Building a New House: Wiring Questions

keefer37 · 05-04-2006, 12:43 PM

So we're building a new house here in NC. We've got three DirecTiVos (2 SD and 1 HD). We also have cable Internet. We're doing paperwork tonight to finalize options, etc. including extra outlets.

Those of you who have had homes built and have both DirecTV/Cable Internet, how did you work it out with them?

We basically get two rooms pre-wired with coax. But in all we would need three rooms with two coax (living room really should have 3 counting the OTA antenna). Plus, we need a seperate line for the RoadRunner. How do I work this out with the builder, etc.?

bigpuma · 05-04-2006, 12:58 PM

We just went through the same process. The base option for my house was to have 4 wires from the dish location and one from the cable co. to a wiring closet in the master bedroom then 1 coax and 1 ethernet to each room. I had them run 4 coax to the closet under the stairs where I will place all of the home theatre equipment for the living room plus 2 coax to the master bedroom and left 1 to each additional bedroom. The kids will just have to suffer.

When we sat down with the "designer" they had a list of options with prices. Going by memory they charged roughly $75 per additional coax, cat-5, or power outlet. We also added a separate circuit to the power outlet where our HT equipment will be.

Before you go into your meeting think about what wires you will need above their base option. You will want to have 4 RG6 runs from where you think the dish will be to a central location, then have all the coax runs to the rest of the house come out of there. If the base price only has 2 coax they might just split them from the cable co. entrance. Make sure they change that to the central location and run one coax from the cable line to that central location.

keefer37 · 05-04-2006, 01:07 PM

Hmm, I'm not sure where our central location would be in this house and if I'd do first or second floor. The four lines you use from the proposed dish spot to the central location are all going to feed into a multiswitch and then does the DirecTV installer worry about sending the 7 lines (6 for sat, one for OTA)?

SteveGardiner · 05-04-2006, 01:18 PM

Here's my two cents: You can't have too much wire!

ayrton911 · 05-04-2006, 02:09 PM

I agree. I personally would need 5 coax to each room with a television plus two cat-5. And that would be to simply meet what I need now, not the future.

Paul F. · 05-04-2006, 02:19 PM

Wire the ever loving S*** out of that house!

No one in history has ever complained "Geez.. I wish I had one less phone/power/coax/ethernet line in here!".

If it was me, I'd have the builder running structured wiring with phone, multiple coax, multiple Cat5e or Cat6 ethernet, and speaker wires to more than one wall in each room, and run them all to a central panel in the basement or in a closet.

Spend a couple grand extra NOW, and avoid having to drill holes and fish new wires up and down through walls LATER.
I've done my time under my house, in my attic, stapling up wires, drilling holes, and trying to hide lines under baseboards...
Trust me, Run five times the number and type of wires you think you'll EVER use!

Paul F.

GusMan · 05-04-2006, 02:22 PM

My builder let me run extra cables myself before they put the drywall up. While I wish I put more Cat5 in, I did put ample coax in and ran everything to one central location. Worked out great. Made hook up of my dish and network a snap!

grecorj · 05-04-2006, 02:35 PM

Remind your builder that running 1 line to a room is just as easy as running 2 or 4 or 8 pre-drywall.

I'd take a copy of plans and mark that up to see where I initially would want stuff. For instance, where I was putting my entertainment center in the family room I doubled up on the outlets. They also used these cool customizable faceplates to put say 2 coax/1 phone line on one plate. Looks nice.

1 suggestion -- run some conduit to each location you're running coax/cat5. Lets you easily snake in extra after the walls are up. My electrician ran one conduit from the basement to the attic so if I go HD one day I can run the lines from the dish to the multiswitch in the basement.

cowboys2002 · 05-04-2006, 02:43 PM

Glad I came across this thread.

I am looking to move into a larger home soon. Trying to decide to buy a pre-existing home or build on. Price wise, the costs are similar, but I would prefer to have all the wiring in before the walls are up. This allows "me" to dictate where the wiring goes and not somebody who wasn't a gadget freak like me!!

rlj5242 · 05-04-2006, 02:46 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by GusMan

My builder let me run extra cables myself before they put the drywall up.

I explained to my electrical sub-contractor how I wanted the house wired for DirecTV and channel modulators. After a few seconds of a blank stare, he said "Just mark the locations that you want a drop and I'll drill the holes through the top plate. " I spent a weekend pulling around 1,000 feet of RG-6. After moving a few pieces of equipment around, I now have to go back in the attic and run another 750ft of RG-59. At least I have access to almost all of my top plates for wall drops.

-Robert

Fahtrim · 05-04-2006, 02:50 PM

Why run RG-59 at all? Just do rg-6, IMHO. What am I missing.

Aquatic · 05-04-2006, 03:05 PM

Check your plans. Is there any area (read: Closet) that might make a workable central or semi-central location to HOME RUN all the wires too? Pick that as your wiring closet.

From there, it's your call. FWIW I would guess my best as to where the DTV dish will be located ( You know the drill--S exposure, no blockage from roof lines, trees, neighbors,etc)
and have them pull 5 or 6 runs from that point to the central point. Leave plenty of extra in the wire too...at least another 20' a line. you can cut it, but splices are ugly.

Okay. From the central point. at least 2 Cat 5e/6 from the central point to each room. then think about the "single" runs.. perhaps where to locate an Wireless access point, etc.

The CATV wire will enter the house at the service entrance (where the power and phone will come in).... SO....make sure the plan shows CATV AND phone up to the central closet as well. I'd ask for 2 of each if you want, just for general redundancy purposes.

Other CATV wires.... Well. do you want to co-locate the DTV (or cable) tuners in each room? Then at least 2 CATV and 1 Cat 5e/6 for each receiver (assuming dual tuner).

If you want to spend some $$$, you can go with the Video/Audio distribution route. then you need only 1 catv run per receiver, and one Cat 5e/6 run (for IR remote control) OR whatever the distribution system requires/recommends. That way you stack the receivers up in the central closet and control it all via IR.

BEWARE if you do the distribution thing. It's not cheap. Stereo RF modulators are pricey, and ya need one for each receiver.....

I use both kinds of things.. Video distribution for the Standard PVRs and have the HD PVR colocated with the plasma screen. There's 4 coax coming down there--2 for the HD, 1 for the Distro PVRs and 1 for OTA antenna. 2 Cat 5s too.. 1 for phone and 1 for an Access point.

Easy to spend your money huh? $75/drop ain't cheap, but worth it in the long run I think. I skimped a bit on mine and wired the rest that I needed myself, but my house is EASY for that kind of thing.. big open attic and pretty easy access to the interior walls for putting the drops in.

Good Luck!

staci · 05-04-2006, 03:17 PM

Everyone has given you great advice, but I would go 1 better.

Run 2-1" flexible conduits from your mechanical room (hub) to each room. 100' coils of plastic flex are cheap. You could even do this yourself before the sheetrock is up. Terminate these flex's at a mud ring behind a blank plate in every room.

I would run these 2 flexs to opposite sides of the room, as you never know where furniture will be placed in the future. Having these flexs already in the wall will give you the option in the future to pull in what ever you need for future.

1" flex will be plenty for what ever youll need. When ever you pull in something also pull in a pull line for future pulls. Next time you attach your cable to that pull line, make the pull with the new cable along with a new pull line for future.

This will give you the ablity to expand for many years and future technology

S and K

bigpuma · 05-04-2006, 03:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by keefer37

Hmm, I'm not sure where our central location would be in this house and if I'd do first or second floor. The four lines you use from the proposed dish spot to the central location are all going to feed into a multiswitch and then does the DirecTV installer worry about sending the 7 lines (6 for sat, one for OTA)?

As others have mentioned the central wiring location could be in a bedroom closet. Ours will be in the Master Bedroom closet on the 2nd floor. I didn't worry about OTA because of our distance to the closest antennas. So you will need an extra coax from your antenna to the wiring closet and then an extra coax to each room where you want OTA. Today you can get away with diplexers but with the new 5LNB dish diplexers won't work and OTA will need it's own cable. Also your cable internet will need it's own line to whichever room you will install it in.

As others have said you can't overwire.

bigpuma · 05-04-2006, 03:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Paul F.

No one in history has ever complained "Geez.. I wish I had one less phone/power/coax/ethernet line in here!".

Well sure, but I bet a lot of people have said they wished they had their several thousands of dollars back.

HDTVsportsfan · 05-04-2006, 03:20 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by keefer37

and then does the DirecTV installer worry about sending the 7 lines (6 for sat, one for OTA)?

I wouldn't count on it. That may depend on the installer. You would have to have him come out before the sheet rock goes up and then come out a second time to install the dish. It may not end up being the same installer etc. Your builder may not allow that for many reasons. Some valid, some maybe not. If you don't do it yourself it would probably be easier (scheduling wise) to have the electrical sub do it.

IMHO. Good luck.

sloan · 05-04-2006, 03:22 PM

While I can't stand the daHeels, I'll try to help you out anyways.

One small tidbit...

If the house is big, and you're going to run wireless (for all those laptops you have) you may want to run a ethernet and power to the most central place your house has.
the "from" being where you going to have your router.

If you have your router in the basement (for example)....if you run wireless from there, you might not get the second story.

With the single ethernet cable to the central / central location, you could actually turn off wireless in the basement, and put a "access point" at the central location.
(or run them both..with different ssid's)

Or

Run an extra ethernet cable to anywhere you want an extra access point.

The point being, think about whether or not 1 wireless router can do the job. Ususually it can, but sometimes it can't. 50ft of ethernet to the central location could save some trouble down the road.

..

If you can do any of it yourself... wire , wire , more wire.
Ethernet, Cable, and Speaker.

..

HDTVsportsfan · 05-04-2006, 03:24 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by staci

Run 2-1" flexible conduits from your mechanical room (hub) to each room. 100' coils of plastic flex are cheap.

We call it "smurf tubing" simply because it's usually blue in color. Yea, I know it's a stupid nickname.
However, that is a very good approach.

Paul F. · 05-04-2006, 03:46 PM

<Well sure, but I bet a lot of people have said they
<wished they had their several thousands of dollars back

Trust me... spend 4 days in attic crawlspaces, at 110 degrees, trying to fish Cat5e line down through sill plates through insulation, and that couple thousand bucks is going to seem like a freakin' bargain!

Paul F.

rlj5242 · 05-04-2006, 05:59 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fahtrim

Why run RG-59 at all? Just do rg-6, IMHO. What am I missing.

Solid copper center conductor. I'm using it for component video/analog audio. Also, it's a lot smaller diameter. Makes it easier to put 15 cables in each wall.

-Robert

SeattleCarl · 05-04-2006, 06:31 PM

Keep in mind D* now specifies solid copper center conductor RG6 for new HD installs with the AT9 dish. So, for new construction I would go ahead and spec the solid copper RG6 anyplace you are running RG6.

Also, if you are relatively close to any commercial broadcast facility, you might consider quad shield. For most installations it's over kill but if you've got a 50KW TV transmitter within a mile or three, it can make a huge difference.

Carl