Buidling Our 3rd Theater (1 Viewer)

[drobbins]

This one will have a new house connected to it. First one destroyed by water. Second one we are currently using. My brother is buying this house, so we will build another. The new theater will be in the basement with a drop ceiling. I think I have the theater stuff down as much as our budget will allow. Still a few questions:

1. Do drop ceilings allow more or less sound upstairs?
2. I am still trying to figure out how to bolt my theater seating to the concrete floor. The floor will be carpeted and there is not enough room under my seats to drill for anchors.
3. Our "cable TV" & internet is provided through our phone co. The system uses a gateway in the living room. From there one line goes out for the internet and it allows for only 2 different TVs.
4. One is s-video
5. It will go primarily to the main TV.
6. I would like to also send it to the theater that is located underneath the living room about 15' away.

[*]The other is the old co-ax cable.

1. I will send it to 3 bedrooms and a den. (The kids can fight over the remote)

[*]I will also have an antenna in the attic.

1. I would like to send it to the main TV
2. And send it to the bedrooms for the FM radio.

[*]Is there a good system for all this, or am I asking too much?
[*]We will install an intercom system and a whole house vacuum system. Any other (not so expensive) cool ideas that should be built in during construction?[*]We rarely listen to radio, mostly mp3s on my computer. I would like to listen to music in many different rooms. Are most whole house audio systems controlled from a single place? Are there any inexpensive systems that are controlled from each room?[*]Currently our network is wireless. The wireless cards cost less than running the CAT5 and was easier to install in a finished house, but they have a slower speed. It always seems that phone jacks are in the wrong place. I am afraid that the network jacks would be also.

1. Should I run CAT5 for the network, or just rely on wireless?
2. If I just use the wireless router for the whole house, does it matter where it is located?
3. If I use a combination of wire/wireless it would probably be in the basement. Does that hurt the wireless performance?

[*]Anybody know of any good "Home Building" forums?The basement is poured and they will start framming on Tuesday.

Thanks, Dave

 

[drobbins]

No replies yet?
Did I type too fast for you to read?
Or too many questions?

Dave

 

[mylan]

Lots of information to digest, sorry this is the first time I have read your post. I can't address every issue but I will try to help with a few of your concerns.
Whole house audio: trust me on this, I have been through this: DO yourself a favor and explore a system like a Russound CAV6.6 with keypads for all zones you wish to install. Route Cat5 and CL3 rated speaker wire to a cental location, like the theater equipment cabinent. The Russound will provide for six zones and, I think, six sources. The controller is around $1,500 but the media server (for mp3) is going to be the costly item, the XM FM tuner isn't cheap either. This will give you the flexibility to listen to different things in different rooms or turn off zones you are not using. Couple this with an Uno 2 keypad and you will have a system that is easy for all family members to operate.
I'm not so sure I would bolt the seating to the floor, you will not have any flexibility to change the seating layout if needed, also, carpet over concrete is going to deaden bass response. Many here install a "false floor" using hardwoods or engineered flooring so that bass response will be better (for lack of a better word). I did not heed this advice and my current sub just dies in my basement theater. It will take a monster SVS to fix my situation.
I ran for a wired system but I am not utilizing it yet. I feel that a wired and wireless network would be the best solution because you will get the realibilty and speed of a wired and the flexibilty (there is that word again!) of a wireless. Think about where you will want jacks and how you will use the connections before beginning. I put one in the office, another behind the upstairs tv, one in the master bedroom, and one in the theater.
I.M.O. drywall or drop would have the same result, drop ceiling tiles are sound absorbing but you might get a rattle whenever someone opens a door or the theater is pushing some serious SPL's.
As far as the other questions I would suggest the sticky thread in this thread entitled "What I would have done different".

 

[chris_everett]

1. Drop ceilings won't help much with soundproofing, but they will help with accoustics.

2. Can you glue down some 2x4's and attach your seats to those? This also gives you a nice floating floor (it's what I did, and I like it)

3-5. The Russound system that mylan points out is the best deal I've seen for whole house audio. This is a complicated field, and can't be dealt with over a few internet posts very well.

6. I highly recommend running at least some wire, and supplamenting that with wireless.

 

[Shoottv]

Oh you are going to have so much fun. I did this about 5 years ago and have learned a lot. Mostly from the mistakes I made.

One of the best things I did was to install a routing closet. All AV in the house runs to one central location. In my case a 4x4' room. All Telco, Cable and internet runs to this location as does the whole house audio system. This has been invaluable in making changes to the system. I have regular 4 wire telco run to every room in the house and in the bedrooms have it on 2 walls. I also have RG6 run from that location to each room (some have 2 drops) each just have a connectors. on the end of the cable into the equipment room. You also want 3-4 separate AC circuits in here.

Now I would definitely run Cat 5 or better to each room.

One thing I learned is that when building a home wire is cheap and labor is expensive. I found that it was cheaper to run 2-cat5, 2-RG6 and 2-mated pair in a bundle was cheaper than having a separate phone video and audio lines run to each room. Electrician charged by the run regardless of what he was pulling.

Patch panels are also very helpful in keeping everything organized. I also have 4 junction panels in the house (mostly in closets) so that if I want to it makes it much easier to tap wires or run new ones.

If you are at all handy I would run your own telco and AV wire even if you have the electrical contractor terminate them. This is a 2 day project even if you run lots of wire and will save you a the price of a new projector.

My advice for your theatre room is to run 1 1/2 or 2 inch PVC for conduit that will allow you to pull new wires as they are introduced.

Look on line for the best deals in connectors, Terminators and cable. This stuff is easy to install but people are scared of it so the electricians make a killing on it. I did all my own low voltage wiring in a 4000 square foot home over one weekend. 2000 feet of the AV/Cat5/Audio bundle an additional 750' of RG6 and about 2000 feet of mated pair for audio and intercom. It took a pretty long weekend. I intalled the boxes and stubbed out the wires and the electrician terminated them and finished them as well. Including materials that I purchased on line I saved $2700 off the electrical contractor's bid. I also know the location of each wire and where they are run and terminated which allows me to change things with ease.

My thought was if I thought just maybe I might someday think about putting something in a room I ran the cable while the house was just studded out. I'm very glad I did.

Enjoy, JS

 

[drobbins]

Thanks for your replies

I don't expect the drop ceiling to do any soundproofing, I am wondering if more or less sound will get upstairs.

In my current theater, I built a floor over the concrete. I didn't think about the bass response with out one. I will add that to my plans.

I checked out the Russound CAV6.6 system. It looks like the ticket, but I don't think I can swing the estimated $650.00 per room. You know how it is, you paint a room and the wife wants to redecorate. Well we are building a house and all of a sudden we need all new furniture :frowning:. So we are both coming up with our wish lists and we will see what the budget says. The advantage that I have is, furniture can be added anytime, but the wires need to be installed now.

I decided to run the network wires along with the phone wires. So each room will have the network plug in the same plate as the phone. I will do all the labor depending on what the phone company will charge.

II like the idea of running all the wires to a routing location. This way it will be easier to change connections as needed. There is a corner in the middle of the basement that would be perfect for this. It also backs up to my equipment in the theater.
Besides the electronics & theater, I will also do all the insulating, lay the tile & hardwood floors, paint, whole house vacuum, install all the wood trim, landscaping, move an above ground pool and build the back deck.
Fun Fun Fun!!

Dave

 

[Shoottv]

I got my bundle cable from a company called TecNec http://tecnec.comwho supplies broadcast video cable. Because of my braodcast connections I was able to get a really good price (At the time I bought cable litterally by the mile). TecNec has very high quality cable that is well shielded for use in High RF environments like tv stations and sat trucks. The stuff I got was Beldon 7913. The main advantage to these cables is that they take abuse in the field but this is not a problem in an installation.

I have also purchased equipment and cable for the house from Smart Home http://smarthome.com who has excellent prices and service.Also check out their patch panels. I would suggest that you use them.

I'm the first to admit I'm not a cable snob but don't be deluded into thinking that cable is better just because it is more expensive. In my opinion any decently shielded cable properly installed and terminated will do the job. In 20+ years in broadcasting I have yet to see a gold plated oxygen free cable in any TV station. Most cheap cables fail at the connections not internally to the cable and once installed rarely fail at all.

 

[drobbins]

Thanks for the links. It looks like I will spend some time at the Smart Home web site.
Dave

 

[BruceSpielbauer]

The best forums for building home theaters is the one at the AVS forum and this one. The best for home building? I have visted a few, but none stuck out as all that terrific. Sorry. Hopefully someone else will help you on this one.