House refurb - where do I look?
Discussion
For a sensible guide to audio and TV options?
I am refurbishing and extending my house, and want to take this opportunity to wire in ceiling speakers in several rooms for music, be able to broadcast sky TV around the house and also ensure that the shabby internet supply that we have is accessible in most rooms.
Can anyone point me to a simple guide that will help me understand the options out there?
My searches throw up sonos, cat 5e cabling etc - what I need is an idiot's guide to what this means.
I'm sure this question is asked frequently, but the search "tool" isn't entirely helpful
Thanks all
I am refurbishing and extending my house, and want to take this opportunity to wire in ceiling speakers in several rooms for music, be able to broadcast sky TV around the house and also ensure that the shabby internet supply that we have is accessible in most rooms.
Can anyone point me to a simple guide that will help me understand the options out there?
My searches throw up sonos, cat 5e cabling etc - what I need is an idiot's guide to what this means.
I'm sure this question is asked frequently, but the search "tool" isn't entirely helpful
Thanks all
What we really need is a 'sticky' for this as it comes up frequently and it's quite involved! Some questions you need to answer
Are you having Sky multi-room? Or do you want to have one box showing to all TVs (same channel?)
How many rooms? You may need a central 'hub' location where your Broadband, CAT5 switch, TV distro, Sky distro is situated. loft is a favourite, or cupboard under stairs etc.
Cabling wise in brief.
Depending on your answers above. Four Sky feeds to the hub from dish location. TV aerial feed to hub + spare for radio.
Every TV point should have a twin Sky feed and an aerial (freeview) feed. Plus minimum 2x CAT5e with 4 x CAT5e at any 'prime' TV point.
Are you having Sky multi-room? Or do you want to have one box showing to all TVs (same channel?)
How many rooms? You may need a central 'hub' location where your Broadband, CAT5 switch, TV distro, Sky distro is situated. loft is a favourite, or cupboard under stairs etc.
Cabling wise in brief.
Depending on your answers above. Four Sky feeds to the hub from dish location. TV aerial feed to hub + spare for radio.
Every TV point should have a twin Sky feed and an aerial (freeview) feed. Plus minimum 2x CAT5e with 4 x CAT5e at any 'prime' TV point.
If you want Wired internet then you will need to run CAT 5e (or 6) cable thru the house. maybe run it with all the power sockets so you have multiple access points in a room.
Alternative get Wifi Repeaters to boost the signal. Obviously this is more flexible in the long run, it will limit thruput but unlikely to be an issue unless you are streaming films in multiple rooms. I tend to 'wire' things that don't move rather than rely on wifi - so desktop, TV, Sonos, Bluray, NAS, etc are all wired. Things that move around use wifi.
If you are after ceiling speakers then SONOS is not really an option. If you just want music in multi rooms - Sonos is probably the best thing on the market. All other options at present are a compromise either with connectivity, or flexibility, stability - that's not to say other solutions are not adequate, just that you have to tailor your choice to what you want to do now and possibly in the future.
e.g.
Connectivity - not all work with NAS drives, or certain music streaming services or internet radio.
Flexibility - play multi tunes in multi rooms, all with multiple controllers - some solutions do one tune in one or multiple rooms and only allow one controller
stability - lots of stories about Apple and Sonos being unstable together. Not heard any issues with traditional kit and Sonos.
there are other systems available Bose, Apple, Denon, etc these are more/less expensive and they are getting better all the time, but Sonos are streets ahead at present.
TV I know bugger all about, partly cos I just use terestrial and internet - I refuse to have anything to do with that scum Murdock so Sky will never be an issue for me. Smart TV covers all my needs along with aerial Cat5 and power.
Alternative get Wifi Repeaters to boost the signal. Obviously this is more flexible in the long run, it will limit thruput but unlikely to be an issue unless you are streaming films in multiple rooms. I tend to 'wire' things that don't move rather than rely on wifi - so desktop, TV, Sonos, Bluray, NAS, etc are all wired. Things that move around use wifi.
If you are after ceiling speakers then SONOS is not really an option. If you just want music in multi rooms - Sonos is probably the best thing on the market. All other options at present are a compromise either with connectivity, or flexibility, stability - that's not to say other solutions are not adequate, just that you have to tailor your choice to what you want to do now and possibly in the future.
e.g.
Connectivity - not all work with NAS drives, or certain music streaming services or internet radio.
Flexibility - play multi tunes in multi rooms, all with multiple controllers - some solutions do one tune in one or multiple rooms and only allow one controller
stability - lots of stories about Apple and Sonos being unstable together. Not heard any issues with traditional kit and Sonos.
there are other systems available Bose, Apple, Denon, etc these are more/less expensive and they are getting better all the time, but Sonos are streets ahead at present.
TV I know bugger all about, partly cos I just use terestrial and internet - I refuse to have anything to do with that scum Murdock so Sky will never be an issue for me. Smart TV covers all my needs along with aerial Cat5 and power.
Edited by sparkyhx on Wednesday 17th September 13:59
Ah yes, thanks for the feedback so far, I can see I didn't really provide the full picture.
I'm thinking 1 sky box, feeding 4 rooms (I understand it will be the same channel), with an option for adding another box at a future date.
Another 5 rooms will just have TV
Music in 3 or 4 different "zones"
Wireless internet in all rooms, (bedrooms, lounge, kitchen/diner, garden room and garage of course) with a couple of wired points.
We can't get Infinity or any other quick broadband, so streaming movies and music isn't going to work terribly well just yet.
What did I miss?
I'm thinking 1 sky box, feeding 4 rooms (I understand it will be the same channel), with an option for adding another box at a future date.
Another 5 rooms will just have TV
Music in 3 or 4 different "zones"
Wireless internet in all rooms, (bedrooms, lounge, kitchen/diner, garden room and garage of course) with a couple of wired points.
We can't get Infinity or any other quick broadband, so streaming movies and music isn't going to work terribly well just yet.
What did I miss?
IMHO
You will you need...
A 4 input 4 output HDMI Cat5 matrix circa £1400 you will need a sky eye and control sky over coax. If you want to watch anything else then a control system. This is something that only an AV company can sort out. Again you are looking at £2k for the kit and programming. Don't forget all the extra power at these locations too.
Get some quotes from AV companies just as you would have for electrics and plumbing.
You will you need...
A 4 input 4 output HDMI Cat5 matrix circa £1400 you will need a sky eye and control sky over coax. If you want to watch anything else then a control system. This is something that only an AV company can sort out. Again you are looking at £2k for the kit and programming. Don't forget all the extra power at these locations too.
Get some quotes from AV companies just as you would have for electrics and plumbing.
Blues said:
Ah yes, thanks for the feedback so far, I can see I didn't really provide the full picture.
I'm thinking 1 sky box, feeding 4 rooms (I understand it will be the same channel), with an option for adding another box at a future date.
Another 5 rooms will just have TV
Music in 3 or 4 different "zones"
Wireless internet in all rooms, (bedrooms, lounge, kitchen/diner, garden room and garage of course) with a couple of wired points.
We can't get Infinity or any other quick broadband, so streaming movies and music isn't going to work terribly well just yet.
What did I miss?
you sure you can't get decent broadband - it doesn't have to be the mega fibre stuff, just FTTC (Fibre to the cabinet) which is widely available now.I'm thinking 1 sky box, feeding 4 rooms (I understand it will be the same channel), with an option for adding another box at a future date.
Another 5 rooms will just have TV
Music in 3 or 4 different "zones"
Wireless internet in all rooms, (bedrooms, lounge, kitchen/diner, garden room and garage of course) with a couple of wired points.
We can't get Infinity or any other quick broadband, so streaming movies and music isn't going to work terribly well just yet.
What did I miss?
music streaming should be a doddle even for poor broadband.
Edited by sparkyhx on Wednesday 17th September 20:49
sparkyhx said:
If you are after ceiling speakers then SONOS is not really an option.
Why? Cable the ceiling speakers back to a Sonos Amp. Separate amp per room. Each room then becomes an independent zone. The Amps can all be centrally located (as I am doing), or hidden on a room by room basis.sparkyhx said:
you sure you can't get decent broadband - it doesn't have to be the mega fibre stuff, just FTTC (Fibre to the cabinet) which is widely available now.
music streaming should be a doddle even for poor broadband.
Alas yes. Apparently we are rather "rural". A postcode check on the BT site says it isn't even planned yetmusic streaming should be a doddle even for poor broadband.
megaphone said:
What we really need is a 'sticky' for this as it comes up frequently and it's quite involved! Some questions you need to answer
Are you having Sky multi-room? Or do you want to have one box showing to all TVs (same channel?)
How many rooms? You may need a central 'hub' location where your Broadband, CAT5 switch, TV distro, Sky distro is situated. loft is a favourite, or cupboard under stairs etc.
Cabling wise in brief.
Depending on your answers above. Four Sky feeds to the hub from dish location. TV aerial feed to hub + spare for radio.
Every TV point should have a twin Sky feed and an aerial (freeview) feed. Plus minimum 2x CAT5e with 4 x CAT5e at any 'prime' TV point.
Couple that with two speaker cables to each room for ceiling speakers and you are there. You might want to add more Cat5e/6 cables to an 'office' area with a desktop computer but the above will future proof you and cover 99% of requirements.Are you having Sky multi-room? Or do you want to have one box showing to all TVs (same channel?)
How many rooms? You may need a central 'hub' location where your Broadband, CAT5 switch, TV distro, Sky distro is situated. loft is a favourite, or cupboard under stairs etc.
Cabling wise in brief.
Depending on your answers above. Four Sky feeds to the hub from dish location. TV aerial feed to hub + spare for radio.
Every TV point should have a twin Sky feed and an aerial (freeview) feed. Plus minimum 2x CAT5e with 4 x CAT5e at any 'prime' TV point.
toohuge said:
I am just a little curious.... why do people frequently recommend to run 4 cat 5e/6 points for a major television.... why so many? And not just run one or two and play a switch if necessary?
2 for carrying HD over HDMI (you need 2 with baluns), one for smart TV functions and one for future proofing or summit else.I have 3 Cat 6 to my TV outlets and they are all used!
I see... We have a different set up in our house... We don"t send HD video over the house, instead we have ethernet and local hosts that are the video sources for each screen. So our network demands usually call for 1 or 2 ethernet ports for each television (one for apple tv / blu ray player and 1 if necessary for the television) although none of our televisions are smart, we use others such as blu ray or apple tv etc.
I am moving away from HD matrices for a lot of my installs now.
Found some really good HDMI input, Freeview HD TV Channel out boxes that can then feed any number of tv's through the house.
So far, since finding them, I have installed 2x twin channel, 2x Single Channel and 1x 4 channel one.
Also as a heads up Samsung have been really struggling with their 4k Screens using HDMI Baluns, they launched a firmware fix this month which has been reported as working in the field.
V.
Found some really good HDMI input, Freeview HD TV Channel out boxes that can then feed any number of tv's through the house.
So far, since finding them, I have installed 2x twin channel, 2x Single Channel and 1x 4 channel one.
Also as a heads up Samsung have been really struggling with their 4k Screens using HDMI Baluns, they launched a firmware fix this month which has been reported as working in the field.
V.
toohuge said:
I am just a little curious.... why do people frequently recommend to run 4 cat 5e/6 points for a major television.... why so many? And not just run one or two and play a switch if necessary?
1. HD video (HDBaseT)2. Control (IR)
3. LAN (Ethernet)
4. Audio return (Analogue audio)
Only LAN is a network connection.
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