New home datacom wiring

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moresi

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Curious- what techniques are others employing in wiring datacom in new homes? For years I have run Cat 5 to phone and data locations and RG6 to CATV locations - seperate runs - to each individual room. Do you prefer hybrid cables that incoporate 2 Rg-6 and 2 Cat 5 cables to one or two locations in a room or do you prefer to pull all cables seperatly?
 
moresi said:
Curious- what techniques are others employing in wiring datacom in new homes? For years I have run Cat 5 to phone and data locations and RG6 to CATV locations - seperate runs - to each individual room. Do you prefer hybrid cables that incoporate 2 Rg-6 and 2 Cat 5 cables to one or two locations in a room or do you prefer to pull all cables seperatly?
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You are referring to multimedia composite cable.

If you are putting this in, you are paying too much for cable. Spend the extra $ and put in resi-gard by carlon, or any other brand. Its smurf tube thats orange.

You will find that if you are doing tract/spec homes and no one cares about the future use, pull in the composite cable if you are one/two man shop and need to speed up your install. Other than that, don't.
 
I fully agree with post #2 Composite cable costs MUCH more than just pulling individual cables. There are times where composite cable makes it much easier, but for the most part - if you are going to spend the extra money, run resi-guard then the installation is "futureproof"

~Matt
 
We looked in to using it on commercial apps, like back to back rooms in hotels on the tv/desk wall where there would be 2 CATV and 2+ Cat5e right next to each other. We never needed QS, and cat6 was getting specced, so cat5e wouldn't cut it. Neither did 500' rolls. The price was always too high imo.

As for time/speed of installation, I'm pretty sure it would take me less time to rig and pull four separate cables than to break out four from one on both ends.
 
We used to pull hybrid cable.

Now, just Cat5e and RG-6, unless spec'd otherwise.
It is cheaper for us to stock Cat5e and RG-6.

For the most part, anything extra (wiring for future, etc.) is done only when the customer pays for it.
 
Last house I wired with hybrid cable was a bit over killed 2500 sq. ft. with 14 home runs - The "backbone" coming onto the main termination point was huge.

Years later the guy still uses the same 3 connection points out of the 56 I installed.

But he wanted to be "ready" :roll:
 
banana peel is very overpriced in my opinion.


as for what to install; at this point, unless you have a customer that knows exactly what they're going to do with it, i don't think it matters much. because the vast majority of people have no idea what to do with this cabling. i'd still try to upsell on every job though, because it definitely has its benefits, but i wouldn't recommend going crazy with it.

an easy upsell is two coax's and two cat5e's behind the living room and master bedroom tv's, and a single coax and cat5e to other tv's. also two cat5e's to where a desktop computer may sit.

here is the pitch; directv requires two coax's for their DVR's (there is a way to do it with one cable, but DTV isn't giving it to existing customers, and very few resi customers, but you can purchase the single-wire multiswitch module yourself). Dish network requires one cable, but they have dual tuner receivers w/ RF remotes that can be used to send a separate feed to another room. You'll need that extra coax w/ dish network to feed the other room and avoid another receiver fee. i know this doesn't apply to cable TV, but most of my customers all have satellite as i'm in a rural area.

one cat5e is for a phone line to connect receivers (used for caller ID, PPV, and some updates to the receiver; if you don't have it connected, you might be charged extra). the second is used for networking; DTV and Dish use your broadband connection for on-demand video. But my favorite use for that cable is home-theater PC's. We use windows media center for 90% of our television viewing in my house. i've been introducing folks to it as its the greatest thing since sliced bread w/ a netflix account and hulu desktop plugings. i also have all our dvd's copied to a couple of TB's of HDD space, and we can pull up any dvd 'on-demand', as well as thousands of pictures, mp3 files, etc. . . . and we have the TV signal running through it.

the other rooms w/ the single coax and cat5e; you can use that UTP cable for a phone line to a receiver, or a network cable for a media extender. most likely a network connection, as many of the new gaming consoles their kids have connect to the internet for multi-player action, downloading games and trials, and can be used as media center extenders.
 
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I like the idea of running Carlflex to port locations in rooms. This feature does give the most flexability and was something that I did in my own house. I found a good deal on hybrid cable - about 150.00 / 500' spool so was thinking this may be way to go.
 
brantmacga said:
You'll need that extra coax w/ dish network to feed the other room and avoid another receiver fee. i know this doesn't apply to cable TV, but most of my customers all have satellite as i'm in a rural area.
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You only need one coax with Dish Dual receivers, even if you are backfeeding another location. You will need two Diplexers and a seperator to do it.
 
Structured distribution

Structured distribution

wshoard said:
You only need one coax with Dish Dual receivers, even if you are backfeeding another location. You will need two Diplexers and a seperator to do it.
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Wouldn't 2 quad RG-6 best serve the dual acquisition head-end feed back to a central distribution? Or are wireless tech becoming more prevalent?
 
lv cable

lv cable

i like to have that second rg6 [in lieu of rg59] for feeding the surveillance/door camera signals to the tv's on the video input. using modulators is increasingly impractical in a digital cable/SATV world, and that second wire sure comes in handy. of course a cat5e and baluns will do the same thing [maybe cheaper] but is not useful as a broadband channel.
 
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