Another question for the Brain Trust.........

We are still working on our Escape from this Hell Hole (San Francisco Bay Area). Still working with the builder to see if we can afford the house we want.

We want to be able to keep our DirecTV.
We currently have 2 TV's, each with a DirecTV DVR, networked together.

The question is should I have the house pre-wired with Coax (RG6) and an Ethernet cable to each possible TV location or just the Ethernet?

From my research it looks like I could go with the DirecTV Now type service and eliminate the Satellite Dish. This looks to use, as a choice, the Amazon Fire TV Stick.

The area we are looking at has a Fiber Connection to the house, so bandwidth shouldn't be an issue.

Any suggestions ? Thanks.

Quad RG6

The quad coax is good, but I’d have ethernet cat6 runs to every room and back to a strategically placed hub area where an internet connection is likely to be. WiFi os fine, but having hard wired Ethernet cables is better.

I will give a different perspective. We stream everything over Wi-Fi to 3 Tv's spread across a 3,700 sqft two story home. We have no issues streaming this way. I see no reason to run coax at all if you have fiber to the door. Spend some of the money you save on thr wiring to buy a couple of state of the art smart Tv's with the DirecTV app built in and forget about the fire stick too.

I'd wire every room you think you might want TV in with both coax and Ethernet. I'd run Ethernet to all of the other rooms.

How many times have you read a thread asking for WiFi or router help on SigForum?

How many times have you read a thread asking about Ethernet problems on SigForum?

I can think of at least 2 dozen threads about WiFi or routers. I don't remember a single thread about Ethernet issues.

if this is not your forever home I would pull coax and cat5/6 to every room. Just because you have Direct tv doesn't mean the future buyers will.

Also, I haven't seen a smart tv or blu-ray player that does streaming as good as a dedicated device.

I'd wire for every contingency, and future-proof it to the best of expense. If it's new construction, I'd consider a 1" conduit to each location.

Eventually (over the next few years is my bet) everything will stream over the web (think Direct TV NOW, HULA, YouTbe TV, Sling, etc), and satellite dishes and cable boxes will go the way of Eight Track and BETA Max players. As such, I'd wire every room in the new home you might want to install a TV with CAT cable. CAT is usually faster and more stable than WiFi as its less prone to be impacted by interference. And If they're pulling CAT cable, they can certainly piggyback Coax with it at the same time. With both installed, you're covered for any set of circumstances.

quote:

Originally posted by TXJIM:
I will give a different perspective. We stream everything over Wi-Fi to 3 Tv's spread across a 3,700 sqft two story home. We have no issues streaming this way. I see no reason to run coax at all if you have fiber to the door. Spend some of the money you save on thr wiring to buy a couple of state of the art smart Tv's with the DirecTV app built in and forget about the fire stick too.

I think each home and location is a bit different when it comes to how well or poorly WiFi will work. I have strong, fast WiFi throughout my home (~2,500 sq ft) and it works very well most of the time. However, I believe there is something that occasionally interferes with the signal. Given my internet speed (100MB) and the routine load on my network, I should never see buffering, yet I do occasionally on my WiFi attached TV's. On the family room and master bedroom TV's (Fire TV Sticks network attached via CAT6) I never encounter buffering or any other service issues.

Ultimately, I'll opt for CAT cable every time its available given how reliable it is.

whatever you go with, it's easiest to get your cable in before wallboard goes up.
I have (at minimum) two RG6 and two CAT5e to every room. Living room and master bedroom get additional Ethernet ports on opposite walls.

Quad shield is overkill for most residential uses. If you're going satellite, use compression fittings for terminations, not crimped.

Cat-5e and RG-6 to every possible TV location. Not sure why others suggest Cat-6 since the cat-5e will easily handle a gig, and it's easier to work with.

A gig is plenty to a TV and will be for a long long time.

Important : be sure your installer does not use the "clad" style ethernet cable. The clad stuff has long term issues since its only copper jacket and not solid copper.

 
I future-proofed by having the builder run conduit to each room, terminating in a Leviton strucured media box, the largest they sold. I included conduit to the RV pad and to the telco termination box. If I had it to do over, I would go with a bigger box and bigger conduit. I pulled all of my own cable (cat5e, in 2002, and RG6 coax), and left a pull string in each pull for future use. I pulled ethernet to every room, and coax only to the TV areas. At that time, dial-up was still an option and we had a landline phone, so some rooms got dual cat5e, which I could terminate either for phone or ethernet. I've had to re-pull to one location only so far (the RV pad), but I am prepared for pulling fiber if that ever becomes a good option. Having experience pulling and terminating cables is sort of necessary for this solution, but it is a great future-proofing option if you can do it. You could even hire someone for the cable pulling and termination work. Just make sure they use sweeps for every 90 degree turn of the conduit.
 

quote:

Originally posted by zoom6zoom:
whatever you go with, it's easiest to get your cable in before wallboard goes up.
I have (at minimum) two RG6 and two CAT5e to every room. Living room and master bedroom get additional Ethernet ports on opposite walls.

Quad shield is overkill for most residential uses. If you're going satellite, use compression fittings for terminations, not crimped.

+1

Also, if possible get photos of the entire house after the plumbling, electrical and telecomm is place but before wall boards go up. Those photos will come in handy at some point.

It is more cost effective to run wire now than later. I would run the wire (coax + ethernet) now as others have said. I would definitely run ethernet cable because as others have said the demand on WiFi will increase in the future.

We recently (1 month ago) switched from cable tv to Directv Now using a fire stick for access via WiFi. We have 5 TV's in a two story home and this works for us. Note not more than two tv's on at a time, only two of use in house.

You could just run cable now and at a later date terminate and install swiches, etc.

quote:

Originally posted by radioman:
Cat-5e and RG-6 to every possible TV location. Not sure why others suggest Cat-6 since the cat-5e will easily handle a gig, and it's easier to work with.

Exactly, a lot of people don't understand that there really is no difference between cat5e and cat6 in this scenario.
Additionally, if you don't use cat6 throughout the installation aka jacks, cables, patch cord then it really isn't helping.
Cat6 advantage is mostly limited to crosstalk.
Use cat 6 in a fully functional server room not in a home unless the cost is negligible.

quote:

Originally posted by Opus Dei:
I'd wire for every contingency, and future-proof it to the best of expense. If it's new construction, I'd consider a 1" conduit to each location.

I would also do conduit to all rooms from a central location (hub) if it was new construction. and preload it with coax and cat 6.

Quad RG6 isn't necessarily optimal. Belden 7915A has better specs than QS, is connectorized the same as regular RG6, has a tighter minimum bend radius, and is cheaper.

QS has a higher pull rating. Probably not an issue in a bare-stud residential installation.

Given the technology that exists today, I would not run dual RG6 to each room. Instead I'd run a single RG6, dual Cat 5e or Cat 6 UTP and, budget allowing, possibly fiber. (Though for the life of me I can't see ever needing it. But once the walls are up, well...)

I would do two runs of the above combination to larger rooms, on opposite walls or corners.

I would make sure to run 2x RG6 and 2x Cat 5E/6 from wherever you expect will be your "network closet/room" to wherever you expect local service providers will enter the premises. I would definitely use Belden 7915A for that run, because, IME, cable providers can terminate it. And you definitely want them to terminate everything up to the modem.

Btw: For the UTP I would consider Belden DataTwist or equivalent. That is a bonded-pair UTP cable that maintains its integrity better--particularly on bends. It's a bit more spendy, and somewhat more a PITA to connectorize, but, again: Once the drywall's up...

I would make provision for placing ceiling-mounted, PoE access points in the ceilings of each floor. I would be inclined to stagger their positions on the long axis. (E.g.: In a two-story house w/basement: Top floor and basement: 1/3 to 2/5 from one long end, middle floor: 1/3 to 2/5 from the opposite end. Or something like that. Stay far away from HVAC ductwork.)

While you're at it consider future (?) surveillance system requirements. Run a single Cat 5E/6 UTP or Siamese cable from network room/closet to near each of those locations, such that you'll be able to fish it out later.

Speaking of security systems: Now is the time to run alarm sensor pairs to each window and door, to each corner in which you might want a motion sensor, and to each ceiling location in which you'll want a smoke/fire sensor. As well as multi-pair for each location in which you will want a keypad (main entry/exit doors).

quote:

Originally posted by Sailor1911:

quote:

Originally posted by Opus Dei:
I'd wire for every contingency, and future-proof it to the best of expense. If it's new construction, I'd consider a 1" conduit to each location.

I would also do conduit to all rooms from a central location (hub) if it was new construction. and preload it with coax and cat 6.

I did some remodeling on my home. I made an equipment niche in the wasted space from making a shower in place of a tub. Access is in a spare bedroom, with a series of air handler grilles, and thermostatically-controlled AC Infinity Airplates to exchange air.

Since I'm using a desktop rather than a NAS, and the spare bedroom office and living room are decently close (~12), I ran 5e/RG6 to both, and the 1" conduit was for HDMI. The router and UPS are also in this closet of sorts.

quote:

Originally posted by Sailor1911:

quote:

Originally posted by Opus Dei:
I'd wire for every contingency, and future-proof it to the best of expense. If it's new construction, I'd consider a 1" conduit to each location.

I would also do conduit to all rooms from a central location (hub) if it was new construction. and preload it with coax and cat 6.

Agree. Wired is always better. Conduit excellent idea. Security system camera prewiring comments also excellent.

One additional thought, cable for 5.1 and/or 7.1 home theater speaker systems.