I am buying a house that is prewired for a whole house a/v system. All the speaker wires, coax, and some cat5 are run from speaker or tv locations back to an a/v closet under the stairs. There are 38 speakers downstairs/outside. There are another 16 or so upstairs. The speakers would be in 9-10 zones. 12 max. There are about 6-8 tv locations that will be used. There are other aspects of the house that need to be finished first so the a/v isn't a priority. However if I could get the system up and running for a budget friendly price, I would like to do so. I am looking for suggestions for descent bang-for-the-buck components, receivers, speakers, IR repeaters, etc. whatever I need to get this running. Any suggestions are much appreciated.
Help selecting whole house A/V components
- Thread starter Jeremian
- Start date
For the in ceiling speakers, I tried the Monoprice 8" and really didn't like them. I felt like it was raining sound in a cone underneath the speaker. To me they sounded better at a high and unbearable volume. However, I did kind of like the budget Micca speakers from Amazon. I used a few 6" in the guest bedrooms and felt they were similarly priced ($30 or so for a 6" pair) and had a bit fuller sound. Perhaps the size has something to do with it. My preference (depending on how your house is wired) is for in wall speakers.
My new thing is to add subzones to my existing whole house audio system. I use a volume controller capable of IR distribution, I like the Niles EVC or Elan VSE series. It needs a CAT5 run to the same location for IR. I connect all of them in one spot near my other hardware and reserve a zone on amp for all subzones. Turning it on turns on the subzone and remote control commands can be programmed. I plan on using it for TV and such, but have been to cheap to find a universal remote. I believe I can also turn send IR commands back to the volume controllers but I didn't want to parse out 8 subzones of IR commands.
My new thing is to add subzones to my existing whole house audio system. I use a volume controller capable of IR distribution, I like the Niles EVC or Elan VSE series. It needs a CAT5 run to the same location for IR. I connect all of them in one spot near my other hardware and reserve a zone on amp for all subzones. Turning it on turns on the subzone and remote control commands can be programmed. I plan on using it for TV and such, but have been to cheap to find a universal remote. I believe I can also turn send IR commands back to the volume controllers but I didn't want to parse out 8 subzones of IR commands.
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