New Home - Distributed AV Planning

[Waza04]

Hello Guys,
I'm shortly going to be moving into a new home and I am already planning my AV layout.

Ideally I would like all the equipment to be centralised such as in the loft (using Pronto RF or Xantech IR for control) - but I don't want to run 7+1 wires for audio from the amplifier to each speaker in each zone; are there any "hub" type products that can send all audio channels down a single wire and extract them the other end?

Also for lighting - I like the X10 technology for the data over powerline, but the wall switch replacements are ugly? Am I missing something?

Many Thanks,
Warren

 

[ocdwhiteboard]

have a look at rako lighting, much more reliable and better looking than the X10 stuff I had previously. has worked falwlessly since installed.

 

[wywywywy]

The audio bit - I think the A-BUS products can do that. What do you is you run a Cat5e cable from the central hub to each individual wall plate, and run a pair of speaker cables from the wall plate to the speakers. I think this is what you want???

The X10 bit - check out Kevin Lo's X10^2 modules, http://x10-hk.com which are much more reliable and better looking. I have some and I love them!

 

[Waza04]

The audio bit - I think the A-BUS products can do that. What do you is you run a Cat5e cable from the central hub to each individual wall plate, and run a pair of speaker cables from the wall plate to the speakers. I think this is what you want???

Sort of, except I need 7+1? I guess I could just run a digital coax from the main amp to a mini amp in each zone and connect all the speakers to this mini amp?

The X10 bit - check out Kevin Lo's X10^2 modules, http://x10-hk.com which are much more reliable and better looking. I have some and I love them!

Thanks, they still look a bit ugly though (ideally I would like to be able to control the lights from the wall plate aswell, similar to the Varilight dimmer) - the Rako stuff looks nice.

 

[wywywywy]

Sort of, except I need 7+1? I guess I could just run a digital coax from the main amp to a mini amp in each zone and connect all the speakers to this mini amp?

Not 7.1 sorry the A-BUS kit only does analogue stereo.

Thanks, they still look a bit ugly though (ideally I would like to be able to control the lights from the wall plate aswell, similar to the Varilight dimmer) - the Rako stuff looks nice.

With the X10^2 wall plates, you can control the lights from the wall plate. But yea Rako do look good. Unfortunately there is less integration with Rako than X10.

 

[Waza04]

Hello Guys,
OK - Ive put some thoughts into words:

The house will at least be wired with CAT5e cabling from one central point to all the rooms.

Music Distribution
I was planning on installing a several zone Sonos setup for music distribution with in-ceiling speakers; however I wasn’t sure if these speakers should be wired to a wall plate and then the Sonos ZonePlayer connected to this or whether the speakers should be wired directly to a ZonePlayer directly and hidden away. Especially for the bathroom zone.

Video Distribution
Ideally I would have liked central video distribution but the problems involved with distributing HD video via HDMI aren’t worth it, especially since I would need multiple sources to control zones independently anyway; so instead I plan to have two complete and separate zones (LCD TV/Sky HD/HD DVD Player/Xbox 360/DVDO Video Processor/Onkyo Amp) for the living room and master bedroom –each using some kind of discrete 7.1 speaker setup (in-ceiling again?). Sonos ZonePlayers in the living room and master bedroom will be amplified by the Onkyo Amp and played over the same speakers (some kind of audio priority control will be needed so that the Sonos system always gets priority if it is playing music).

I am not too sure on what to do with smaller zones (dining room/kitchen) – I guess they would receive an audio/video feed from one of the other main environments, this is where a central video distribution would have been ideal.

Lighting
For lighting I was looking at the Rako range – simply for the ease of swapping old wall plates for new ones. Do these units have the soft fade on/off feature?

Remote Control
Finally for remote control, I was looking at the latest Pronto devices (TSU9400/TSU9600) with their RFX9600 serial extender.

...any advice or recommendations would be greatly appreciated.

 

[ocdwhiteboard]

hi Waza,

once the sonos system is set up you are not likely to need to get access to the players - hiding them away should be fine. I would suggest having easier access to any which are going to wireless though as these do sometimes need resetting. my wired zone player in our lounge has not been touched in 12 months since installation.

rako do soft on/off/cross fades as standard - and look very good while doing it.

having had a pronto I would strongly advise looking at the harmony range of remotes (specifically the 895). they are so much more usable than my pronto ever was, especially for "untrained" people.

 

[Waza04]

having had a pronto I would strongly advise looking at the harmony range of remotes (specifically the 895). they are so much more usable than my pronto ever was, especially for "untrained" people.

Thanks for the comments!

Ive configured a TSU9600 in the past, and being a developer the new ProntoScript will come in very handy.

 

[ocdwhiteboard]

I reckon a well set up pronto would be brilliant, just never managed to get mine "well set up" in the 4 years I had it!

owain

ps - just to clarify, the "untrained people" bit in my post was referring to friends and family! having re-read it I'm not sure if thats how it came across...

 

[Waza04]

ps - just to clarify, the "untrained people" bit in my post was referring to friends and family! having re-read it I'm not sure if thats how it came across...

No probs, gotcha