Unlimited Free Cat6 & currently rewiring house - what to do wish list?

pencil

I'm in the lucky position of having the following:

A. 2km (approx) of free Cat6.
B. a brother-in-law electrician to install it.
C. a house to rewire.

With all this Cat6 I'd like to future proof the house, as much as possible, while rewiring.

I'm putting a networking point in every corner of all the rooms etc. What else can I do to make the best use of this Cat6?

What do the big 'home automation' rewirings do?

Any suggestions most welcome?

seamus

Choose a room that could one day serve as a "server room" and stick a patch panel and a UPS in there

pencil

Server room & corner for patch panel has been assigned :-)

robbie1876

Yeah, as Seamus said, pick a room and home run all your CAT6 points back to that. Run 2 wires to every point in every room, and consider running 2 extra wires to important rooms like the living room and kitchen etc.

You should also consider running CT100 or RG6 cable to all your CAT6 points, in the same home run fashion. Then, from the home run point, run at least 2 CAT6 and CT100 cables to where the utilities (phone and cable TV) come into your house. Run 4 CT100 cables and 2 CAT6 to your attic to future proof for satellite requirements.

If you still have tons of CAT6 left, other things you could do could include running some CAT6 to your front gate and front door in case you ever wanted to open them via an intercom system linked to your phone system. Run CAT6 to all your light sockets in case you automate your lighting system at some point. You could aso tap into that CAT6 if you were installing a keypad based audio system at some point in the future. Run some out to your back garden, you never know when you'll get a shed office. Just generally leave coiled up bundles of spare CAT6 in various walls throughout the place, but make sure to document exactly where the spare stuff is!

Remember that CAT6 can carry line level audio and video, so home run some anywhere you think you'll have TVs or music. At the home run point, have your electrician run a clean spur off the fuseboard for exclusive use by your AV and computer stuff.

Enjoy!

Hal1

Hey, put in some wireless access points in the attic also so you can strut around the house with your lappy or go out in the garden when the weather gets better.

I can sort ya out with a backbone if ya want lol, 10gig sound ok?

Hal1

Lol I can get a fluke test done for ya too and a resonable price

pencil

Cheers all,

Robbie, why would I run CT100 to all networking points?
Is this nessecary or would I only run CT100 to the points where I would possibly have TV's (not a big TV watcher) - guess I'm asking 'what is CT100 used for?'

Eurorunner

CT100 is good quality sat tv cable. Even if your not a big TV watcher, run it anyways as this will add value to your house. A roll of 100m is approx. 50 euro (b&q, satellite.ie, etc).

johnnyrotten

its now possible to send Tv Signals over CAT5e or Cat6 cable. So basically run a pair of Cat6 to easch Corner of each room and bring them all back to a "Comms Room" ( Cupboard/ BoxRoom Etc, etc,)
Then you can use any point for Phone, Broadband, Intercom, Tv, Sat, Piped Music and endless other uses

Best Of Luck

preilly79

it might not be such a bad idea to run some good quality speaker cable to each room along with the cat6. with open source jukeboxes easily built it doesnt take much effort to build a whole house music system. they're going to be ubiquitous given a few years, so if you want to futureproof your house this is a very handy addition.

pencil

All good suggestions

preilly79 - what would you consider 'good quality speaker cable'? How about this stuff?
http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?ModuleNo=20679&doy=23m11 or
http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?ModuleNo=50&doy=23m11

johnnyrotten - will do, bring a pair of cat6 to each point.

On the speaker cable, should I route them all back to the same 'Server room' or route them to the audio hub (which is in a different room)?

Any tips on good online shops for cable?

patrido

Audio...
if you're thinking of multi room audio, don't bother with running speaker cable to each room back to a central point. there are tons of ways to do multi room audio, and very few of them require this. those that do are either very expensive (using a big multiple input multiple output amp) and/or not very sophisticated.

solutions like sonos or squeezebox just use cat5/6/wireless. windows media center + extenders or mythtv + xbmc (xbox) are the same.

DO run speaker cable within rooms though. in your living room, decide where the tv / dvd is going to be, and run speaker cable from there to the corners for dolby 5.1. You could also consider wiring for dolby 6.1 or 7.1. Unless you are a serious audiophile, don't bother with the expensive silver, oxygen free, fiver-a-metre stuff. standard 42 strand or 79 strand speaker cable should be enough for most purposes.

Automation:
HA rewires are not for the faint hearted. basically, everything is home run to node zero to control panels that look like consumer units. you have a central programmer like homeseer or comfort. lots of cat5/6 is run to each light switch, alarm panel, thermostats, heating controllers, blinds, gates, garage door, ventilation system... all the devices you want to control now or in the future .

your free cat6 is no good for a lot of this anyway, because you need mains rated data cable to run it in the same conduit as mains cable. Do some googling as there's lots of info out there... look into clipsal c-bus, homeseer, comfort, automatedhome.co.uk, diyha.co.uk. Oh, and ignore anything you find about X10

TV:
While you can send tv signals over cat6, as well as s-video, composite, etc using a balun like Kat5 (www.kat5.tv), I would still put in some coax. Baluns are usually either expensive or require external power so I wouldn't use them everywhere. Also, if you ever want to sell your house, having bog standard tv points will be a selling point.

CT100 is more expensive than RG6 but it's much better, and it can also carry CCTV signals. Run 2 cables to every tv point to allow for an uplink. Then install something like a loftbox (http://www.tvlink.co.uk/loftbox.htm) to distribute everything including infra red signals from the remote.

...
In general think of every place that it's vaguely possible you'll need cat6 in the future, then double or triple that number of points. This way, it will be at least 2 years before you realise you still didn't put in enough

Also, it's almost as easy to run 4 cables to each point as it is to put in 2, so put in 3 or 4 particularly anywhere there might be audio or video. Even if you don't have enough jacks on the wall plate just yet, they'll be there for future hacking.

Oh and try not to ruin the house with wall acne

pencil

Jasus thanks Patrido!!!

My brother-in-law is going to have a heart attack! :eek:

Pataman

patrido wrote:

Audio...
if you're thinking of multi room audio, don't bother with running speaker cable to each room back to a central point. there are tons of ways to do multi room audio, and very few of them require this. those that do are either very expensive (using a big multiple input multiple output amp) and/or not very sophisticated.

solutions like sonos or squeezebox just use cat5/6/wireless. windows media center + extenders or mythtv + xbmc (xbox) are the same.

Hi
I am going to be wiring for multi room audio soon, I was thinking of the opus system. I will be running cat5e back to a comms room. My question is do I need speaker cable from the wall controller to the speakers( in the ceiling).

patrido

as far as i know the 500 system doesn't use cat 5 at all. in each zone you connect the keypad to the local controller using their own proprietary combined audio/data cable, and run speaker cable from the local controller to the speakers. however, i think subzones have speaker cable from the keypad to the speakers in that sub zone.

with the octupus system, you run cat 5 from the controller to the active speaker, and speaker cable from the active speaker to the passive speaker.

Pataman

The octopus definately looks a better system.

patrido

sorry, i just looked through the documentation and i misinformed slightly

with the 500 series, you CAN use cat 5 and speaker cable if you like, but they recommend using their own BTC1 cable. either way you don't connect anything directly from the keypad to the speakers.

patrido

Pataman wrote:

The octopus definately looks a better system.

really, why do you think that?

i think the 500 is better for a music server setup, lcd screen for feedback on the keypads and i think it's a more logical layout. i don't like the active speaker thingy on the octopus.

Pataman

patrido wrote:

sorry, i just looked through the documentation and i misinformed slightly

with the 500 series, you CAN use cat 5 and speaker cable if you like, but they recommend using their own BTC1 cable. either way you don't connect anything directly from the keypad to the speakers.

AH the penny has just dropped. I thought the keypad was connected to the main unit with cat5e and then the speakers were connected to the keypad by speaker cable. Am I right in saying the speakers connect directly back to the comms room?
Apologies for hijacking this thread!!

patrido

the speakers connect to the zone controller (dzm?) which is normally installed in the room but can be put in the comms room.

Pataman

Sorry wrong name meant to say opus. Can it be connected to a pc that has mp3's stored rather than the hard disk server?

patrido

there is some pc integration available, but i don't know if it can be used as the music server in the same way as mce/mythtv/squeezebox. they seem quite keen for you to use their hardware so i doubt it.

by the way, don't wire it based on what i've been telling you - get detailed info from opus themselves. they should be able to supply you with detailed info on how to first fix.

Pataman

I will contact them, i appreciate the info.
Thanks

Carb

Just on the multi room audio thing, I looked into this at one stage also. I liked the look of what Rokulabs were offering. (see www.Rokulabs.com ). Bascially runs on Microsoft Media Centre, the reviews I read were good, didn't seem overly expensive, and most importantly, it was simple to understand. I'm not sure how it compares with the other products mentioned earlier though.

pencil

Hey all,

Multi-room audio is MAIN system I want to have working properly - I like my music. I'm going to wire it with speaker cable for a cheap 'switcher box' & ceiling speakers multiroom system maybe using a Squeezebox untill I can afford a sonos.

I would kill for a sonos http://www.sonos.com/ but they are just too expensive (especially when your gutting & re-doing a house :-)

Thanks for all the help and more suggestion on multi-room audio welcome.

P.

Stoner

IMO I would not run CAT 5e cable for TVs, I'd at least run in Cat 6A or "cat 7" getting 10 GB, this is enough to send DVD quality around the house, the other stuff does not really have a great pic quality.

However I would recommend simple standalone speaker units etc with at leats 2 data points by your main TV. I would also recommend RG6 sat cable ahead of CT100 IMHO. I would also back feed the main tv entry point with two cables to your central wiring place.

Please note that SKY NTL digital and DVD , UHF will run down a Cat 7 cable but the new HDTV sky signals will not. In this case the unit will have to be place beside the TV where HDTV is required, you can still back feed and share it , but it wont be shared HDTV.

So I'd go for nice well installed speaker cables, installed to central points in each room. Alot of data points etc back to a main hub, and decent RG6 cabling bnack to this same hub.

This way you can make the most of cheapo DVDs etcs. The idea of sharing a DVD and sky box never really works, unless you live on your own and you want to watch the same thing everywhere

You can make the most of the simple multi room options as patrido has suggested , a media PC with hardwired extender boxes playing movies/TV and sharing music while other people do other things.

FrankGrimes

Stoner wrote:

I would also recommend RG6 sat cable ahead of CT100 IMHO.

Hi Stoner, I admit to being a novice in this area but I've seen plenty of people say CT100 is better than RG6 so am just wondering if you have insight that suggests otherwise? Thanks.

Stoner

You heard right Frank, disregard everything I type.
We are usually recommended to use RG6 because
A) its 1/3 of the price
RG6 is a safer bet for short runs for both CCTV cabling and TV. for long runs RG12 has been sucessful with us. RG59 would do CCTV but not TV in many cases. So RG6 is imprinted in my head.

You are correct CT100 is a better sat cable but if you wanted to run CCTV then its not great, but the OP does not mention CCTV , so if my anuty had balls she'd be my uncle.
I was suggesting RG6 as a future proofing / safe bet situation. Checking the OP I was wrong

Sorry,