New construction

[cop9980]

I have read for weeks about all the different HA systems and for my budget it seems that upb or instenon would be a major up grade to x10 that I tried in the last house I built. I don't have the funds for hai or c4. But Need help deciding what to get started with my structured wiring. I know to run cat5e and rg6 at least to every room and anywhere else that I can think of but into what kind of central box? The house is being framed right now....please help!
P.S. I don't think I need to pre wire for an alarm but do I still need an elk one or similar base command system...

 

[WayneW]

Welcome to CT. I would start here: http://www.cocoontech.com/wiki/Wiring_Your_New_House_101

 

[Neurorad]

Wiring Your New House 102 and 103 are also excellent, links on the 101 page.

This is an oldie but goodie http://www.swhowto.com/

 

[cop9980]

I'm still not sure what kind of panel boxes I need to put in. Or will that depend on what system I go with

 

[apostolakisl]

I highly recommend running conduit. It is cheaper than running every wire you think you might ever need to every location you think you might ever need. Plus, as is always the case, in a couple of years there will be something different. It is possible that the world may go totally wireless, but it seems to me that no matter how good wireless is, wires will always be faster, more reliable, and cheaper.

The gray conduit at home depot that comes in 10 foot secitons cost maybe 20 cents per foot. If you heat it up a little it gets very flexible and you can curve it all over the place without the expensvie flex stuff. Just run conduit from any location you think you might want something to the nearest attic/basement/crawlspace/or other similar location. You can then put single gang boxes that the conduit terminates to, or switch your 110 outlet boxes to double gangs with the little divider piece for the low/high voltage separation (that is what I did).

You can also just let the conduit end at various locations around the house without using any box. Just be sure to keep careful records on where they all are so you can pop a hole in the wall later. And for goodness sake, take a million piectures of every single wall, ceiling, or other location in your house before the drywall goes up. I mean take like 200 pictures. You can't have too many.

Make 100% sure you don't want to ever have an alarm system before you choose not to prewire it. It is sooooo much easier to do in the rough in stage.

I am a little confused by some of your comments about needing an Elk. If you don't plan on an alarm, you don't need an elk. Yes, elk is a home automation controller, but it is first and foremost an alarm system. If you were to go with Insteon, you should consider an ISY unit as your command central. That is what I have. There are other home automation command centers that are good, most run on a pc. I really like the ISY becuase it is a tiny little unit that never crashes, never needsreboots, and never gets any of the other myriad of pc based problems. It just keeps working while using practically no electricity.

 

[sic0048]

The house is being framed right now....please help!
P.S. I don't think I need to pre wire for an alarm but do I still need an elk one or similar base command system...

You actually need to wire for alarm and all other potential uses right now while the house is being framed. It really doesn't matter if you think you want an alarm or not. For $200 or less, you could wire the entire house for an alarm system. Wireless alarm contacts are $50 each. So if you don't wire now and decide you want an alarm at some point in the future - you'll spend about 10 times as much money.

I'd recommend that you read the Wire Your New House 101, 102 and 103 guides. Then sit down with a set of plans (even if it is just a crude drawing) and think about where you want wire run. If you only run cat5e and coaxial cable you are going to be disappointed in the future when you realize you haven't run enough wire - especially since you hope to add some automation feature in the future. Cat5e and RG-6 is the bare minimum for people who don't want automation.

I'm not trying to rain on your parade, but hopefully spur you on to some more careful wire planning. Wire is relatively cheap and certainly easy to run while the house is being framed. But you don't have a lot of time to waste.

It is better to run too much wire than not enough. Just keep that in mind as you do this. Always run 2x as much as you think you might use.

 

[apostolakisl]

The house is being framed right now....please help!
P.S. I don't think I need to pre wire for an alarm but do I still need an elk one or similar base command system...

You actually need to wire for alarm and all other potential uses right now while the house is being framed. It really doesn't matter if you think you want an alarm or not. For $200 or less, you could wire the entire house for an alarm system. Wireless alarm contacts are $50 each. So if you don't wire now and decide you want an alarm at some point in the future - you'll spend about 10 times as much money.

I'd recommend that you read the Wire Your New House 101, 102 and 103 guides. Then sit down with a set of plans (even if it is just a crude drawing) and think about where you want wire run. If you only run cat5e and coaxial cable you are going to be disappointed in the future when you realize you haven't run enough wire - especially since you hope to add some automation feature in the future. Cat5e and RG-6 is the bare minimum for people who don't want automation.

I'm not trying to rain on your parade, but hopefully spur you on to some more careful wire planning. Wire is relatively cheap and certainly easy to run while the house is being framed. But you don't have a lot of time to waste.

It is better to run too much wire than not enough. Just keep that in mind as you do this. Always run 2x as much as you think you might use.

I so agree with prewiring the alarm. Even if you just run the wires and leave them hidden behind the door and window moldings. If you want the alarm later you can drill a hole in the frame of the door/window and fish the wire out, or worse case pull the molding off. Again, I can't stress enough the importance of good photography just before the drywall goes up.

 

[cop9980]

Thanks for all the help and info everyone. I will pre - wire for the alarm for future use for sure. would I be correct in thinking I shuld run multiple runs of cat 5 anf rg6 to each room for ha. As well as to anywhere a keypad might go for a panel?

 

[sic0048]

I think that is a safe bet. It seems that cat5e/cat6 etc is going to be with us for a long time. It might eventually be replaced by fiber or some other future technology, but that is still a long way off.

Also, with all the different baluns being produced for cat5e wire, you can use it to distribute a great variety of things. So I would consider it a great "catch all" for any wiring scheme.

That being said, good quality baluns are generally more expensive than simply running the correct type of wire in the first place. So if you know you are going to want to distribute component video around the house immediately, then I would suggest running enough precision coaxial cable to each TV location and equipment location instead of using a couple cat5e wires and baluns. (I would still suggest running cat5e for the future as well). So you might want to run 5 or 6 precision coaxial wires, 2 RG-6 and 3-4 cat5e wires to each TV location. If you plan on having any video/audio devices at that location (like a VD player), then add more precision coaxial and cat5e wires, etc, etc, etc.

But if you don't plan on distributing component video, then you don't have to run it. But I would run at least 2 cat5e wires to use to distribute it in the future. So I would run 2 RG-6 and 5-6 cat5e wires instead, etc, etc, etc.

Hopefully that makes sense. Of course this is all just my opinion. You'll have to plan out what you think your needs will be. Unfortunately there is no "standard answer" that works for everyone. Well, perhaps "Run more wire than you think", but that doesn't really help.

 

[apostolakisl]

I think that is a safe bet. It seems that cat5e/cat6 etc is going to be with us for a long time. It might eventually be replaced by fiber or some other future technology, but that is still a long way off.

Also, with all the different baluns being produced for cat5e wire, you can use it to distribute a great variety of things. So I would consider it a great "catch all" for any wiring scheme.

That being said, good quality baluns are generally more expensive than simply running the correct type of wire in the first place. So if you know you are going to want to distribute component video around the house immediately, then I would suggest running enough precision coaxial cable to each TV location and equipment location instead of using a couple cat5e wires and baluns. (I would still suggest running cat5e for the future as well). So you might want to run 5 or 6 precision coaxial wires, 2 RG-6 and 3-4 cat5e wires to each TV location. If you plan on having any video/audio devices at that location (like a VD player), then add more precision coaxial and cat5e wires, etc, etc, etc.

But if you don't plan on distributing component video, then you don't have to run it. But I would run at least 2 cat5e wires to use to distribute it in the future. So I would run 2 RG-6 and 5-6 cat5e wires instead, etc, etc, etc.

Hopefully that makes sense. Of course this is all just my opinion. You'll have to plan out what you think your needs will be. Unfortunately there is no "standard answer" that works for everyone. Well, perhaps "Run more wire than you think", but that doesn't really help.

Again, I think you should consider conduit. When you add up the cost and work involved in pulling 4 and 5 wires to all of those locations it gets to be measured in dollars per feet, not pennies. And you will in all likelihood use less than 10% of the wires you installed.

I pulled tons of conduit in my house. I put no wires in the conduit until after construction was complete. I pulled only the exact wires I need to the exact locations I need and don't have to worry about needing more wires or different wires in the future.

I also used some left over pieces of the big fat central vac pipe to run between tech heavy areas and ran two of those from the attic to outside for running low voltage control wires to lighting/sprinklers/other stuff I might think of in future.

Any room with attic above is easy to do this with. You just run the conduit up the wall and into the attic. Same holds true for crawl space or unfinished basement below a room. And run a few large bore pieces from a crawlspace area to attic area. Or from one control closet to another.

I promise that this will cost less and you will not curse when you are that one extra coax or cat 5 wire short. There is going to be stuff you didn't consider.

And the last benefit, you don't have to worry about the trades getting in there and trashing your wires, because there won't be any wires until they have all finished and you are about to move in.

 

[pete_c]

Personally I would do both; run as much cable as possible and also put conduit where you might want to add more in the future.

The more you can do with no walls up the better.