wiring my main room and need to run the right stuff

[chucksrt]

I am currently redoing my main listening room and i have it down to the studs. I am going to remote mount my equipment in another room about 20 feet away from my main listening/HT room. I want to make sure that I am running cable that will give me the best sound and that I can grow with. My current receiver is a Yamaha RX-V3000 but I am saving to go with a new receiver or do separate components. Are rca cables a bad idea for such a long run (30ft). I was looking at the svs subs or something along that line (maybe even DIY). Once this all goes back together i will not be able to modify it so I would like to cover my bases now. Thanks, Chuck

 

[Nestor]

Run conduit or some kind of accessible raceway if you can. Technology changes faster than most home renos.

 

[j_garcia]

Yes, RCA cable runs that long are a bad idea since analog video is more or less no longer included on equipment going forward. For audio, there would be no reason to run RCA cables anywhere else in the room except perhaps for the sub, since all the gear requiring analog should be in the same location. Run HDMI, CAT5 or CAT6 cable whether or not you need it now, and UL/CL rated wiring and you should be fine.

 

[chucksrt]

are rca cables ok for the subs when running them 30+ feet? I was thinking that I would run 10awg from my receiver to the mains and center speakers and just mount binding post directly to the wall so I can just plug my speakers into the post on the wall. I was planning on running a HDMI a pair of cat 5 cables and a wire for the remote target along with running a fiber optic cable, in case I move my HT system to the Basement then I will have the fiber to connect my fios set top box to a sound bar.

 

[j_garcia]

Sounds like a good plan except the wire. 12AWG will be sufficient for nearly all speakers; 10 is overkill IMO.

Speaker Wire

For the sub if you use RG6/RG59 and terminate with RCA, it should be fine as long as it is not run near any power. I had a friend do that in his remodel and he got hum and they had to separate the wires where the contractor had run them side by side for a ways. If you look at a sub and AVR or Pre/pro with XLR, that would make the long runs even less of a concern, though the gear choices then tend to be a bit more limited.

 

[chucksrt]

I didn't know that I could use RG6. NICE!!!! I was thinking about running XLR cables and leave them in the wall just in case.

 

[Nestor]

You can also send your audio over cat 5 cable with a pair of baluns. The unshielded twisted pairs (UTP) provides good noise rejection.