# DIY, hide your equipment!



## Dustin07

Just thought I'd contribute to this section.

My wife and I mounted our plasma on the wall with some brackets we designed. they were horrible though, so just buy the nice ones at the store 

however, the DIY part... we ran the cabling through the wall into a closet that is exactly on the opposite side of the wall. There we have the:

Tivo
Dish Receiver
Audio Reciever (HT/SS)
DVD Player

We purchased a RF remote from www.smarthome.com and now we have all of our electronics in this room HIDDEN from site and can control them from any room in our house. I fell in love with the product so much that I actually called them up and became a distributor myself  .

next, we mounted a small shelf directly under the tv and put the gamecub on that. Wireless controllers was the next step. 

so from our couch you see only the wall mounted tv. wall mounted surround speakers (sub woofer is hidden) and wall mounted game cube, which doesn't require the use of all the extra wires to use 

just thought I'd share a little tip and DIY from our home theater to yours. I'll try to take some pics tonight to post.

Dustin


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## jestersma

can't wait to see pics! sounds awesome


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## Sauna

Wow thats going to be amazing, lucky you.
The sound quality will be awesome and the visuals... well yes I think we are going to need photos to believe this


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## Dustin07

Hmm... I forgot about this. I'll try to take pictures this weekend


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## autnur

Hi everyone. we just put up our home theater system. we had it up before then took it down to do over the room. we have older Boston Acoustic speakers, woofer, center etc. bought a new reciever (digital) instead of dolby prologic and got an upgrade dvd/cd player. OK  so everything is working dvd stereo but no sound from tv into ss speakers only sound from tv speakers. we shut the speakers off on the tv thru the audio controll on tv remote. tried with them on and off no change. The tv is older ? 10-12 years. nice tv 35" all the hookup places on the back that shows in the instruction manuals. Had all this hooked up to it before and worked. only change was upgrade of dvd and reciever. Please someone help!!! My husband is:furious: . THanks


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## Dustin07

LOL, I don't think this is something we can really troubleshoot without seeing your setup. There's lots of things it could be. 
First thing I'd check though is that your speakers are selected on your receiver. A lot of recievers have "speakers A" and "speakes B". It's easy to accidentally have both turned off.

good luck...


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## smallcrpt

*hhmm*

some tv's allow you to turn off the on-set speakers and send audio only through audio out on the back of the TV, either a spdif/dig coax or through a left and right channel rca's. check to make sure its going out of that. if your TV doesn't have audio output and its coming from a STB,set top box, from your cable/sat. provider, just take the video into the TV for say, Vid. 1 and route the cable boxes audio output into the back of the receiver and make sure you put them in the corresponding input on the receiver.. 
GL
-chris


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## Soundbroker

Dustin07 said:


> Just thought I'd contribute to this section.
> 
> My wife and I mounted our plasma on the wall with some brackets we designed. they were horrible though, so just buy the nice ones at the store
> 
> however, the DIY part... we ran the cabling through the wall into a closet that is exactly on the opposite side of the wall. There we have the:
> 
> Tivo
> Dish Receiver
> Audio Reciever (HT/SS)
> DVD Player
> 
> We purchased a RF remote from www.smarthome.com and now we have all of our electronics in this room HIDDEN from site and can control them from any room in our house. I fell in love with the product so much that I actually called them up and became a distributor myself  .
> 
> next, we mounted a small shelf directly under the tv and put the gamecub on that. Wireless controllers was the next step.
> 
> so from our couch you see only the wall mounted tv. wall mounted surround speakers (sub woofer is hidden) and wall mounted game cube, which doesn't require the use of all the extra wires to use
> 
> just thought I'd share a little tip and DIY from our home theater to yours. I'll try to take some pics tonight to post.
> 
> Dustin


Two observations. First, whenever you run cables thru the wall, make sure they are fire code rated or run in a code rated conduit. Doing otherwise is an excuse for an insurance company to deny a claim should there ever be a fire (it HAS happened). This is particularly true for speaker cables. 

Second, if you mount gear in a closed closet or cabinet, you always need to make certain you provide for cooling. I've seen too many systems that were overtemping. Otherwise...enjoy!


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## gregzoll

I am sure, that all the other person did was put a hole, which allowed for the cables to pass through to the other side. And as for the closet, unless the other person had a huge amount of equipment, just having the TiVo, Satellite Receiver, A/V tuner, and DVD player, are really not going to give off that much heat. I am probably guessing that this was a Clothes closet, which means most likely Accordian doors, other wise if a closet with a door, a vent at the lower portion will allow for better air floor, if it gets too warm in there.


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## Soundbroker

Running the cables thru a common wall probably wouldn't cause a concern...though just to be absolutely safe, I'd stick a small piece of conduit in there. But when you run things IN the walls, that is a whole different ballgame and you get legal issues to consider.

As for the heat. A modern 7.1 reciever, TIVO and Sat receiver can put off a ferocious amount of heat. Even in a large closet, I've had customers contact me with units that are thermaling out. And to do proper ventilation, you need airflow...that means intake and exhaust. Easy way to check...go into the closet near the end of a loud, dynamic movie at the end of a big dynamic sequence and check the temp of the closet and the gear. If it is lava hot...time for a thermal solution.


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## gregzoll

That is true. One way, is to use a exhaust system to pull the heat, or even no door on the closet.


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## harleysilo

Soundbroker said:


> Two observations. First, whenever you run cables thru the wall, make sure they are fire code rated or run in a code rated conduit. Doing otherwise is an excuse for an insurance company to deny a claim should there ever be a fire (it HAS happened). This is particularly true for speaker cables.
> 
> Second, if you mount gear in a closed closet or cabinet, you always need to make certain you provide for cooling. I've seen too many systems that were overtemping. Otherwise...enjoy!


Well that's an interesting statement. All the electrical wire in my home is not run in conduit. Are you suggesting the my speaker wire is more of a fire causing concern the 240v and 120v run through entire home?:whistling2:


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## Dustin07

no, it doesn't cause fires. But the fumes that non in-wall (Plenum) rated wire puts off are considered harmful. Insurance looks for any and every loophole they can find.

when in doubt it's best to look into local firecode. There's a reason why they make plenum rated speakerwire.


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## Soundbroker

harleysilo said:


> Well that's an interesting statement. All the electrical wire in my home is not run in conduit. Are you suggesting the my speaker wire is more of a fire causing concern the 240v and 120v run through entire home?:whistling2:


Yes, and the wire in your home is all Romex which is fire code rated. If you run NON fire code rated cable and (god forbid) you have a fire...you very likely just lost your insurance. It has happened to some people. Welcome to a litiginous society. :furious:

This is why you'll see in-wall rated speaker and low voltage cables labeled CL-2 or CL-3 and why any non fire code rated cable should be run thru code compliant conduit (typically Smurf or Schedule 40). Check with your local building dept or low voltage inspector who will likely tell you the exact same thing and will likely kick it back if the cables are not compliant. I've had theater calibrations and installation with pre-wired homes I've walked away from because the cables and the video cable routing were not code compliant...too much liability.


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## Bacardi 151

I was interested in doing this, but thought of something. I have four tvs with cable boxes. If I change the channel in my living room with the rf remote, wouldn't that change the channel on every tv? Also if my neighor had the same cable box and was not that far away?


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## gregzoll

No, due to CATV tuners use IR remotes, not RF. And with RF remotes, each remote is set to the specific channel for that tuner.


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## Bacardi 151

gregzoll said:


> No, due to CATV tuners use IR remotes, not RF. And with RF remotes, each remote is set to the specific channel for that tuner.


Could you please explain? I don't understand HOW you can program a RF remote to change only my living room tv's cable box and not the others in the room.


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## gregzoll

Your TV & CATV converter do not use RF (Radio Frequency) for the remote. It uses IR (Infra-Red) technology. Currently the only tech that is seen in homes widespread that use RF tech for the remotes, is Satellite boxes such as Dish, which use a A,B,C,D channel for assigning a channel to a particular remote, especially if you have more then one box, and more then one remote.


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## keyser soze

Soundbroker said:


> Two observations. First, whenever you run cables thru the wall, make sure they are fire code rated or run in a code rated conduit. Doing otherwise is an excuse for an insurance company to deny a claim should there ever be a fire (it HAS happened). This is particularly true for speaker cables.
> 
> Second, if you mount gear in a closed closet or cabinet, you always need to make certain you provide for cooling. I've seen too many systems that were overtemping. Otherwise...enjoy!


hmmm, I'll have to tell the owner of my A/V company that we've been screwing all of our residential clients for the past 12 years. :no:

We only have to (by NEC) run plenum rated wire in Commercial buildings and we never _HAVE_ to run our wire in conduit (we will rough in conduit for HDMI cables etc). Maybe that's just the codes in the mountains? We did do a job last year in a county that didn't even do FRAMING inspections much less electrical.

I have never heard the things you are saying, even when we've had clients houses burn down....................:boxing: sorry I love all of these smilies.

Seriously, we have homes that have low voltage trunklines that measure 12" in DIAMETER. Would we have to make a rediculous series of conduit swept Y's and drops to make insurance cover the house? It would look like a central vac system on steroids. Or just make the customer spend the extra 100% for the plenum wire? Just wondering. They already faint at the prices.


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## keyser soze

Oh, almost forgot, Dustin, *congrats on the new setup *and thank you (and your floors thank you) for getting professionally made brackets. :thumbsup:


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## ajwt2

*Home Theatre*

I've been playing around with a home system of my own where I have a TV on one side of the room and a video projector projecting onto a pull down screen on another side of the room. The cunning bit that I have been working on is a single rotary switch that shuffles the surround sound speakers around so that it works for either sitting position, either TV or projector.

I'm writing up how I did all this, as well as how i chose the rest of the system, take a look at How I did my home Cinema System and let me know your thoughts!

thanks


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## kswoot

I know this post is very old, but I'm getting ready to do this, and wanted to know if the RF was still something you would recommend?
Did you ever post pictures?
Thanks,
K.


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## Bacardi 151

kswoot said:


> I know this post is very old, but I'm getting ready to do this, and wanted to know if the RF was still something you would recommend?
> Did you ever post pictures?
> Thanks,
> K.


Logitech 890 remote comes with a RF extender which is works flawlessly! You can find them on blowouts on amazon or ebay auctions for around $100 shipped. It's very cool as it has a LCD screen.


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## chris75

keyser soze said:


> We only have to (by NEC) run plenum rated wire in Commercial buildings and we never _HAVE_ to run our wire in conduit (we will rough in conduit for HDMI cables etc). Maybe that's just the codes in the mountains? We did do a job last year in a county that didn't even do FRAMING inspections much less electrical.


He's not talking about running plenum rated wire, he's talking about running wire thats rated to be IN-WALL use. 

Same as your HDMI cables, they better be CL2 or CL3 rated for in wall use...


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## chris75

Also, just so everyone knows, you cannot run power cords through walls or ceilings.


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## Taz38

I'm glad this post was brought back to life--we're getting ready to take on the same type of project. good information!


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## kswoot

*Any Experience with an RF?*

Too bad no one has responded though! I am very interested in knowing more about the RF remote that allows you to have your equipment in another room. Sounds too good to be true!


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## chris75

kswoot said:


> Too bad no one has responded though! I am very interested in knowing more about the RF remote that allows you to have your equipment in another room. Sounds too good to be true!


 
Just about any electronic store sells them, RF is built in with my directv receivers, so its a non issue, but go to Best buy or circuit city.


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## kswoot

Thank, Chris.


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## chris75

kswoot said:


> Thank, Chris.


 
You should be able to find what your looking for, You can also try Smarthome, http://www.smarthome.com/_/Remotes_IR_Repeaters/_/5/land.aspx


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