Elan has a solution as well.

[Link: elanhomesystems.com]

Stew

Your explaination makes the most sense to me. Music where you want it. My friend's house of double cat5, double rg6, etc in every room sounds way over board.

From teknobeam1 and katahdin's posts, it sound like were still aways away from lots of solutions for distributed component video. With no mention of DVI or HMDI (?) distribution.

If I were building a house, I think I'd stick conduit to every room. That way you can future proof, if there is such a beast, your infrastructure. I'd also wire up the rooms for audio. At least the ones I really cared about. I'm not sure I need audio in the powder rooms. Of course, one super bowl party can change that thought.

For my current home, distributed audio to the dining room and the deck is enough for the moment. I'm sure the kids will not want to listen to the same music as mom and dad. Separate components in the family room and future HT in the basement should fit the bill. Shuffling the old stuff to the garage will answer that call. No the kids will not get video in their rooms. My son would watch it 24 X 7. Wireless networking for the PC should handle that end.

The interesting thing about wiring a new home "for the future" is that the future is here. If you consider the recommendations of CEA's Tech Home Division, you would run to every room two CAT5E and two RG6. This is considered the medium level of structured wiring. If you wish to share any source, audio or video, from one room to another, even this is not enough. So now we consider running smurf tube to every room. Are you going to run it to the same location as the wall plates that terminate your structured wiring? If you are running it to an outside wall in Florida, you will find that the largest tube you can fit in the outside wall is 3/4" tubing. It would work fine to run an extra CAT5 or speaker wire, but it would never allow many of the current cables we use and their larger termination ends.

I guess my point here is that many of us already distribute video and audio in our homes with a simple splitter in our attic pushing cable to jacks throughout our homes. The difference is that our sources are offering much better quality in both sound and picture and our speakers and television monifors and computers placed throughout our living space can take advantage of them. In my opinion, communication options will be ever increasing and not even the poorest Americans will be without distributed audio and VIDEO.

Sonance makes a 8x8 video matrix that does component via cat5. 9800 for all 8 locationss.

ive almost abandoned the dual cat5/rg6 structure approach. wire what you need and have plenty of 1" carlon pipe from each location to the crawl. 2" at the network box and a few from crawl to attic. same basic cost but allows for many different future configs.

Why are smurf tube pefered to traditional hard wall tubes? I'm assuming:

Less cost (less labor and fewer connectors)
Easier to install
Easier to pull wire through in the future (fewer connector so smoother curves)

No


Yes


Yes - less connectos are smoother bends

Why distributed audio??
Ever have a dinner party and want to play the same music throughout the home and outdoor areas?? Hope you like the radio....
You won't be listening to CDs unless you have several burned copies of each disc you want to play and you are exceptionally talented with syncing your mini-systems

OK, now why you would want multi-zone distributed audio...
Similare scenario except there's a sporting event (superbowl, olympics, world series, etc.) and the men gather in the media room to watch the event and the women gather in another area and couldn't care less. They guys can have the sporting event audio piped into the adjoining areas like the bar and maybe the closest bathroom so nobody misses out on the action. At the same time, the ladies are listening to the CD changer or music server in the other areas of the house simultaneously, and at different volumes room by room.

Another advantage...
All of your media can reside in a central location. When you want to listen to your old Eric Clapton CD, you don't have to search high and low in every room just to find it a few weeks later in the boombox in the garage where you left it when you waxed the car.

About distributed video:
As far as distributing S-Video, Component, RGBHV, etc... skip the baluns except to bail yourself out of a jam and use mini-coax penta cables and terminate them to a control friendly matrix switcher.
Extron, Altinex, Kramer, RGB Systems, etc. make several varieties and now companies like Key Digital and Audio Authority make more basic versions that will suit the needs of the residential system.
If you treat the system designed for today's need seperate from the "future proof" aspect of the cabling, you will be fine. Don't count on using all of those coaxes and CAT wires today, or you won't have anything left to expand with tomorrow.