New house, need help with wiring.

[darien87]

Hey folks,

The wife and I just put money down on a house that hasn't been built yet. We haven't been to the design center to pick out our upgrades, but we don't have much extra money. So I am assuming that we won't be able to afford having KB wire the great room for home theater. I think all I will need is to run speaker wire from the front of the room to the back of the room. I have speakers and an extra 2 channel amp so that I can do 7.1 if I want, but I haven't decided if I'm going to go that route or not. Certainly if I do 5.1 I only need to run 2 speaker wires.

If I can't have KB wire the room, what are my options? I have heard that there are types of molding that are hollow that you can run wires behind. But the problem with that is if I mount my surrounds on the wall, I'll still have to run a wire up the side of the wall and that will probably be ugly.

What should I do?

 

[jostenmeat]

I am not qualified to talk about this stuff, but what I will say is that Monoprice inwall speaker wire in bulk is super cheap. Like, even as 12 AWG, 250 ft is only $60. I say throw it all up there, just in case. Smarter people would tell you to run conduit in the walls, so that you won't have to tear anything down. I mean, remember component cables? They are going to be outlawed by HDMI/HDCP regs? Will they have 5 years from now, some new and improved HDMI 2.6 cable that can handle 2x 1080/60 streams for 3D? What is KB wire? I vote for doing as much as you can right now.

 

[Weasel9992]

Conduit is your friend. Figure out what you need as a minimum, then double it...terminate with whatever size box is appropriate. That way, you'll be able to get from here to there later on without tearing the walls apart to do it. Also very convenient when you have to replace a cable for whatever reason.

Frank

 

[Bryce_H]

I prewired a TON and ran conduit (2.5" - wish I went 3"). Don't forget about the ceiling for a potential front projector system. If you go through a lot of my old posts they are about the physical construction of a dedicated home theater (not gear). I also suggest you read front to back the this thread over at Home Theater Forums