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Anonymous | I'm starting to build my house and would like to have speakers placed throughout my house (ie garage, master bedroom, master bath, kitchen, etc) wired to a single sound source. I need suggestions on wire types, speaker types, and things to beware of. I have an Onkyo HTS650 sound system. Should I hook up everything to that or is there something else I should hook the speakers up to. Any help or suggestions would be appreciated. |
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Derek | You need a profesional installer. Give Cedia a call or find a local high-end installer. You are going to need special multi-channel amps, lots of wiring, volume controls and multizone equipment. Let the pros advise you. They may roll in Satelite, data and other wiring services as well. Alternatively, most builders have intercom systems that they can build into every room that have radios and sometimes CD. Of cource this isn't high fidelity or stereo but you can get the cost of it rolled into your mortgage. Some builder will not let you install "other" wires while they are building your home. It threatens the Certificate of Occupancy inspection (and thier bottom line). Hope this helps. |
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Anonymous | I can't afford to hire professionals to do it. My builder has already ok'd me on wiring my surround speakers into the wall as well as putting these speakers in. I'll probably just get the wires in right now, I just want some ideas and things to be aware of before I put the wires in. |
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Derek | Do what's called a "Home Run". A Home Run is when you terminate all of the wires to one spot. Don't splice and daisy-chain wires together. You will loose independent control of a pair. I had done something like this with Data and phone in my house and the wireing guys spliced the phone and I made them redo it. Because it was home runned, I could make a data of phone line appear anywhere in the house my moving a patch cable. At your home run location, terminate your lines with binding posts. Second. Use architectural speaker wire. This type of wire is very thin and easy to use because the unsulator is very thin (paper-thin). The copper part is much thicker. It doesn't have that cool looking thick clear plastic jacket but hey it's in the wall so who's going to see it. You get a higher gauge wire and save money. Try www.partsexpress.com. They have all the stuff you are going to need. Hope this helps. |
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| You will need a speaker selector box with a protection circuit if you are connectiong more than one extra set of speakers to the front channels. Niles makes them with and without independant volume controll for each pair. Get it without if you would like to wire a volume controll into the walls at those locations. I understand that for longer than 50 foot runs you want to have at least 14 guage wire. I love this one, Monster cable and others make 2 channel cable with 4 conductors(2 pos and 2 neg) so 1 cable can be run for 2 speakers. the cable is a little thicker but inside a round sheeth which is pretty easy to pull. Niles also makes the 5-way binding post plates which make for clean looking walls. |
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superfecta | Couldn't he wire in a Radio shack speaker selector in every room he runs wire?That way he can get sound in every room ,but he has to turn it on and off every time he leaves the rooms.he can run it to the main reciever,but he has to make sure he has no more than one room "on" at any given time.Or he runs the risk of burning up the amp in the reciever due to the ohm load dropping too low. |
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Hawk | There is no way you can do what you are suggesting with the Onkyo. It doesn't have the power,and it couldn't handle the load of more than one room running at a time (the impedence load of the speakers would drop to a level that would fry that Onkyo). Since you are doing the wiring now, I would agree with Derek that you need to put in a junction box where everything terminates (I have this in my home). You would also need something that would be very tolerant of low impedence speaker loads (NAD or h/k), but that can be down the road. You only need to do the wiring now. However, Derek is wrong to suggest what he calls "architectural speaker wire" which is made to lay flat under carpet. Your are wiring in walls and have to have the wiring approved by a building inspector or your builder cannot finish the house and you cannot get an occupancy permit! Make sure you buy special "in-wall" speaker wire, or your building inspector will not approve your house at the framing stage. This is wire that had a second outer jacket and every building code in the country requires it for safety sake (less likely to have a wiring fire). And while this code requirement was put together for electrical wiring, not speaker wire, the building inspector will not care. He/she must certify that all wiring in the walls meets the building code. And don't go cheap on the wire. For long runs, 18 gauge will not do. Go at least 16 gauge, 14 gauge if possible. I haven't checked, but Parts Express should have this kind of wire. Good luck! |
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Hawk | I just double checked and I see that I misunderstood what Derek was saying. I guess I was confused by a local dealer who is selling flat speaker wire as "architectural wiring" but is only made to lay flat under carpet. In fact, Derek and I are talking about the same thing. Speaker wire that has a second thin jacket around the insulated wire. This is what building codes require. Some places call it architectural wire, some just call it In-wall wire. either way, it is the right product. Parts Express is currently featuring 16 gauge in wall wire in spools of 100', 500' and 1000'. Don't know how much you need, but the price is very good and should do the trick. |
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| Using a niles speaker selector in the main room you will be able to run more than one set at a time. When selecting more than 2 sets of speakers all you do is engage the protection circuit which limits the ohm load to 4 which Onkyo, Denon, Yamaha or most better brands will have no problem with. Now don't do this setup for loud listening in many rooms, only for backround music at lower to moderate levels. In order to keep from going back to the source every time put volume control knobs in rooms you want wired for sound and wire the speakers through them. Niles also makes these. If you do this right you will only have to do it once so don't skimp. Spend a little more. Use Monster Cable and Niles or other good brands. You will forget how much you paid in a year but 10 years down the road you will still be thanking yourself. |
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Hawk | Miguel: None of the brands of receivers you mentioned are approved for a 4 ohm speaker load! They may be "better brands", but they do not have the circuitry to play consistently into a real 4 ohm load. Check out the back panel and you will see that they will only play into a 6 ohm load, and then provided that you use the fronts outputs only! Only two companies that build receivers do that for less than $1K, and they are Harman/Kardon and NAD. |
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superfecta | Uhh,Glad to see I got a good unit...my panasonic is able to handle 4 ohm stereo loads.But actually many brands do,some better than others.That is for left and right channel...center and surrounds are usually rated for 6 ohms nominal. |
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Anonymous | How about using a Phoenix Gold SAM100 In-Wall Transformerless Speaker Distribution System? This is suppose to protect your receiver when using multiple speakers sets. I plan to use it in my house, I have most rooms wired for speakers, I just haven't had the money to buy the speakers and additional receivers. (I had my house wired for 3 zones with a total of 12 speaker pairs.) |
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Anonymous | Tell me more about this Phoenix gold SAM100. Where can I get it? What does it do? |
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Anonymous | This sites sells them and gives a little info about them. http://www.globalmart.com/page/s/sam_100.htm I never bought from this place so I am not endorsing them, just giving you a site where you can see info about the SAM-100. There is also a SAM-200 I think that can handle more pairs of speakers. I heard about them from a local audio dealer so you could try a local store in your area. Basically instead of using a speaker switch you would use this box and use the volume controls for turning on and off the speaker for each individual room/speaker location. Like I said in a earlier post, I haven't used one yet but was planning to as it seems to make sense for a way to regulate the load between speaker and receiver. |
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Anonymous | I have set up eight extra speakers. 2 sets I have run of the B speakers from the main reciever. through a multi speaker splitter with impedance protection They are small satelite speakers in other areas of the main living area - my house is very open. I purchased a cheap sherwood to run the other two sets of speakers which where in different rooms and lager speakers which worked well |
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Anonymous | "There is no success like excess." ---Oscar Wilde |
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Anonymous | I am looking at installing the Niles with volume control in every room. Do you run one twisted pair #14 to volume control; then two twisted pair out from volume control to each speaker (2)? Or do I need same amount of wire back to the receiver? |
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| In case you want to take the unconventional "FM Transmitter" wireless route: http://www.ccrane.com/fm-transmitter.asp Basically you plug the FM transmitter into the headphone jack of your main receiver, and it broadcasts whatever is playing (CD, etc) over the airwaves on an FM frequency. Then in your other rooms you just need a receiver and speakers with the tuner tuned to that particular FM frequency. Actually there would not be much advantage to doing this, since you will need an extra receiver in each room. As for fidelity, the quality will be FM quality. Then again, if you are doing it your way with long wire runs, the long wire will also degrade the quality, so it might be a toss up between the quality on a long wire run vs an FM broadcast. I just throw this solution into the mix because it is unorthodox, in case you like to experiment with radical approaches to problem solving. |