fileserver, towards a media-server which does the dvr, cardsharing, upnp, dlna, torrent, etc.