Sanity check before drywall goes in, did I forget anything?

[Doppel]

I'm drywalling as early as tomorrow a basement remodel and want to be sure I missed nothing related to wiring before I go ahead and cover it up.




Installed & labelled from cabinet:

- 8 runs of 16/2 gauge in-wall rated wire all well within 50 feet length http://www.southwire.com/products/InWallSpeakerWire.htm

- 2 X high-speed mediabridge HDMI cables. Will use HDMI switch in-cabinet later (have two cables in case one fails down the line)

- RG-6Q coaxial

- CAT6 to router, bringing network into cabinet

- CAT6 from cabinet to TV (not sure why, but it's cheap)




Anything else I should bother with? I don't really know what an IR sensor is but maybe I want one some day. All I have left for network cables is CAT5E at this point.




Thanks for any input you have!

 

[Fallen Kell]

Might want to run an extra cat5 or two from the closet. They can be used in all sorts of things, for instance, many IR repeaters can be run over cat5, or RS232 over cat5 (RS232 is used in many automation control systems).

 

[Drako]

No Romex-Southwire for power?

 

[velillen]

Like Fallen said, i would run an extra cat5 or even two to the tv area. Even if you just have the cable and dont hook it up just having it there is a good idea for the future.

Maybe run a Powerbridge like cable run to your tv area to the cabniet? That way you could have a UPS in the cabniet and have the tv run through it. Would just need to run the romex today, the rest oculd be added later

Only other thing i would have considered is running the hdmi cables through some tubing. That way you could replace the cables in a couple years pretty easily. (if needed of course)

Only other thing to consider owuld just be to double check you have everything run to where you want it. If theres nay chance you'd move the tv to a different wall or something i'd run cables now. or i fyou might go to a projector or something. basically just consider options while its easy to work

 

[Exterous]

+1 on the tubing. Also - check ever single wire you ran again to make sure it works

I think several IR repeaters use an RG6 cable with an RCA connector (At least my Hot Link Pro did) so if you run another one of those you can get the repeaters working if/when you buy one. Of course if you can run the tubing, pre-running the IR cable is not a big deal

Oh - I also found out the hard way that, if you are putting in a smoke detector and want it to be connected to the others, they need a 16/3 wire run

Do you ever want to expand your sound system? I have a 5.1 now but I ran wire for a 7.2 system

 

[Modelworks]

Don't forget to take pictures. I can't stress this enough. It might never come in handy but years from now you might be wanting to know where all the wires are in a wall and that will save you a lot of time.

 

[Doppel]

Yes, forgot a socket is already in the closet.

Don't forget to take pictures. I can't stress this enough. It might never come in handy but years from now you might be wanting to know where all the wires are in a wall and that will save you a lot of time.

+1! I took a ton of pics. I also took measurements of various studs I may want from reference points and wrote it on the stud before taking pics. I only want a 5.1 system but wired for 7.1 and will drywall over the last two, for later retrieval if I ever use them.

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Let me get this straight: For an IR Repeater the gist is that if I have the closet out of line of sight I can run a network cable between the closet and the repeater which is on the wall or somewhere easy to see and simply shoot all my remotes at that with signal carried over cat, then pumped back into the closet, irrespective of device, right? And then within the closet I put as many IR extenders as I want, which shoot the signal straight into the device's IR eye?

 

[Howard]

As the others said, did you install any conduit? Don't forget the lube.

 

[Doppel]

No conduit. I had thought of it, but the wall is such that I literally cannot run any (metal lally column coming up through middle of wall, but I can run wires around the side). The good thing is that I believe I could run more wiring between the TV and the closet possibly with no wall cutting, or at most one small cut. I cannot easily run the speaker wires after, though as they snake this way and that.

EDIT: I read that apparently the sub should run on coaxial instead of the 16 gauge, so I may run another one of those to make a sub line.

 

[Exterous]

Let me get this straight: For an IR Repeater the gist is that if I have the closet out of line of sight I can run a network cable between the closet and the repeater which is on the wall or somewhere easy to see and simply shoot all my remotes at that with signal carried over cat, then pumped back into the closet, irrespective of device, right? And then within the closet I put as many IR extenders as I want, which shoot the signal straight into the device's IR eye?

It depends a little on repeater. Some are much easier/cheaper to expand than others (for example - I don't think cables-to-go makes an IR repeater than can be ethernet extended) They repeater receiver (eye) will plug into a box. Typically you'll need to purchase an ethernet kit that goes between the recever and this box. At the box you will need power and this is where you plug in the repeaters for your devices. You can generally cover 4-8 devices with the base model repeater kits. Line the emitters up with the device eye and you are all set. Just point the remotes at whatever location you placed the recever at and have at it

Its generally very very easy to setup. It took the longest time for me to locate all the device eyes and even that was only about 5 minutes of work

 

[velillen]

Yes, forgot a socket is already in the closet.+1! I took a ton of pics. I also took measurements of various studs I may want from reference points and wrote it on the stud before taking pics. I only want a 5.1 system but wired for 7.1 and will drywall over the last two, for later retrieval if I ever use them.

Definitely take pictures. And also lable everything...even on the pictures. Lable the ends of the cables as well. My dad when they had their house took pictures of the wiring in the basement. It was great if you needed to ever replace a run or something since you knew where it went. but none of the wires were labled so we had 2 boxes with 2 cables each and had to just hook them up and test to see where they went lol.

EDIT: I read that apparently the sub should run on coaxial instead of the 16 gauge, so I may run another one of those to make a sub line.

RCA cable yes. But i would also run a normal speaker wire to the location as well. i would also have a wall plate at the spot too. in fact you could get a RCA keystone jack and 2 speaker wire keystones have have them all on one wall plate (with a blank in one spot). That way you can buy another rca cable to meet your needs for subwoofer placement and not have to worry about how much you have in the wall.

You probably wont use the speaker wire as most recievers have an LFE channel these days and most commercial subs are rca. But just in case you ever build your own sub or buy a higher end model that needs a larger power supply or something. Just another one of those might as well do it now rather than later things.

 

[Tiamat]

check each of the cables to make sure none of them are defective. It would be such a bummer to finish painting and drywalling only to find out one of the hdmi is funked out. Without having conduit to run the hdmi through, replacing a defective cable is going to be painful.

 

[Doppel]

I labelled like a mother. Checking cables for functionality is a great idea, but for whatever reason I simply didn't bother to do it on anything but the ethernet. I don't think speaker wires could ever really fail or coax unless cut. Hopefully the HDMI is ok but I have two just in case

Ended up getting drywalled over today, and I did run the extra rca for sub.

 

[Tiamat]

I labelled like a mother. Checking cables for functionality is a great idea, but for whatever reason I simply didn't bother to do it on anything but the ethernet. I don't think speaker wires could ever really fail or coax unless cut. Hopefully the HDMI is ok but I have two just in case

Ended up getting drywalled over today, and I did run the extra rca for sub.

hdmi is what i'd be worried about. Some of them can be delicate, you step on them the wrong way, they hate you. Other times, of course, luck is on your side and absolutely nothing wrong occurs. Speaker wires should be fine unless you ran a staple through them by accident.

 

[brotj7]

Use the extra deep PVC electrical boxes. Pull the speaker wire in through the top and push the tip a few extra inches back out the bottom(or vice versa). Keep the cables as flat to the back of the box as possible and stuff a small rag in the back to protect it. Then use a short plunge router bit when cutting the boxes in the sheetrock.

I was at work when the front wall got sheetrocked, and they hit wires in 4/5 boxes in the front of our theatre. I had 9" leads with the shorter depth boxes that will barely reach the jack now. Luckily I ran 2 cables to all positions.