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Pimping Out a New House
Jason Michael Perry writes "I just got pre-approved to buy some gutted property in New Orleans. A lot of the houses I'm looking at are blank canvases that need new wiring, new walls, new everything. I've always dreamed of a high-tech house that says my name when I walk in the door and now is my chance to get a close as I can with current technology. So I'm looking for ideas to pimp out a newly renovated house with all the best technology. If you had a blank canvas to start with, what would you do? Run CAT-5 or fiber optics? Build a closet for servers and A/V equipment? Build a 7.1 speaker system into the living room walls and ceilings? Install automated lights and intercom (with support for Apple equipment)? How about appliances, the kitchen, and other spots... what cool tech can I use there? My only rules and requirements are support for the four Macs I have in the house, and reasonable support for technology on the fringes."
Build flood wall/stilts for the house (or more realistically, Flood Insurance).
"Victory means exit strategy, and it's important for the President to explain to us what the exit strategy is." G.W.Bush
What is your budget?
I'd do the networking all as Cat5-e with Gigabit Ethernet...
Its a lot of bandwidth, cheap, and a universal lingua-franca.
I'd also have 802.11whosiwutzit access points, and more specifically cubbies with power so you can upgrade the access points.
Also, don't just string cable, string CONDUIT so you can upgrade the networking should you ever need to.
Test your net with Netalyzr
Since you're trying to future-proof the place, I have one word for you:
Crawlspaces.
If that's not practical, try to have a few key walls with hidden corridors in them so you can run conduit or whatever you might need in the future.
-- I'm old enough to have lived through six different meanings of the word "hacker."
And definitely a watertight room for all the fancy toys you plan to buy.
Tags != Comments, and -1 (Troll) != -1 (I Would Respond Angrily To This Poster So They Must Be Trolling)
Run CAT-5 or fiber optics? Build a closet for servers and A/V equipment? Build a 7.1 speaker system into the living room walls and ceilings? Install automated lights and intercom (with support for Apple equipment)?
Yes.
State of the art insulation.
Heat exchangers instead of air conditioners.
Solar.
Demolish the property and stick a nice sized Yacht on top of supports right where the house used to be.
I think the invisible hand of the market has its middle finger extended
--A wise old fart named SC0RN
...make sure all the technology you install is fully and easily upgradeable. If you're going to be spending some years to come in this house, you don't want to be saddled with obsolete equipment because of oversight in the construction.
smurf tubing
(cheap plastic conduit)
I would (and have for both houses I have owned) install CAT5e. It's cheap, you can install it yourself, and all the computerized crap you'll need (or want) will have NICs.
Also keep in mind that you might not want to live in that house forever so whatever crazy crap you put in there might be a turn off for a prospective buyer. In that aspect, make sure you document and have layouts of all your excess cabling (network, cable, telephone, speaker cord, etc...).
Mr. Universe: "They can't stop the signal, Mal. They can never stop the signal."
Panic room.
Cat-5 for the network, but have fiber optic lights!
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and ask him for the plans to his house
Don't bother, it can't do 1080p/24. Do you want HD movies at non native fps? Thought so.
Cat6 with a 1gbps switch is faster than hard-drives can pump the data, I recently did my house in it. Use conduit if you can, because it'll allow simpler installation of even better networking in 10 years.
Soo many wannabe geeks try to hardwire their homes with cat5; that's a waste of money considering Wireless N is faster than most cabling methods. So avoid the computer networking wires, IMHO. You would be better to wire for high def between your rooms, but even then a lot of great solutions for wireless highdef exist.
I recommend doing some research on smart homes:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smart_Home
Cheers!
I have no idea if they exist yet, but after I saw them in Blade Runner as a kid I always dreamed of being able to dim and outright black out my windows with the push of a button.
Instead of ringing a bell, the bell-push could IM you...
Quidnam Latine loqui modo coepi?
Start off with the basics. The data network and the home automation network should be separate. Data should be old school for any slashdotter, but home automation is where you can really do something impressive. And for that, I would recommend that you look into CAN or Controller Area Networks. This is the primary system used by the automotive industry to make cars "smarter".
The reason CAN is so special is that it drives decision making into the network level. It's like taking Sun's motto of "the Network is the Computer" and applying it to large scale automation tasks. Most people try and go the easy way by using the off the shelf crap that is out there but the truth is that home automation has hardly begun because the real power tools are being largely ignored by the less than technically courageous types that typically do home automation.
I suggest a change in perspective. A good piece of technology is one that doesn't intrude on your life and doesn't have to be maintained. If you start adding all kinds of technical gizmos and gadgets to your house, you will become a slave to maintaining them. Home automation technology just is not to the point yet where you can install and forget. It's constant tweaks and upgrades, failed components, trying to figure out odd configuration files, languages, and protocols to get things to work correctly and with each other. At the end of the day you will spend far more time maintaining it than it will ever give you in improved lifestyle or productivity. Focus the your technical research on the low tech items that will make your house easy to live in, like good electrical wiring, good plumbing, good toiliets, sinks, and energy efficient appliances. You've got hundreds of hours of research to do on that front before you should even think about Star Trek style housing.
Um, why not Cat6, which is the current EIA/TIA 568A standard? (Cat 5e used
to be the highest quality standards.) And don't forget cat7, still in
draft amendment to 586A.
One thing I would have a a massive hard drive on the server so I could watch or listen to any film I have in any room. Of course you would have the RIAA knocking on your door as you have circumvented their anti-user software. Also thin hardware - no hard drive, but plenty of memory
Don't forget that the basement will need a pool with sharks. With freaking laser beams on their heads...
Oh, sorry. You're pimpng your house, not building an evil lair. Never mind. Big hat with a feather should do.
~ a low user id is no indication I have a clue what I'm talking about.
http://www.dilbert.com/comics/dilbert/duh/ Although this doesn't really address your technical questions exactly, there are surprisingly a lot of good ideas in there.
Author of Enyo: Up and Running from O'Reilly Media
Yeah, second that. Run some cheap 1" id tubing from your central computer closet, to the same places you run your cat-5. Leave pullcords in each tube. When the next big thing comes along, you have an easy job of rewiring.
We are all just people.
Market crashing STOP Do not buy STOP You are the greater fool STOP
tupperware
lots of tupperware
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
My understanding is that at this point cat6 or cat7 is just overpriced hype with no practical use at the time. I'm not sure anything requires it to function properly.
When talking Tech and all, it isn't a real good idea to stock up on unneeded supplies for future use. The industry ends up going other directions to often. Imagine if you stocked up on a bunch of sdram because you thought your wouldn't need to buy memory again. Imagine if you purchased the top of the line P4 in 1999 thinking you would never need a new computer. If you have the money to waist or a need for the stuff, go for it. If your thinking of the future, keeping your options open is more important then top of the line.
why not all 3? Plus a pipe/conduit to allow new wire to be put in.
Do you even lift?
These aren't the 'roids you're looking for.
Rack everything then figure out a way to disconnect that rack in a hurry. The next time New Orleans gets hit by a big one you can be out of there in a hurry with your data and porn collection intact. The last thing you want is to be still cutting through cables when your knees are under water.
Ed Almos
The more corrupt the state, the more numerous the laws. - Tacitus, 56-120 A.D.
Computer controlled change the colour to the mood you have, save power and heat.
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You could start by not saying "pimp out". What are you, a nerd or a gangsta?
I recently had the opportunity to do so. What I did was, I ran cat5e throughout the house. Instead of using cat3 for the telephones, I just put the phones on the unused pair of the cat5. This allowed me to have ethernet at every phone outlet, just having to install an RJ45 Jack. I ran all of the wires to a large switch, and the phone to the phone box. I didn't get around to it, but essentially I could have set a computer up as a router/home control system. You could theoretically have ethernet-aware appliances, speakers, etc. You would control those from your home control system.
I second the point on documentation. I've been in a couple houses where there is a wall full of RCA/Ethernet/phono/etc outlets and built in speakers all through the house but the owners had no idea what connects where or how to use any of it. Thousands of dollars of wiring and technology that is totally useless to the current owners. I had to DJ a gig at a mansion that was decked out with this sort of equipment and had a closet full of connectors and knobs but the owners had absolutely no clue what went where or what controlled what. I played with it for over an hour and couldn't make anything work, so I wound up setting up separate speakers in one room only; it worked fine of course but it would have been great to use the built in system. They had a ton of ethernet connectors in there too; I imagine there was cat-5 throughout the house but again they had no idea what to plug in where so it was useless. Besides, even if you never sell, it's a good idea to document everything in case you forget what goes where.
Invariably if you ask a geek crowd what sorts of custom modifications they would employ for a new house, you get some really mundane solutions, like "Well I'd run cat 7 copper everywhere", or "wifi every floor", et cetera. These are all things you could learn in any 60 second trip to a Radio Shack.
Instead of considering what sorts of technology might create an interesting environment, focus on what you want the house to do. Will you have lots of local friends? Think of the things people do at home. Sleep, relaxing, and entertaining. Try to use available tools to facilitate these activities. Simply filling a new house as a tank to store electronics is pretty boring, and probably a waste of cash, too. Intercoms? Server racks in closets? These are well and good if you're trying to run an ISP or a galaxy class starship, but ditch them otherwise. And don't buy any 400 dollar kitchen-aid appliances just because they "look good on the kitchen counter".
Back to the local friends thing-- Set things up so you can watch some movies, sit people down, and have a nice comfortable flow between the living room and the kitchen. Entertaining friends is 50% food, 50% chat. If you still have the ability to control the layout of the kitchen, do it such that you can prepare food in front of your visitors. This lends incredibly to socializing. It reduces the rush to finish, perhaps even extending the process moreso. The best kitchens I can think of have a center island with plenty of chairs and a nice work area for the host to do all the focused work. Toss all the ranges and ovens on a back wall because they are rarely visited. I know that's not really in line with your question, but I'd personally like to hear someone reply to this particular thought with improvements as it's personally interesting to me.
In the living room, most of your guests won't care if you have the 8 thousand or 15 thousand dollar 7.1 surround. Just drop a reasonable amount of cash on yesterday's receiver, dvd players, and speakers, and get a screen just big enough that everyone can get a good look at. Best Buy and friends wouldn't have you believe that after three beers, you won't be able to tell that the 1500 you spent is roughly enjoyable (I didn't say comparable) to the rest of their stock.
If you just sit back and think things through, maybe you'll decide that some must-have item on your list doesn't actually make a lot of sense, and you'll save some cash... or find something else just as silly, but will get more use.
slashdot: where everyone yells sarcastic metaphors to themselves to understand the issue
Fit X10 automation everywhere, very handy.
not below it. sea levels are going to rise anyway. your high tech house will become a swimming pool in 5-10 years..try pimping it with a snorkel and pressure resistant blast doors/walls if you cant do that.
You are right. Conduit is key. There is no way you can realistically future-proof you're wiring.
You can, however, make paths so that when you decide you need cat"x", coax, speaker wire, fiber, or whatever, you can run it without getting out a saw, spackle, and a putty knife.
If you are on this site, you'd rather run cable than patch drywall, eh?
~T
The wiring part should be easy. You can go with conduit and pull anything in the future, or probably be safe with a lot of cat5e and coax. But the hard part is knowing what to do with your network. CentraLite has some nice stuff, LCD touch-screens let you control all your lights, HVAC, and virtually anything else you might hook up to the system. You can even have cameras, and view the video on any of the control panels in the house.
The 7.1 speakers in your AV room is good, you can get nice in-wall speakers, which makes things look cleaner. Also consider some additional in wall speakers all over the house, you can pipe music all over for parties. If you have a hottub or deck outdoors, a couple of outdoor speakers are virtually a requirement. Again, with the proper control, you can adjust audio source and volume for any zone from any panel in the house.
As long as you're wiring, also remember that you need power for stuff. Don't skimp on electrical outlets. In fact, consider running a couple of separate circuits all over the house, with a UPS in the basement.
Consider an intercom instead of shouting up the stairs at the kids.
Finally, make sure you don't get too carried away. Some day you'll sell the house, if the neighborhood isn't affluent enough or attacks the wrong kind of buyers to appreciate all the wizz-bang technology, it's a waste. My boss did much of what I described to his summer-house on a lake. But most of the people who moved there were retired folks. The couple that bought the place were totally baffled by virtually everything in the house.
You'll also be able to tell people you get your Internet "through a series of tubes" with a straight face!
If a job's not worth doing, it's not worth doing right.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
Here are five ideas for a New Orleans House printed in Popular Science recently after Katrina hit. They are really good ideas.
ALSO, you might want to look into using these nails that were especially made for hurricanes/earthquakes. They will hold your house together a lot better.
Hope this works!
Those of us who think they know everything annoy those of us who do.
Tech will change over the coming years.
Run conduits through the building so that you can more easily upgrade the cabling as required. It's easier than trying to fish a new line when the tech changes.
Seconding the conduit. If you can afford it, run multiple fiber lines and put cat5 transceivers on the end. If you aren't made out of money, do a superbundle, 4 cat5e's and 2 RG6 coax runs to each plate. Team 4 Gigabit NICs and you'll have more bandwidth than your systems can actually move across the internal bus for years, and you can always pair them off into separate networks back at the punchdown if you need to split into voice / data / homeauto / etc.
In-wall speakers can be very nice if you do them correctly, but they can also sound like poop if you aren't careful. There are also in-wall subs. If you do a home theater room, look into soundproofing it under the drywall. It's possible to do a very discreet home theater setup that doesn't look like it's TV oriented until it's time to watch TV, just by having art on the walls and a ceiling-mounted retractable screen w/ a front projector discreetly mounted on the ceiling.
'course none of this matters, because whatever you build is just going to be destroyed again in the next flood anyway.
Even Jesus hates listening to Creed.
-Samuel
If you are really gonna pimp your pad /. style might I recommend a significant UPS system at the heart of things.
Just a thought.
Regards.
I'd add Cat5e drop points to every room in the house and outfit a closet to be a server room. I'd set up an Asterisk server so that could have my own VoIP PBX, complete with voicemail and call forwarding to my cell. I might also add a wireless access point for folks with laptops. Finally, I'd round out with a *BSD file server and maybe an install of MythTV for DV recording and burning. But this would be the ultimate geek house.
We just put in a HDTV and stereo system. This was a real problem in our existing construction, since we had to run about 25 cables of various sorts.
Instead of putting components in a closet, we used a TV shelf in an unused corner. Helps keep kids out of it, uses the space, and swivels for access.
We wired for 7.1 sound, so that is 8 new wires. We used orb speakers, they are small and nice. We also ran wires to the kitchen and deck. I have heard some amps support dual subs, but we only ran one RCA.
I ran a 35 ft HDMI and component and some composite just to be sure, since the TV is difficult to mount / dismount. HDMI / HDCP stinks, we have to power cycle the amp/box occasionally when it gets screwed up. Grrr.
Order your cables online, there are many cheap places with nice cables. Maybe I should have run two HDMI, but I assumed I could always get a switching amp.
Having the wires hidden is really nice and clean, not a jumble of HT mess. The Wiimotes hang around and a couple of DVD cases usually, but that is not too much clutter.
Cable, new power, Ethernet. Nice wall outlets where needed.
And we left pull ropes in case we need to run more cable in the future.
Whatever they pay guys to run cable in existing construction, it is not enough.
And we used a shelf in an existing closet to hide the cable modem, VOIP, and router. Just cut a hole for the wired ETH and run some power into the closet.
One system that I have looked at is PlutoHome http://plutohome.com/index.php
:)
They can in some circumstances integrate just about everything you want for automation, Phone (Asterisk), Lighting (Insteon, X10 and others), Security, HVAC (I think), and presence based services (Music, phone calls, video follows you from room to room), TV, DVD jukebox, etc.
And if you want to install it yourself you can, or you can have it professionally installed.
For the infrastructure, go for Cat5e, and Wireless A/B/G. Fiber is overkill and doesn't appear to be coming to a desktop as a standard install anytime soon.
Conduit as others have mentioned is also a great idea... How many HD connectors have there been in the last 3 years? How about the next 10? Put in generous counduits between your video devices (TVs, Projectors, etc) and your server room/closets. (3 inch should be good)
Multi Zoned Heating/Cooling System. (If you are looking for do it yourself, Pluto has some built in, and DIY Zoning http://diy-zoning.sourceforge.net/
Depending on Cell phone converage, possibly integrate a Cell repeater in the house.
Plan for also quite a bit of COAX for satelite or Cable. 2 COAX or more per data drop, remember you can use good COAX for your Component, or digital COAX audio also.
Zoned in wall speakers with room based controls (Like A-bus or similar). For the actual home theater system I would stay away from the in wall speakers, stick to good floor standing or wall mountable speakers. For Speaker Wire check out this site before you drop major dolars on "Premium" speaker wire http://www.roger-russell.com/wire.htm.
Plan for Sound deadening your rooms. (http://www.soundproofing.org/index.html or http://www.soundisolationcompany.com/
Also consider running Data cabling where you might not think to, Washing machine, Dryer, Fridge, Stove, Microwave, Freezers. At least you can use this data cabling for alarm circuits to monitor temperatures inside your freezer and fridge to check for temperatures out a range (It sucks to come home to an upright freezer that the door didn't close and it is 95 degrees out... Say goodbuy to your Frozen Elk and Deer...) Also Aquariums for temperature and other sensors that you can feed back into your central HVAC/Security systems. Temperature sensors all over the place (check out the aforementioned DIY Zoning site)
Outlets outside under your eaves for Christmas lights.
And the list goes on.
Good luck and I hope you have some deep pockets...
Build a small network room with both phone and cable jacks. You could also put the circuit breaker box in this room. Put all phone wiring in there along with Cable/DSL modem, router, etc. If you put this room in the right location (i.e. just behind wherever you plan to put your living room entertainment center) then you could also use this room to get easy access to the wiring of all your A/V components. If you don't put this room there, you still want to consider building in easy access to the back of the entertainment center.
If the house is more than one story, consider a centralized vacuum system.
I'm not sure I'd put many computerized gadgets into the kitchen, except for the home automation of lights and phone. If you're much of a cook spend your kitchen money on a convection oven a good refrigerator, and a high quality stove (if you want high tech you could go with an induction stove). Consider an under sink hot water heater for instant hot water from the tap. Don't forget a good water filtration system (possibly for the whole house and not just the kitchen).
I'd do the networking all as Cat5-e with Gigabit Ethernet...
I've cooled on that idea quite a bit over the years, network jacks in every room is so 90s / dot bombish. I'd vote for running conduit to all room but only install boxes/jacks in very very select locations. For example the bedroom/den/loft serving as the serious home office and the garage (attic in NO?) with the noisy servers, let the rest of the house with the more consumer needs just go wireless. If things change, or there is a new owner, the conduit behind the wall provides a lot of flexibility, a selling point.
Since the house has been gutted, you can install an entire system of pneumatic tubes, one to each room. Send a sandwich from the kitchen to the garage; send your laundry directly to the laundry room.
Electric trains running from room to room along the crown moulding, and through tunnels in the walls.
Lift-off computer room floor in the living room.
Underfloor fishtanks.
I speak as an expert on this, if the house was sitting in flood water then its probably useless. saturated wood loses its trueness and is susceptible to dry rot. your looking at warped walls which are a pain in the but to finish. I suggest if the house has a second story you put all of your new hi fi equipment up there as it's usually no good sitting in ten feet of water.
If you're planning on wiring your home, start from the basement, under the stairs. In most normal sized houses, you can route every cable from there. Don't forget to double everything: two Cat6, two RG6, two everything else in every room if not more. You won't regret it even if you don't use the extra wires in the end.
I have my little data center under the stairs and it's a fun little thing to have. And because TV and phone are also distributed there, it makes life easier when you want to have a media server that records TV shows. And because it's in the basement, it's never hot or warm.
Pimp it out modestly, and use the saved money to help those around you who are less fortunate.
You want to rebuild a house in an city built below sea level on the coast in a hurricane prone region. Where the city is protected by levees maintained by corrupt politicians and backed up by incompetent federal bureaucrats. And your biggest concern is which electronic gadgets to buy?
[Insert pithy quote here]
New Orleans is big on crime. I have been recently trying to rebuild a house that I had gutted, and I have had reports from my neighbors about people trying to hop over my newly-made 9-ft fence and bust in through iron-barred windows. If you put tech in your house at all, be 100% sure to theft-proof the place, or you might find every single speck of stuff missing the next morning.
You can use cheap PVC stuff instead of the expensive rigid metal variety, so that you can afford to use larger-sized conduit (although the latter provides some nice shielding if it's properly grounded); and use gentle, sweeping curves instead of tight corners, but make sure that if the signal conduits are parallel to any power, they're several feet apart, to avoid inducing a current in your Ethernet. Since standard AC wiring puts outlets near the floor, and light switches are 3-4 feet from the floor, that means running the signal cables more like 6 feet from the floor, and dropping down to the outlets you wish to install.
Since the cost of pulling cable is generally a lot more than the cable itself, do yourself a favor and put in the Cat6, even though you don't think you need it yet. A centrally-located wiring/server closet isn't a bad idea, provided that you give it good ventilation. Use the upper part of the closet for the electronic gear and patch panel, middle for your AC distribution breakers (if any) and UPS to power the server and network switch, router, etc., and the lower part for storage of things that won't die if they get wet.
[100% ISO 646 Compliant]
SVM, ERGO MONSTRO.
Those refridgerator drawers are a must for the kitchen =)
Know what you mean about water damaged wood. I'm amazed houses and businesses with lots of wood composite chip board survive the rain until they are completed. I see construction sites with that stuff warping before its even installed.
Another thing that would worry me about buying a house in NO... Are the title deeds REALLY clear? They won't have any claims made on them in the future from former lost residents trying to come back? I see a movie in the making...
I talked to a colleague a few years ago before Katrina who did electrical work for some older buildings. Alot of wire insullation is not even rubber based but rather cotton based. Spill water on it and you have a major short circuit and a fire.
At this point I wonder if it would be cheaper to buy a new home built from scratch?
New Orleans also has a problem with invasive African termites that devour older homes much quicker than American ones. Older homes use alot more wood for things like floor boards compared to newer ones which use plywood mixed with polymer boards for flooring.
http://saveie6.com/
I've bought toys from http://www.audioauthority.com/, and if you have the cash to spend, I'd invest in a AVAtrix Whole-House Routing System (about $4000), which is an A/V matrix distribution system.
It doesn't support HDMI, but for sending/controlling HD Component (or DVI) from up to 6 locations, and signal distro over a pair of Cat5s, it's really tough to beat. I've been planning for years on setting a system like this up in a house so I could watch/play any component on any display in the house.
The primary focus should not be wiring. You should be installing 3-5" plastic conduits in the walls, that run between all rooms and a central location such as attic, basement, or a wiring closet.
With the wiring closet method, you might end up with more than one (IE a closet on each floor) in which case youll also want to run conduit between the closets, and possibly between there and the attic/basement.
This way you can pull cheap cat5e now, and later easily upgrade to cat6 or fiber, as well as run low grade cat5 for simple wiring purposes (IE phone, security, alarm, or any electronics you want to wire up together or to a computer.)
This not only lets you upgrade as needed, but you don't have to waste money on fiber you won't use just yet, or worry that whatever you ran won't be compatible later. You just run what you need when you need it, as you need it.
Another thing to keep in mind, do NOT run electricity/power lines in the conduits! Not to mention it wont meet electrical codes, but will cause interfearance with data/signal cables. So you'll want to do/have-done the power lines seperate, and lots of them.
Even if the house is only rated for a set amount of amperage from the mains, and youre limited in circuits in the breakerbox, it's still a good idea to run extra wiring to plug outlets in the wall and simply leave the lines unused by the breaker box.
This way if you ever move your server room/closet, you can disconnect and reconnect outlets as needed when the time comes.
like these guys at MIT. See:
http://web.mit.edu/zacka/www/midas.html
The page has the circuit diagrams for the wiring as well as a suggested layout.
HAI, which is fittingly a New Orleans based manufacturer of home automation products is the way to go if you want a cost effective automated home. It employs UPB technology, which is basically an improved version of X10, a carrier wave based protocol that can minimize the need for excessive rewiring. The main thing is that you have a neutral at the switch. Their system integrates security, lighting control, heat, etc.. The system is very flexible, and can be programmed with a laptop very easily; without a laptop it takes a bit more time. They have touchscreens, thermostats, dimmers, relays etc..and if you want fancy looking devices you can integrate an HAI system with a higher end system to yield roughly the same capabilities. Check out their website http://homeauto.com/
As a guy with several overclocked PCs running various distributed computing projects 24/7, the rooms get hot. I'd want a way to vent PC heat with some conduit without having to run it out a window. I'd also want some pipe fittings in key rooms so I could operate watercooling outside and pipe it into the house seamlessly (to save noise from fans and truly remove the heat from the inside). And of course there is solar power. Don't have to buy now, but at least make allowances for it now.
Slashdot "libertarians": Small government for me, big government for those I disagree with. -1, I disagree with you
I did the phone/data thing at my parent's house (I couldn't do it in my apartment because I knew I'd be moving out eventually... screw the next tenant) and it's pretty sweet.
I have 12 runs and arranged the terminations in a cabinet in the basement like this: 3 rows of 12. The top panel is for terminating the run to whichever room. The middle panel splits out the middle two wires (pins 4 & 5) and connects them to a 66 block (which is in turn connected to my vonage router) and forwards the remaining wires (pins 1-3, 6-8) to the bottom panel. I also have a 24-port 100Mswitch and a 5-port 1000M switch. The 24-port switch supports vlan and is connected to a linksys WRT54GL which has priority queuing for specific vlans.
This allows me to select the following configurations simply by swapping patch cables:
1. Full ethernet (compatible with 100M or 1000M ethernet): patch from the top panel to one of the switches.
2. Ethernet + phone (compatible with 100M ethernet & 1-line phone CONCURRENTLY ON THE SAME RUN): patch from the top panel to the middle panel, then patch from the matching bottom panel jack to one of the switches. Whether phone or ethernet is used then depends on the device plugged into the jack on the other end of the run.
3. Phone only: Patch from the top panel to the middle panel. No patch connected to the matching bottom panel jack.
One thing about this: You have to be careful when using the mixed ethernet and phone configuration. Some ethernet cards terminate pins 4 and 5 to ground (or somesuch) which is "picked up" in telco wiring. This makes the phone unusable.
An improvement on this system would obviously be to have some sort of asterix box in the wiring cabinet such that each phone or phone+ethernet could be its own extension. This would eliminate the problem mentioned above.
Instead of worrying what type of cable to run in the walls, run PVC pipe from every room down to a room in the basement. As standards change, it will make it a lot easier to re-run new cable to a central point.
Be very careful when buying plastic conduits. The stuff suitable for in home conduits is not necessarily what you will find in the gardening section for your lawn sprinklers. Some PVC pipes, glues, etc will emit some pretty nasty stuff when burning. Check your local building codes.
It's been a couple of years since I saw it, but I think the company still exists out there, you'd have to do a search on the internet. Basically, it's a flash-bake oven based off IR/UV lamps (the same lamps they use to 'cook' integrated circuits). It can flash-bake a pizza (or any other thin food) faster than a microwave, and it's hot and browned, not just heated like a microwave. The last I saw they were going for about 5K apiece, but should be cheaper by now if they are still available.
Just wifi it all up really good (multi-channels) and use that wifi blocking paint on the outside to keep others out.
That way when it floods again you can grab it up and take it with you. And once you establish the workability of it you can use your home as a working example of your new internal wifi home technology business.
As technology advances things get smaller, faster and able to store more information in that small and faster.
That's what you can count on for the future, and not the need for more wiring as some have suggested you to conduit for upgrade possibility.
then you are going to need a few iracks to store stuff.
Monstar L
Get a small LCD and an Apple TV, mount both behind a plexiglass window above the shower head. Retrofit the Apple TV's remote to work with a waterproofed keypad and add some waterproof speakers in the ceiling.
The main point to this would be for music but you could probably find other uses.
What are you going to do with it all once you've built it?
Owning a lot of high-tech crap does not enhance your life.
If you're trying to impress the easily impressed, it's easier to buy an expensive sports car.
"But there are no windows!"
"Exactly."
You are reading a sig. Cancel or allow?
Want to build a high tech house? Don't use wood. What the hell is it with people building homes out of wood anyway??? Wood rots, burns, gets eaten by insects and ants, etc etc...
a nel-house/
Build this on a steel reinforced concrete foundation:
http://www.inhabitat.com/2006/05/02/touring-the-p
Bonus points if you shock-isolate the house from the foundation.
Install solar panels on the roof, and wind power in the back yard.
Don't run too many cables (except for power). Use wireless. It is only going to get better/faster.
Home automation rocks too. Just don't use X-10. I have an X-10 system. It sucks ass. Try to build your own around WiFi or Bluetooth so you can control the house from a PDA or cell phone. Bonus points if you incorporate voice activation.
Next time a big one hits, just move all your stuff to the top floor in case of flooding, and ride it out.
Then you're ready to start thinking about control gear for all this, so that if a big storm comes when you're not there, shutters close, pumps start if needed, power is cut in wet areas to prevent shorts, gas valves close, water lines are isolated to prevent contamination...
I think the best advise would be to run conduit, for the future, you can pull more wires through if needed. If you have my luck it will not matter whatever you run now, as the spouse will want it in another location when you place the furniture. I recommend conduit in as many areas to cover every possible spousal equation.
I do like the flood walls and stilts replies as well, ask a question your going to get a plethora of sarcasm...
Good Luck,
Married Man
OK /. -- what goes in THIS room??
Construct the replacement house such that it won't be ruined if it floods.
http://www.concretecentre.com/main.asp?page=1583
You are also in a hurricane region. Concrete construction is also quite wind resistant. Decent shudders will keep out flying parts of your neighbors' houses. They can also keep out the looters who come after the storm/flood.
Having said the above, you then having trouble convincing the cops that you aren't building a fortification. That's illegal in lots of jurisdictions.
Finally, check out the magazine "Fine Homebuilding". After every major natural disaster they have articles researching how various kinds of construction resisted the disaster. http://www.taunton.com/finehomebuilding/ Do your research. Concentrate on basic house construction. Don't forget that you will have to be able to get insurance and that could cost a lot unless you take precautions to minimize damages in the next disaster.
I have an apartment with (maybe) 600 square feet and most of that is the bedroom. I still manage to host a party for 30 and everybody has a good time. I took the biggest blank wall and, opposite, put a shelf right near the ceiling on which sits a $800 projector from costco. I also bought a $60 dvd player and a $850 5.1 stereo/receiver from Best buy. (found one that had been previously opened, discount=good). atop the receiver sits my Wii. The only trick is running the cable from the receiver on one side of the room to the projector on the other, and the cables for this I was able to get at the dollar store. Anyone else would sell me the same 25' for >$100. I'll take the signal degredation, thank you. If I suddenly come into some money then I'll get apple TV and hack it so i can run VLC and connect that to my receiver, because right now the only problem is that I have no way to get 5.1 out from my Mac (that I know of).
This set up has a number of advantages. It's almost invisible. I don't have to worry about a guest thowing the controllers at the wall. The projector makes a 93" picture, which would cost about $10,000 if it was a flat panel TV. I can't watch during the day which forcibly curtails my video addiction.
The kitchen is only remarkable in that my breakfast table is one of those flat arcade machines you can sit down and put your drink on. This way People can Wii Box, smoke on the balcony, hang out in the kitchen, or Galaga to their heart's content.
I have a single 802.1g Wifi connection which doesn't see much use, a decent number of fish and easy to take care of plants (like bamboo), and a few pieces of art. I used the Rastorbator to blow up my favorite photo from spain and it covers one wall. My place still provides me with all the high tech I need, requires no maintenance, is girl-friendly, and all I need to do for a party is roll up the carpet to prevent spill damage.
So I hope that gives you some ideas for your place.
While your question deals with network and entertainment technology,
/. typical ;)
I will give you some points, why you should save some money on the entertainment part and
spend money into a "green-house"-upgrade, and present some pro/cons of the availible
solutions
a.)
Prices for energy were on the rise other the past few years,
it´s unlikly that they will drop, and with the
computerdensity you will pay much
b.)
At the moment you are in a good financial position, as the economy shows a cyclic
behaviour this can turn upside down, then it would be good when your energy paymentsis are no concern to you.
Why better insulating your house ?
(+) less energy/money for heating in the winter
(+) less energy/money for cooling in the summer
(o) higher resale price in future when energy prices are climbing
(-) higher investment costs
Why solar electric power ?
(-) higher investment costs
(o) efficiency depending on the availiability of direct sunlight
(+) *can be* independent while power outages
(o) perhaps it´s sponsored by the goverment where you live
(o) higher resale price, if you sell to green people or if prices will rise
(+) could power your AC in summer, while the AC not flooding your electricity bill
(+) **could power your AC in summer, while the powerlines are offline
**can be -
if your DC to AC converter is netcontrolled it will go offline if the electricity network
goes down, an alternative: battery buffered solutions.
Why solar thermal heating ?
Why geothermal heating ?
(+) low price for heating
(+) constant availiable
(-) power for the heatpump
(-) higher investment costs
(o) *solar* efficiency depending on the availiability of direct sunlight
I did this last year on a complete gut/remodel and went for dual cat 5e/dual RG-6 video bundle. Each room got ethernet/phone/dual video going to a central box. My only advice is to choose a box the next size larger than you think you'll need.
-G
During the construction, place a outlet box in each wall and run a conduit to you crawl space.
Do not try and chain a series of boxes through one conduit. It can rub the insulation off the cables when they are pulled over each other. The total number of bends when added together in a conduit should be under 360 degrees or you will have problems pulling through them. If you like to play around with your house wiring, moving things around, go with 3/4 inch if possible; two cat-5 and a coax do fill things up.
Check with your local building permits before you do anything. Different areas have rules what is allowed to be installed by the homeowner and what comes under licensed contractor. Installation of conduit will cause a building inspector into looking at things a bit more closely than usual. When it comes to building inspectors, do not at anytime argue, just ask very in a nice way on what you need to do. Get on the wrong side of one and you will get a stop work and a lot of frustrations in trying to reschedule.
Use copper over the fiber to connect things up. Most of the consumer grade network equipment does not have fiber capabilities. Look at the pricing between a fiber NIC and a copper. Fiber is used mostly to handle distance problems and backbone infrastructure. Gigabit Ethernet over copper and Gigabit Ethernet over fiber will get you the same speed, you will just spend more money for the fiber. Fiber optics have the additional problems of termination, how are you going to get the ends on it?
(Anchor optional.)
Windows has detected an undetectable error.
Flood zone.
Are you really going to want to use crawlspaces in a place that could flood at least a few feet deep? I like your idea for false walls, though.
You can get structured wiring cable pre-bundled with two cat5 or cat 6, dual rg6, and cat3 for telephone. Or get bigger bundled cable that also includes two fibers for future expansion. Leviton wall plates with "keyhole" adpters for fiber, cat5/6 telephone, etc.
...
Put in a biger than you think you'll ever need structured wiring panel. Put in a wall mount swing out rack mount above it for the rack mount UPS, the rack mount ethernet switch, small shelf for your Vonage adapter(s), video routing equipment, security camera DVR,
Replace all the wiring and update the electrical service panel. Put in a automatic transfer switch to accomdate a generator (wire the generator junction box outside if not adding the generator now, but put in the transfer switch. In an area with natural gas? Run a line to the same area and have it capped off (and run one to where your outdoor BBQ will be just in case the hi-tech attracts friends frequently)
Determine where your flat panel entertainment device will go, as well as the one for your work, if different. Accomadate a power oulet (clock style that is recessed) and data cables to the location for video to be remotely accessible. Similarly wire the ouside security cameras with siamese cable, even if you don't install any camera yet. Or wire the camera locations with cat5 and low voltage power cable for a future net-cam security system, although normal video to a central location and a video server/dvr is cheaper and almost as flexible or more flexible depending on the money spent.
The importnat thing: Wiring now during the rebuild and leaving wasted wire in the wall is cheaper than doing concealed wiring after the walls are up.
Consider running high voltage and low voltage conduits to the attic and other potentially hard to route to areas or locations where maybe you want something but are not sure yet. Also, consider having some outlets in the house to be battery backud up UPS driven where a BIG UPS sits in the wiring closet. Old "APC Matix" units show up occasionally on eBay.
I can not stress too much that you want, really really want, to put in the wire and access ways and conduits etc. for your wildest dreams while the walls are stripped. Don't forget IR sensors and transmitters as well for whole house AV control. They'll run to your wiring cabinet too.
- Tjp
I am in wallow with my inner money grubbing capitalistic pig. ... Oink!
I recommend running cat5e to all thermostats, appliances, etc.. for future proofing, in addition there should be at least two cat5e outlets per room. If you are going to do a lot of VOIP then spring for cat6. I would also recommend having a demarcation point somewhere in the home, where all of the cable, satelite, phone services will come into the house. Run at least three coaxes from the exterior of the house to the interior, and make sure that the demarcation point has a conduit run to the attic so that you can drop new services in as they become available. I would also recommend using #12 gauge wire instead of #14 if budget is not an issue. If you want automated lighting and security use HAI http://homeauto.com/, which is a New Orleans based manufacturer. Their products make use of UPB, which is a newer, open version of the old X10 protocol. It is superior to X10 in that it will not pass through a transformer, and has a higher voltage which is less susceptible to harmonic noise. Fluorescent and low voltage lighting can still be an issue so you will want to make sure your lighting is line voltage, or else has magnetic transformers. Also, put in occupancy sensors with relay outputs and run those back to the HAI panel so that you can use them in your conditionally programming of the system. You can also integrate it with Russound home audio to get a multi room multi source audio system. You can also control the blinds, heating and irrigation with HAI. They almost got wiped out by hurricane katrina, but they stuck around and kept their operations, and employees. A great opportunity for you to support a local manufacturer, and employer.
Build an ark!
I couldn't agree more with the parent. Chances are probably 50% your local friends will be tech-savvy. So when you get together with your buddies they'll all want a wall outlet close to their leather recliner. This will keep cords from stringing across the room.
Have an above average sound system with crisp highs and tight thump. I'd have 7.1 in the living room but have high quality flush-with-wall speakers in every room. The 'house' music is always playing everywhere. Have an audio jack in each bedroom to allow your visitors to plug in their iPod so they can pump their favorite tunes in their own room.
When your friends come over and crack open their MacBooks they'll assume you have Wi-Fi. Get corporate grade Cisco wireless routers so nobody's connection ever gets dropped and you can assure them that it's as secure as possible. I'd get a gateway router with 2 Wan ports so you can double up on the fastest broadband you can afford. Your friends will appreciate the lightning fast downloads and surfing.
It's important to have a bar with a mini-fridge that's always stocked. You could even go for one of those fancy Starbucks-style cappucino/everything coffee makers. Have the best coffee in stock. Always have a case of chilled Bawls, Mountain Dew and Dr. Pepper in the mini-fridge.
Inevitably you'll have friends wanting to make your house their remote office/hangout spot. So want a really cool idea? Install those card access readers for your front door locks and various internal doors (bedroom, office, etc.). Give cards to your friends and tell them, "If your card lets you in just let yourself in and make yourself at home. If it doesn't then go away, I'm busy or not home."
Would this not be the sweetest tech hangout ever?
At some of the break rooms at my job there are sensors on the walls that detect movement in the room. When you walk into the room, the lights turn on. After some certain amount of time without any motion in the room they automatically turn off. They're pretty nifty AND energy-saving.
Might keep the water out, but more importantly it'll help keep stray rounds out and provide a more secure firing position when you defend it after the next hurricane.
If your not going to use ducting take pictures of the wiring before it is sealed beind the dry wall..
Cat-6 has come down a lot in price, only slightly above the cost of Cat-5.
Besides, you would want to keep to the specs; Cat-5e wont help once 10Gb networking becomes norm.
RFID tag your entire DVD collection, get sensors and be able to find any DVD quickly! Much better use than for making passports insecure. While you're at it tag your keys and any other easy to lose items.
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
Some poor unfortunate was screwed out ot your gutted property by the republican greed machine. And you want free technical help.
Cat5e should be enough for anybody. :) 1Gb has become pretty commonplace, and Cat5e can carry it. But, what happens when 2, 5, 10Gb... is commonplace (not in the too distant future IMO). I think, it would be worth it to put in Cat6 for future capacity.
But, I agree with the other posters that conduit is the best future-proofing you could install, insofar as the wiring goes.
"Speech is conveniently located midway between thought and action, where it often substitutes for both." John A. Holmes
I've had X10 for years - and while nice, it doesn't always work as expected. Remotes will stop working until I unplug and replug in the receiver, tap DIM to lower lights one level and they'll occasionally dim all the way to OFF and be unresponsive after that.
I'm in the process of upgrading my X10 system to INSTEON. It's much more robust, haven't experienced the quirks I've had using X10. I've also noticed it's much quicker at turning things on/off.
Indigo is home automation software for OS X - it supports INSTEON as well as X10.
...I wanna come to your party.
Yeah, Gigabit Ethernet oughtta be enough for anybody....
To
One thing a lot of people don't think about is putting power outlets near the ceiling or in the attic for all of those fancy wireless devices, security cameras, etc. you're going to want to power. Don't overlook data lines up high for the same reason.
The idea of pre-wiring for speakers always seems like a good one, but I've never been able to use it in any house I've ever lived in. Inevitably, someone's idea of where things should be placed will be different than yours - technology will change, all of a sudden you'll find yourself needing/wanting "10.1" instead of the 7.1 you ran through the walls.
The conduit idea is a good one and probably the only way to truly future-proof your investment. If I were starting from scratch I'd definitely consider the idea of a wiring closet or 2-post telco rack in a corner of the garage.
That and the prehensile tail you may grow after a few years of living there...
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
Cheap.. Hey that's the idea:Don't build a rich kid's house. Build for the poor in New Orlans.
A Good Troll is better than a Bad Human.
I don't know how things work down in New Orleans (particularly given that it is not a common law territory) but many of the homes, probably including the one in question, were condemned. That probably makes it much easier to void the previous titles.
"Most people try and go the easy way by using the off the shelf crap that is out there but the truth is that home automation has hardly begun because the real power tools are being largely ignored by the less than technically courageous types that typically do home automation." Design Time is very expensive, and off the shelf products tend to be very cost effective due to mass production. You can install a network of dimmers that will communicate with each other without a need for a central brain easily, provided that you have a neutral at the switch box. HAI http://www.homeauto.com/, uses UPB, which allows its dimmers to communicate using a carrier wave signal over the house's neutral. It is an improved version of the old X-10, which many of you are probably familiar with. Unlike X-10, it is not as finnicky and susceptible to harmnonic noise, which is very prevalent in most modern homes. You can have basic automated lighting with programmed scenes for about $60 a dimmer, and they all talk to each other, so unless you want more than basic lighting control, there is no need for a central "brain".
CONDUIT.
Everywhere.
No matter how much you take suggestions, plan, and over-spec, you WILL see a day in the near future where you want to have a new and different comm line than you had first installed.
So, the first thing to do is to run conduit everywhere. This will let you easily run new wire/fiber, etc. later(it will also let a future homeowner do it, so it may improve your ultimate resale value). Plastic PVC pipe works great, and it is even a bit slippery inside to make new runs easy.
As you install the conduit, install multiple pull-strings, and label them all. Whenever you pull a new wire, also pull a new pull-string, so you will always have them ready.
Two caveats: 1) check with the Fire Inspector to see if they have any regs, as they could be concerned about the conduit creating a "chimney", so you may need to install something to prevent that. 2) You may need to use plenum grade cable, which is good anyway, since it has insulation that is tougher and more slipprey. (buy all your cable in bulk)
This conduit system will need to work for telephone, computer, cable, and audio and visual systems.
Some of these will require point-to-point systems, but a number of them will also require a central distribution/hub/multi-junction/router sort of device, and so planning a central wiring closet / hub-central is good. It should be accessible, and have ventilation. While it might be most convenient at the wiring entry in the basement, the top floor or attic is probably best in your potential flood situation.
From that closet, run conduit to every room and to most walls. You might consider several parallel conduit runs while you are in there, or at least oversize the conduit a lot, because cable bundles get fat much faster than you expect.
There are two possible exceptions to the conduit-everywhere approach, a media room and a security system.
The media room because it will have known locations, so you might not run conduit, but you might just want to run some anyway between the various I/O points, since never know when you'll want fiber to your new monitor, or something.
The security system should probably just be cheaply pre-wired with a 2-pair wire to each window and entry -- WAY easier when the walls are open. These are really basic sensors and tech. Ask a security company what is best, and run the wire while the walls are open, even if you don't plan to hook up a system (might help with resale even if you never install the system).
Once you have all the conduit, you can run what you like. Probably start with a bundle of Cat6, some 3-pair tel wire, and some coax TV cable. This covers all the basics, both for you and for a potential future owner.
Remember the labels and the pull-strings, and you will be very happy one day in the future when a weekend wire-fishing project is done in a half hour....
And Good Luck with your new house!
Seriously, don't be such a selfish turd. Help your neighbors. If you think your surround sound is more important than the people that live next to you, go screw.
If you had a blank canvas to start with, what would you do? Run CAT-5 or fiber optics?
Me, I'd run empty conduit to every room. No matter what you run today, there will be something better 10 years from now. Maybe 5.
"We reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals." --The American President (20.1.2009)
But what I really want when I get around to building a house is central vacuum and compressed air. Central vacuum is amazing for dealing with bugs: just point the hose at the bug, and whoosh! he's in the garage. Having compressed air available is great for drying off your glasses, blasting dust out of your keyboard, or getting a fire started with damp logs in the fireplace.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
Something I've desired to do for a long time is to put all the baseboards in the house on hinges. That way whenever a new cabling standard comes out its a simple matter of lifting up the hinges and putting new wires down. If plumbing were also run along the same lines it'll save money in renovations when something inevitably gives.
The tricky bit about the whole thing is software, while there are lots of good individual bits and pieces for the various functions you probably want (MythTV for example), there isn't anything (AFAIK anyway) that lets you manage all these things centrally - if you want the house to be really clever, then having everything coordinated by one system is what you want...
I think that first of all you need to decide whether the house going to be mono hull or double hull. A double hull is more stable in large swells and you can make a nice open living room on the bridge.
Excuse me, but please get off my Pennisetum Clandestinum, eh!
The first thing I would do is not use the word "pimp". I know a lot of people use it, but if you think about it, it should be no more acceptable than "hos" and "bitches."
Self awareness - try it!
1st, a note to other readers with bad intentions: if you are planning on some kind of crass flame-fest because you have decided to show a complete lack of planning in your own personal lifestyle, skip this long-winded post. I don't care that you think it's old skool or some other crap. The original poster asked for an opinion, I gave it. Short version: Trolls, go put your head up your ass. IMHO, when the fit hits the shan, you'll be dead anyways due to stupidity, and I don't have conversations with dead people.
To the poster and interested, open-minded readers: Sorry about that, let's get on with this:
The high-tech-toy approach is great for entertaining and informing, but when it comes down to it, I think you really should be thinking long-term. Don't develop the kind of myopia that runs rampant through the industry when it comes to long-term planning. Focus on what will happen in the next 20-30 years, if you are really planning on living there long-term.
Given that the area is well-known for hurricanes, building a housing structure that can take some punishment might be a good idea. I know people will poo-poo this, but, a geodesic dome, or earth berm house, or some other structure that can take severe damage and still be intact would be a really good idea. Nothing says short-sighted than to have another hurricane come along and raze your house - and the computers in it - to the ground. I'm not saying domes are the absolute way to go, go out and do some research, there are other structures as well. But domes are well-noted for their structural integrity.
Next, given that the ACoE probably will continue to be underfunded and floods WILL continue to occur, you might want to make sure it's property on a hillside, and not down in the floodplain. If it is, why are you bothering to buy it? You're just buying into someone else's grief - give it enough time, and you'll share that grief.
Having some kind of emergency facilities would be far more geekier than a bunch of networked Macs. Imagine, your home, the only one around with working emergency electricity, working stoves (some kind of outside firepit or fireplace made with masonry would be ideal), and drinkable water. Put some thought into having the home in a working state off-grid, it will go a long ways towards keeping it going - and towards preparations for future issues the country faces, like an overworked and overloaded electrical grid on the east coast. At a minimum, spring for a 1000 Watt generator, one that is durable and long-lasting, pay the electrician for a temporary hookup into your mains, and you're still in better shape. If you want a cheesy way to picture this, think "Jurassic Park Emergency Power Station", sans CGI dinos and wonky, stupid, plot-device-necessity placement. (sorry, couldn't resist the cheese!)
As an extension of the "facilities" concept, a small workshop, one big enough to house a motorcyle or ATV in for work, would be another great idea. Make sure it's as structurally sturdy as your house. It also means that, when you're not using it to service your computers, you can be using it to service motorcycles, ATV's, small generators (see above), etc. and not worry about a mechanical breakdown when things might be difficult to get to a mechanic.
A septic system may be so 19th-century, but it also doesn't require a working sewer hookup. If you don't think taking a dump is serious business, try holding it in for several DAYS, and see if you change your tune. Working waste facilities means not having to worry, and worrying about where you're going to go relieve yourself after a potential hurricane/flood doesn't help much. Remember, there were people stuck in confined spaces for days or weeks, can you imagine what they had to do? If you get really ambitious, find a way to be able to switch between the two at will, so you can have septic as a backup system rather than your full-time system.
So, now that location, structure, energy, water, sewer, and facilities are squared away
It is traggic how much we are limited to mass produced products, so I'll name some crazy pointers I be most interested in.
All heating done by combustion.
All rotation done by pneumatic motors.
All potential energy stored as compressed air.
All chemical to mechanical energy done with gas turbines.
Given comercial and technical feasibility two completely distinct spheres, and we are not of bourgeois, what matters is durability and efficiency. Imagine having all your mechanical kitchen applicances, laundry appliances, backup generators, air contioning, bench tools, done by pneumatic motors. Afterwhich your only problem is filling the tank with compressed air, which would prove far superior wether you're using a solar panel, solar/sterling dish, windmill, gas turbine, diesel/gas/steam engine. So moving past off-grid/desaster scenerio pipe dream, I would maximize insulation with non openable windows, hermetically sealed doors, a porch in the 2nd or 3rd floor.
orgasmatron
Gutted property? You will be sorry. Are you buying in an area with tons of blight and high vacancies? That pretty much automatically puts you in a high crime area, or at the very least high potential for it. Are the houses you are looking at gutted because of the floods? Then don't waste your time "pimping" out your house. God knows what unseen damage there is beyond what is apparent (undermined foundation?) You might save when you initially buy the property, but you will spend untold 10's of thousands renovating the place. Remember, construction materials are insanely expensive right now, especially down there. If you have delays and cost overruns, which is very likely, you will find yourself going upside down (ie owing more than the house is worth) quite quickly. Additionally, if the area remotely bad, you are going to find that construction materials will disappear from your property overnight.
My personal recommendation is this: Spend the extra money and buy a single story house that needs little if any work with an easy-to-work in attic in a good neighborhood . If anything, get something that only needs cosmetic touchups, not major structural work.
Drywall is easy to work with. You can do everything you were talking about in your post with the walls and ceilings in place. Save the boatload of money you'd dump into construction and use it to buy a home automation kit and all the wiring you can shake a stick at for a fraction of that cost. Invest in a long drill bit, a drywall saw, and some metal fishtape to run the Cat5 in the walls. In that single story house w/ lots of working space in the attic, it'll be a lot easier and keep you saner than forking over tons of money and time to renovate a pile that should otherwise be demo'ed.
-R
Everyone seems to be obsessed with data transfer. I'm going to go in a different direction. Install plugs. Lots and lots of plugs. I believe the house standard is two outlets every 3 feet - put in at least eight outlets every 3 feet. I don't know about you, but I'd *love* to be able to forget entirely about power strips.
If you want to be really cool, install some normal outlets and some UPS outlets, connected to a big honkin' UPS in the middle of your house somewhere. How many people have centralized battery-backed power?
Breaking Into the Industry - A development log about starting a game studio.
If you're going for a smart house, don't use Gb eth. You need poe switches...
Cat-5 wiring is not some high tech thing. It is a basic feature on new houses. Each bedroom-sized room should have two wall plates with 2 RJ-45 jacks each. All of this should connect back to your wiring closed with a structured media panel. Coax jack should come back to the same closet, separate panel. The wiring closet should have plenty of power, probably at least two circuits worth.
This is not some nerd dream. It is basic house wiring today. Any RJ-45 jack in the house should be able to be part of the telephone network, the pc network, the security network, the tv network, etc. Don't have a security network? Fine. Don't have a tv network? Give it a year or two.
You want your entertainment room to have adequate connectivity back to your wiring closet. You should have Cat-5 to your projector/big screen/tv area. You should also have the ability to plug a remote extender in here, with a lead going back to your wiring closet. Your surround sound, and any other speakers throughout your house, should also wire through your wiring closet.
This isn't star trek stuff anymore. It is just common sense.
Whether the wiring closet gets loaded with PVR, PBX, DSL Router, Wireless Access Point, etc. is up to the current occupant of the house. If you choose to put an old fashioned VCR in your living room next to your TV, fine. But when you sell your house, you won't have to apologize for your wiring.
I recently looked into this for my house. Most residential A/V and networking people have no clue. Further, they fail to consider anything but the most minimal usage. As a result you'll have to spec this out in detail yourself:
1. Plan for a wiring closet/server room.
a. Make sure you have room in the closet for a full 4-post 19" rack (not a telecom rack, which your wiring guys will probably want to do). Take into account the space you will need to insert servers on slide rails into the rack and space needed to access cabling behind the rack.
b. Run adequate cooling and power to the wiring closet. You probably want a separate zone on your air conditioning to keep the room cooler than the rest of the house. You'll probably want power for a large UPS to handle everything you mount in the rack. I put in a 30A/110V dedicated line for the UPS.
c. Your contractor will think you're nuts because no one does this kind of work in a residence. You will need to lay out the room exactly as you want it because they have no experience with this kind of equipment.
2. Run conduit from the wiring closet/server room to every TV or networking location. Expect that whatever wiring you run today will be outdated in 5 years and you will need to pull new wiring. Run the largest conduit that your contractor will put in the walls at a reasonable price. The cost is dominated by labor, not the cost of the conduit.
3. The choice of cabling you run will be determined by how you want to do A/V distribution. You have two choices:
a. All your A/V equipment resides in the server room, and you distribute only audio/video to each TV location.
b. Or you put cable and/or satellite tuners at each TV location and distribute the raw signals.
4. If you want to use a cable and/or satellite tuner box at each TV location, I recommend at least 3 RG-6 coax to each TV location from the wiring closet. A dual tuner DirecTV Satellite HD-DVR requires 2 RG-6 coax for basic operation plus if you want to receive over the air HD channels you need a 3rd coax for that. That's 3 RG-6 for just one device. Must contractors will want to run only 1 which is totally inadequate. In addition, you will need at least 1 Ethernet and one telephone jack at each location. Most satellite, cable or TiVO boxes need at least one of those. Don't forget that not only will your TiVO, home media PC, and other set-top boxes want Ethernet, but so will your Xbox360. Consider running multiple wires verses an Ethernet hub at each location. I recommend Cat-6 since the cost is dominated by labor, not cable cost, and I prefer the peace of mind of Cat-6 in potentially long cable runs through the walls.
5. If you want to location your satellite/cable box in the server room and distribute HD video throughout the house you will need to run fiber. The only reasonable HDMI distribution system I'm aware of is by Geffen. Don't even think of doing long HDMI cable runs. The Geffen system uses 1 fiber and 1 Cat-6 line to carry HDMI. You install transceivers at either end and the Geffen HDMI switching equipment in your wiring closet.
6. If you want a mix of the above, or just want to be sure, here's what I recommend to every TV location:
+ 4 RG-6: Using 3 is easy with a dual tuner HD DVR, and if you want to carry security cameras, terrestrial TV, etc. that 4th line is useful. Cable is cheap, labor is expensive; run a bundle of 4.
+ 4 Cat-6: Make sure you punch down the Cat-6 using T568B as the wiring scheme so you can use this for GigE or phones. You can easily use 3 of these at each location if you need Ethernet, phone and centrally distributed HDMI video. Again the cable is cheap it's the labor that's expensive; run a bundle of 4. Make sure you contractor tests each line and delivers to you a test report for each line.
+ 2 fiber: Run a fiber pair as well if you want HDMI dist
in my current house I have 2 cat6 + 2 cat3 phone + 2 coax per room, it's not enough
so, first think about the infrastructure of the house and make it able to accomodate changes in the future.
run anything that goes through walls through conduit, you _will_ have to replace wire at some point.
at least two coax per room
at least four cat6 per room
don't bother with cat3 phone jacks, you can plug them into the rj45 plugs of the cat6 runs, and when you move to IP based phones you don't have to re-wire)
this all will fit into a single-wide outlet with a 6-jack panel.
for large rooms, or rooms with lots of doors, plan the layout above for each section of the room (you want to be able to move things wherever you want easily without having to run long cables around the room to the outlets)
for lights, electrical outlets and switches pay the extra money for larger wire then you need for 15A circuits, you may want to upgrade later.
don't do normal wiring for the outlets and switches (which chains the outlets and switches togeather with horizontally run wires) instead run a seperate wire from each outlet vertically to the attic or basement and join them togeather into circuits there. This gives you the ability to move individual outlets to other circuits (including UPS protected circuits) easily, and it also gives you a point where you can insert computer controls to switch on each outlet/light and detect the position of each switch.
for your water, do essentially the same thing, use PEX tubing and run a pair of tubes from each fixture to a water distribution manifold.
look seriously into radient heating (again useing PEX tubing), and a tankless water heater (smaller and more efficiant). on a large house you may need more then one.
you definantly want a good size patch panel somewhere to join this togeather, you want at least a closet.
unfortunantly speaker wire isn't something you can plan for as readily. for large rooms where you may end up doing a theater system you could run wire from the center of each wall to the center of each adjacent wall and to the most distant two corners you wil cover 7.1 in all orientations (it's a total of 8-12 runs of wire, four handle the side speakers in all directions, and then two runs for each possible set of rear speakers)
high-quality video (S-Video, VGA, HDMI, Component, DVI, etc) is expensive enough to run that you probably don't want to run a lot more then you think you need, but you can cheaply run conduit in other locations to make it easier to run the expensive cable later.
once you have this sort of infrastrucure in place you can basicly do anything to the place.
I would start off by placing computer controls on all the lights and making the switches be inputs to the computer, after that move to place useful outlets under computer control.
beyond that you can start placing cameras/microphones around (all IP based so that they just plug into the jacks that were put in place above) and useing voice and face recognition to do the fancier things you are asking about.
David Lang
I'd just run Cat-6 cable rather than fiber or anything fancier, because, ya know, 640Mb/sec should be fast enough for everyone.
G.
Assuming you've taken care of the basics described by previous posters (foundations, structure, flood-proofing), you have a chance to take a more integrated approach to low-power lighting: lots of white LEDs, or even multi-colour LEDs with colour control. Having a blue day? Turn a knob. 8)
I don't know about you, but I have a lot of power supplies powering various devices, and I've wondered about a central DC supply and wiring; I have more 5V devices than any others, but also a few 12V, and two laptops that run on 18V. The 5V and 12V could come from a large PC PSU, or more than one ganged together, with fuses or breakers. You can install the PSU(s) high and dry, and the DC poses no shock risk: just be sure to use wire and connectors rated for the high currents involved.
(this is not a
Apuku has it all figured out. I guess we better call the SAE and let them know that the decision is final, Apuku has made his decision. The new trend is using data architectures for control networks. This should be interesting as we attempt to design drive-by-wire systems using ethernet packet switching. But I'm sure Apuku wouldn't steer us in the wrong way.
cat 5e is capable of carrying gigabit BUT it is at it's limits and if you have any sever crimps or nicks in the cable OR you have not been very careful when jacking the ends you can have a 'gigabit' connection that will switch down to 100 speed as soon as you start transferring data. you will pay no more than 10% more for cat 6 and it is less picky about running gigabit as its pair winding is better suited to higher megahertz(cat5 had a 100mhz target and gigabit is something like 155mhz though i cannot remember exactly) cat 6 will also support 10gigabit which is a currect standard.
i would not aim for anything higher than that with your current wiring as predicted standards change quickly.
conclusion? : use cat6, run 2 wires to each outlet and use conduit if you can as you can pull new wires later AND it will help keep your wires away from the AC wiring which can interfere. if you want speakers all around the room then run 3 cables as cat6 will carry enough speaker current on a single pair for surrounds. you need a little bigger gage for fronts though i have just used 2 pair for each polarity on cat5e and it works quite well. cat5/6 will also carry a cable tv signal a short distance but i would only use multiple pairs on a digital signal as an analog signal may give you some ghosting or noise as the pairs have different lengths because of their twists(blue pair is about 30% longer than the brown pair as it is twisted more)
A hatchet in the attic. :(
Home automation technology just is not to the point yet where you can install and forget. It's constant tweaks and upgrades, failed components, trying to figure out odd configuration files, languages, and protocols to get things to work correctly and with each other.
There is big money to be saved on air conditioning in New Orleans, so this is worth your while. Venting the roof is a good low tech starting point that can use simple temperature based automation, aka the bi-metallic switch they come with. There's a house in my neighborhood with three large box fans and filters in the eaves to keep the attic cool. After that, it's worth your while to learn how to talk to your air conditioner. If you are not going to be around all day or go on vacation, it would be nice to tell the thermostat what to do - so find one that works and will take instructions from your computer. Once you have it working, it should last 20 years, which hardly makes you a slave to it.
Putting in network cable for entertainment purposes has been well defended here.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
It's probable that you'd use Cat5 computer wiring; put a couple of sockets in each room, more in the large shared
rooms. And phone sockets everywhere.
Don't wire it like a home phone system (daisychain), but rather like a commercial
building (all runs to a central wiring closet location). Try to put your wiring closet
somewhere distant from the fuse box and water heater (which are locations riddled with
other pipes). You'll want the wiring closet to have easy access (not behind
things stored in the basement), and light and AC sockets.
If there's a long run inside the walls (crawlspace to attic) consider using conduit, otherwise
just add a nylon string to the pulled wires; it can drag another wire if you find the box
is lacking in any way.
In the wiring closet this week will probably be 100baseT switches (they're cheap), but
gigabit someday. Cat5e is more than adequate for gigabit, remember a house has relatively
short wire runs anyhow.
Might not be a bad idea to cover the roof in solar panels feeding a big battery bank. Then at least when the next "natural" disaster comes you might keep your uptime. And hey, it'll reduce the utility bills too!
Me? I'd move to Canada...
"'I pass the test,' she said. 'I will diminish, and go into the West, and remain Galadriel.'"
- JRR Tolkien.
(double)(float) house;
Tsunami -- You can't bring a good wave down!
Anyone else out there reading this. When dealing with businesses, cheaper isn't always better as far as they are concerned. But they have to be able to trust they are getting what they pay for and what they pay for is worth it to them when you charge more. Do it right and they will never look around again. As cheap as that sounds, that is more business advice then I have given in a long time. And probably something most people understand already.
I would definitely add stripper poles!
Hey, there is only one Return and it's not of the King, it's of the Jedi.
If your not going to have a solar roof, you might as well tilt your roof towards the sun and sell it to a power company who WILL use it. It'll pay off for itself after a while. And after a long while you can replace it with your own solar cells. Or do a green-roof plan.
When it comes to residential, I prefer the Lious Kahn simplicity method: a single long hallway with rooms jetting off it. Separate private from public, setting private in the back, and seperate the garage from the building altogether as an extremely private maintenance area.
Ginga no Rekshiya Mata Each page.
I've done the standard stuff. I have CAT5/CAT6 throughout the house both for a digital phone line as well as network, I have 7.1 wiring in the living room built into the walls, I prewired sensor lines at the doors and windows which all route back to the utility room, have wiring for CCTV and alarm system back to same room. Here are some other things to check out;
Ethernet Thermostat;
http://www.proliphix.com/NT-Basic.aspx
Control and monitor your homes temperature remotely. Multiple sensors are an option.
Ethernet stove with built in fridge and Ethernet/phone connectivity;
http://www.tmio.com/products/
So you can set your dinner in the stove and keep it cold all day, then have it automatically cook and be done right when you get home. If you are late, you can remotely tell the stove to start a bit later. If you don't do this, the stove will refrigerate your food after cooking to keep it from going bad.
There are other vendors of this type of stove. Best Buy had one for $1600 a while back.
You probably don't need an Ethernet sprinkler system. Of course everyone knows about the Ethernet Fridges and X10 light controllers. A video conferencing system for answering the door from throughout your home or even when at work would be nice. I love being able to check my system from my cell phone to make sure the dogs are fine. They like to bark at traffic out the windows.
I can't say that I would "speak as an expert," and anyone who can should feel free to correct me, but as I'm leaving New Orleans in a day or so, would think that covering the bottom portions of a first floor wall with water-resistant sheet rock, aka "green board" would do wonders in the event of another flood, and possibly save you the trouble of gutting the entire house again. Of course, I'm renting in the Garden District, and don't really have to worry about flooding anyway. I presume you're looking at slightly lower elevations. As for the network, go wireless and don't secure it. No one else does, and I haven't paid for my severe abuse of bandwidth via streaming video and torrent downloads since the day I got here. :)
While you're at it, leave the default password unchanged on your router. QoS is a wonderful tool for the above adventures.
The future isn't what you see today. We started out using coax and token rings, Then one day while some PHB was looking for his token, twisted pair came around to be the norm. (that was a joke playing off a dilbert commic) But seriously, look at what drives out connections. It is typically the Internet and whatever comes with the computer. NICs weren't always on board, I remember a time when you had to buy one. When people connected to other computers by telephone and null cable modems. When networking was primarily saving to disk and walking to another machine or having dumb terminals everywhere and everyone worked form the same computer but on different desktops. This isn't all that long ago either. I think the chances are that other tech will be driving the speeds by the time the speeds are needed and used. It is difficult to future proof anything today. Until on another post where I read about the cost of cat6 going down a lot, by the time you need it, it will likely be obsolete. I couldn't see how anyone could justify the cost outside of bragging rights.
If you have a need, use it. It not, just make sure you can replace the cat5e or whatever later. I think twisted pair as we know it will be gone by the time we see the speeds you are talking about. Fiber, Some hybrid fiber/coax or another type of twisted pair would probably carry it.
I'll leave the whiz-bang computer stuff to the Computer related EEs here. I'm a building/sustainability related EE, though, so I'll happily offer my thoughts on the electrical system.
p hp#2 ) if your home owner's association has a problem with traditional PV panels (which can be rather ugly. If you're planning on being in your house 15-20 years or more, you'll probably see a payback in the energy/money you save. If you're going to move in a few years, it might not be worth the investment (unless you just want to do the environmental thing, which I encourage you to do!). One cool thing to do with PVs is to hook up some sort of Red/Green LED device to it so that it shines Green when you're net-positively exporting energy to the grid and Red when you're importing energy from the grid. It's a simple way to get your family involved and make them realize how much power the consume and perhaps convince them to keep better track of their power consumption.
Some people have mentioned running separate conduit for data/electrical systems. I say don't waste your money. Run a few conduits here and there with a pull cord if you ever want to add a couple of power or data outlets, but there's really no point in running your initial stuff in conduit anyway. The contractor is going to want to use romex/MC cable for the power system anyway because it's cheaper and less labor intensive, and he will charge you out the ass to put conduit in a residential application.
For appliances, take a look at induction stoves. A lot of companies have them now so the prices are dropping pretty fast. They heat up your pots and pans ridiculously quick (although make sure you get steel pans of some sort... aluminum won't work) and use much less energy than a typical electric burner or gas burner (albeit it's a different type of energy being used, so I don't know if it's fair to compare the two). They also don't make the cook surface hot, which is always good if you have kids running around.
If you can afford it, I'd also suggest some PVs to produce at least a portion of your power. A company called OpenEnergy has some that look like regular shingles ( http://www.openenergycorp.com/solarsave/products.
Hope my comments helped a little. Best of luck in your endeavor!
www.hometech.com
They have excellent tutorials; I'd start with the stuff on structured wiring. But go through all of the tutorials, and pay heed to their recommendations. For example, it used to be that they were recommending two coax connectors per new wall plate. Now they are recommending three. And they point out that, with some of the newer HDTV's, you may need much more complicated wiring than that in order to support all of the possibilities.
They also sell everything that you will need. But the key point here is that their free tutorials will give you ideas that you never dreamed of.
They are pretty nice folks, and they can often give you extremely good advice if you ask them nicely. They also claim to run Linux on their servers too. :)
My only relationship with them is as an extremely satisfied customer.
New Orleans is below sea level. If you live there long enough, sooner or later you will get flooded out.
It would be illegal to do any of this work yourself. You have to be a licenced electrician to do anything that connects to the mains or the phone system, including network cabling and despite mandatory use of RCDs on mains switchboards.
The only way you can become an electrician is to do a four year apprenticeship. (and of course become an ETU member), regardless of what experience, knowledge or ability you may already possess.
This is ostensibly for safety, but is more about the closed shop mentality of the electrical industry and union power.
If my call is important, why am I talking to a recording?
A few things that come to mind:
- Ground Sourced Heat-Pump (GSHP) (installation space, plumbing, ducting)
- DC cables for solar power distribution (and installation space)
Build flood wall/stilts for the house (or more realistically, Flood Insurance).
Actually do both. By using flood protection in the building construction the cost of flood insurance will be lower, if it is available.
FalconShould there be a Law?
I dunno; I don't think it's the Internet that will determine the best in-home speeds; I think it will be the video being served to a set-top box from a media server in a closet. YMMV, of course.
Rolladens. Shutters, built into the wall. Raise and lower either with a cord or electric/remote. Excellent protection for storms, and lockable for security. I had these in Germany, and they were excellent.
New hotness, and the best fasteners ever built. Check out Popular Science's overview when it won the best tech for 2006.
"The more pity, that fools may not speak wisely what wise men do foolishly" - Touchstone,Shakespeare's "As You Like It"
- radiant floor heat throughout (even heat throughout house, doesn't dry you out like forced hot air) if you live in a cold climate, extend to driveway. flick a switch and bye bye snow. - run all your cables in a conduit pipe. nothing worse than having to fish wire thru floors and walls - solar roof tiles - LED lighting - CAT-6 wiring throughout for ethernet, internet, audio/video distribution, telephone (voip) - SIP phones for voip, intercom, etc.... no analog phones. use asterisk/freeswitch for telephony server - HDTV projector w/ceiling mount for watching movies
You could for once, please, run the electrical tubing and the plumbing in orthogonal lines along the main directions in your house! Perhaps even through dedicated gutters/conduits.
What I see here (in the Netherlands and in Denmark) is that all plumbing and electrical conduits are guided in a sort of "shortest path"-way to the application point. This causes many plumbing tubes and electrical tubing to run criss-cross through the walls, making it very hard to determine where it is safe to drill a hole and where it is not. Also, you'd make your life immensely easier if you would run your tubing through accessible conduits so you wouldn't have to tear down half a wall just to replace some tubing.
Also, earth EVERYTHING! (everything metal and not carrying current that is). Install fire and gas detectors, install a few well-placed extinguishers and then think about the rest.
B.
Every experiment which ends in a big bang is a good experiment.
Run smurf tube from all your data / phone / video / audio wall boxes so that you can rewire easily when the time comes (and you know it will).
p ?productid=3189
Something like this http://www.galesburgelectric.com/store/product.ph
Also, don't just string cable, string CONDUIT so you can upgrade the networking should you ever need to.
I did our house with flexible blue conduit (smurf tube) to everywhere I thought I might want someting in the future.
To run cable, I vacuum a wad of kleenex tied to a string through a run, then use the string to pull the cable/cat5/whatever.
Not too expensive if you do it yourself. Running the tube goes a lot faster with two people.
Never shake hands with a man you meet in a fertility clinic.
What are you going to do to the house, renovate/fix or build new? Assuming you are above the FEMA floodline, I would prefer rebuild with Insulated Concrete Form walls. You can get wind rated windows, they absorb a lot of noise as a byproduct of being wind rated. (Wind being hurricanes and what not.)
In the past, houses have not been built with an eye towards eventual renovation. There are some groups looking into this now. A good stop is Pathnet ( http://www.pathnet.org/ ), which is a partnership between the US Housing and Urban Development Commission and the housing industry. One progressive commercial site is Bensonwood Homes ( http://www.bensonwood.com/ ). They are now doing things like planned crawl spaces and chases in walls. If you watch This Old House, Ted Benson did a timber frame in MA. Same guy (as far as I know). A civil engineer from the south, now doing cutting edge housing out of MA is Building Science Corporation ( http://www.buildingscience.com/bsc/ ). Lots of good info on his site. The US DOE has a good site out of Colorado ( http://www.eere.energy.gov/ ). I know New Orleans and Canada are a long way apart, but snoop around the Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corporation site (probably via Google is better http://www.cmhc-schl.gc.ca/en/ I'm assuming English). All kinds of useful information.
In an incident like Katrina, power can be important. But even in general. Cogeneration is nice. On a per-house basis, you sort of get sucked in to Otto or Diesel cycle prime movers. At some point (micro) gas turbines come into play. What prime mover you choose depends on the work/heat balance, but I really like gas turbines compared to either Otto or Diesel cycle. The ability to burn biodiesel would definitely tilt things towards the Diesel cycle. For fuel independence, nothing beats Stirling cycles, but very little happens on that side. Which is really a pity. There is no reason why your cogen plant can't run your heat pump or air-conditioner, or for that matter your refrigerator (largest power user in a typical house). Finding refrigerators capable of having "off-site" heat transfer is difficult. Marine seems the best place to start looking.
It's bloody difficult to build a nice house on stilts. The Dutch have an approach where "house boats" are anchored to pipes. If a flood happens, the house just floats up. The anchors (big pipes in the pictures I've seen) keep the house in place.
There are LED lights (pucks) which can be inserted in almost any surface (wall, floor, ceiling) that only require about 7mm machining. Supplier I seen is ( http://www.eyeleds.com/ ).
The tornado rooms (steel box inside the house) are probably a good investment.
Mold likes to eat most of modern construction. There are mold resistant lumbers (I prefer concrete, especially the stronger/later curing concretes with fly ash additions) and drywalls available. Don't use fibreglass, it's useless in a fire. Use mineral wool for insulation.
Don't use nails. Use screws, or screws and adhesive. Some acoustic applications might only want adhesive. Go to 5/8 inch, fire rated drywall. It gives straighter/flatter walls, and absorbs more sound. Visit http://greengluecompany.com/ to find out about Green Glue for acoustic uses.
Somebody mentioned poor insulation (cotton based) for wiring, getting good concrete is a problem. You might end up being better to make the stuff yourself in nobody locally will guarantee their concrete.
If the temperature of the outside is precisely what you would want at any time of the day or night, you don't need (thermal) insulation. For any other situation, you need insulation. Use as much insulation as you can afford. (I would prefer
I suggest you use fiber optic not electrical network connections because cat 5 or any electrical cables leak out electromagnetic radiation that can be picked up by black hat hackers and unlawful goverment survailence.
I would suggest going with plenum rated wire to help cut down on fumes if there is a fire.
It may be a bit more expensive, but it's something I've always gone for when wiring a home.
Some folks say its unnecessary, however any bit of insurance to keep you and your loved ones safe is a no brainer in my opinion.
Here is a site that discusses plenum wiring.
http://www.phonicear.com/learnplenum.asp
Just run cat5 and coax to every room. Run multiples to the larger rooms if necessary.
If you want a nice home AV system, design and build it from the ground up, they you'll know where and if built-in speakers would be a good idea.
Space for a few servers near where all your cat5 terminates would be nice, but don't spend a lot of money on it. Home servers will just get smaller over time. If you plan to put in several servers like I do (for hobby reasons), make sure the location has adequate cooling and a couple power outlets.
The bottom line is that wiring will do nothing to improve your home's value, so don't put a lot of money into it past the basics. Save your money for things like good design and finish work. Pay attention to classic architectural detail.
The tech bling will take care of itself...to much built-in bling will "date" the house. In my area, if you see built-in stereo system, it just screams it's from the '70s. Don't make your home look prematurely old due to excessive tech or design fads.
I came across these the other day http://www.wiretracks.com/. Basically, they're split channels that you can place beneath your wall and baseboards to route cabling. I haven't tried them, but the idea is certainly appealing. However, I do wonder how precisely you can attach the baseboard to the outer half of the shell though.
Not sure where you were looking, but CAT 5e has gone up in the past year or so actually. Not by A LOT, but some yes. I never paid that much for CAT 5e though. You can get it pretty cheap, between 55 and 70 bucks the last time I looked for 1000ft. CAT 6 is closer to 100 bucks for 1000ft.
Of course that is not in bulk, so I am sure you may be able to find it even a bit cheaper.
Install 4 inch conduit for data/audio/whatever cables. this means you can run fiber, copper, whatever. Use Flexible Plumbing (PEX or Hep2O) systems. Make built in clothing storage systems. Drawers, bins, and shelves. Laundry room on same floor as main bathroom. Solar panels and battery pile. Consider moving to DC white led lighting. Dont skimp on the kitchen counter and cupboard space. On demand hot water heaters for kitchen and bath. Venting system that allows you to completely air out the house in one hour. Oversized doors.
Well, the good news is that what you want is easily within today's technological grasp, and having support for your Macs is a non-issue. Now that I've told you the good news, I'll tell you the bad: It's expensive. There are a lot of guys here who think that running two CAT6 cables to each room is fine. There are a lot of guys here who think you should go wireless. There are a lot of guys here who think you should wig out and get optical and run it everywhere. They are all mostly wrong. What they did get right is that it's easy to pull cable. What's hard is WHERE you want to pull it to, how much, and what it's purpose is. This is not star trek stuff; it's just getting signals from one room to another, and having a central controller to take care of it. You mentioned a 7.1 theater, motion sensing technology, HVAC control etc. etc.etc. There are many companies that do this, from "retrofit" type companies like Control 4, who provide a complete whole-house solution, to companies like AMX which provide greater customizability and capability to interact with a wider range of gear. Ultimately the gear is what's going to hit your pocketbook hard, IF you want to do it RIGHT, with ZERO worries after it's in, AND for the lifetime of your home. Any truck driver can install a cheap-o Sony amp & in-wall speakers, and then program your remote. But, it's not rugged, it's not reliable, and it's not custom to you and your home. If you choose to do this, you need to first be honest with yourself, and spell out in clear writing what it is *exactly* what you want to happen in each room. Open the door: motion sensor/IR sensor sees person, tells controller to recite greeting over house audio Hit "movie" button on remote:lights dim, plasma turns on, DVD turns on, plays DVD. Receiver turns on, goes to pre-set audio mode. Etc. But I digress :)
As for what you should put in your wall, the only thing I can say is that there is no such thing as pulling too much. Conduit is nice, if you plan on only having things at fixed points on your walls, forever, and you never want to upgrade. Where I work, we will run extra runs to likely locations for stuff (as long as the customer requests it). So, if you're not sure you want to put living room speakers in yet, we'll run the speaker wire to locations in the ceiling and/or walls, because when the sheetrock's not up, it's easy and cheap. If you want to do it after that, it gets real expensive.
Same thing with control. Not sure if you want a volume control or touchpanel in a room? We'll run extra wiring to that location, so that if you change your mind down the road, you have the flexibility.
As for WHAT kind of cable to put in, well, it depends :). We used to use a combination cable for our video runs, which was 6 minicoax + 2 22ga shielded twisted pair. With that combination you can run just about any video signal you want for up to 150 feet before needing a repeater or distribution amp. BUT, that cable costs $4 a foot. Not cheap.
Nowadays, BalUns for A/V applications are robust enough, provide a great quality signal, and are inexpensive. They convert RGBHV, YPrPb, Composite, Line Level audio, etc. to CAT5/CAT6. CAT6 is cheap & easy to pull, so it takes less time and labor to run the same amount of lines as compared to the bulkier combo cable.
So, to sum up, you should run two things everywhere in your house: CAT6 wherever you might want to put a display, have gear, or control elements (volume controls, touchpanels, etc.). You should run 16/2 or 14/2 (16ga, 2 conductor) speaker wire everywhere you think you might want to put a speaker.
Combine that with a wireless data network, or Zigbee control network for your A/V and automation, and you'll have an awesome house.
As a ballpark figure, assuming you paid a contractor to do all this for you, you can expect to pay between $50K and $150K for most homes to be fully automated (shades, lighting, HVAC, custom touchpanels, full integration, etc). That's assuming that all the wiring is done be
Technology that has been around for years - either the X-10 motion detector/wireless receiver/light switch replacement for the front door (imagine never having to worry about light to find the damn keyhole) or even simpler infrared detector switches for mudrooms and such. Of course you don't want lights blazing when you walk into every room - the 3am half-drunk run to the toilet comes to mind, enough light to hit the toilet (more or less) and no more!
Seriously, there are lots of X-10 setups that are flaky. Since you're starting from scratch, put in the X-10 device on the main line into the house that blocks other X-10 signals. Beyond that, use X-10 where it makes your life simpler not more complex (applying automatic blinds to a small window may be more trouble than it's worth).
Nothing says hi-tech like your lights being on when every one else is dark - check out the natural gas powered generators that sit outside the house in a (mostly) soundproof enclosure - automatic power within a few seconds after the power fails. Doesn't replace UPSs large and small for your electronic gear but it's another one-time investment that pays off in peace of mind.
What would you recommend for people who don't know enough about this kind of thing to actually manage and install the conduit/wiring themselves? Who would you talk to about getting this kind of thing in a house? An electrician perhaps, but would they set up a patch panel as well? Is there a name for the profession that handles this for homes?
Evidently, the key to understanding recursion is to begin by understanding recursion. The rest is easy.
But adding electronics options to your house doesn't cost much if you've already got the walls torn off. You're designing a system that'll fit behind sheetrock walls, not one that needs to be retrofitted behind plaster with unknown wood pieces and bumpy stuff behind it. The obvious technology to use for wiring hasn't changed in a couple of decades - you're going to run conduit, fat enough to put whatever you really need inside it, and you can probably run straight connections up to an attic or down to a crawlspace if you're luck, and leave some strings in it to pull whatever wiring you need in the future. Plus you're going to run Romex for the electricity and twisted pair for phones, and again it doesn't cost you much extra to homerun it back to somewhere central and accessible. There may some places that are obvious locations for TVs, desks, or washing machines - so make sure the wire's fat enough for whatever you need, and it doesn't cost much to make sure you've got an extra conductor or two in case you want to split things out into two sockets or isolate circuits or whatever.
Make sure you've done diagrams of everything you run - that's really cheap to do up front, and a real pain to do later
Save the high-cash spending for things like kitchens, bathrooms, and other plumbing and HVAC. You'll also want to make that stuff as modular and accessible as possible.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
for a Class B motorhome (converted van) so when the next big hurricane hits you can evacuate in style. Maybe add room for a boat in case you hung around too long, something with a hull that isn't going to get sliced up by submerged debris.
Actually, a big garage is a good idea regardless of where you live. Every McMansion should have one. It's tough to have too big of a garage. Kinda stands out though. You'd need a 10' high door for a Class B vs. the usual 7', just to be safe.
toaster that runs java
Get referrals from computer and A/V stores on electricians who know what to do with things other than AC power.
[100% ISO 646 Compliant]
SVM, ERGO MONSTRO.
Think of things that annoy you, like waiting for the water to heat up in the shower,
they have dual plumbing that keeps hot water at the tap now.
They run it behind the mirror on the way so it doesn't steam up the mirror when you
are in the shower.
I have X-10 motion detectors to turn the lights onin my room, but
wish it worked on other lights too.
Why do I need to push a button to open my garage door? Can't my house
recognize my cars wifi ssid and open the garage for me?
Oh, and of course you should have a bat-pole! (Even if you have to
build a second floor just to use it.)
or a beowolf cluster of these things?
current rates in my area is ab out $155/1000 for cat5e and $170/1000 for cat6
the cost of networking cable is like gas. when copper goes up so does cable but when copper goes down, cable only goes down a little bit.
I'm a little appalled that nobody has used the words "ecological" or "environmental" yet. But what are you gonna do?
You can do something about it, that's what. If you want geek cred, nothing's gonna do that better than a stack of PV panels in your roof supplementing your grid juice. Power outages in NOLA are frequent (I live there too). Coupling a nice, juicy array with a big battery bank and hefty inverter not only allows you to sell back juice to Entergy when you're producing more than you're using, it's also an instant UPS. FOR YOUR HOUSE.
Go beyond solar, for the other half of production is conservation (which everyone could do). Buy energy-efficient appliances. Go SunFrost for your refrigerator. Use only low-wattage energy efficient lighting. Think of everything you can do to cut power, water or gas consumption. Set an example for your neighbors.
Switches, routers, cabling are power-hungry. Go wireless! Get big antennas, do 802.11n, have repeaters on every floor, encrypt everything, hide the SSID, you know the drill here. How many geeks can claim their whole-house network uses under 200 watts or so? And who the hell wants to yank cabling out through conduit in the ten years when RJ-45 goes obsolete (and don't nitpick there, you know what I mean)? If that seems like a long way off, may I ask how long you're planning on owning the house?
Don't stop with electricity. Maximize airflow throughout the house by adding temperature-actuated circulating fans (more juicy programming here!). Be proud of the CFM through your living room, not your desktop case. Take pride in breathing.
Select carpeting from companies that don't use volatile, poisonous chemicals in their production. Choose low-odor latex paints. You'll be worlds healthier for it. Honest.
Do this, and every geek on the block will want to be you.
I'm building a new house and I'm definitely leaving out the central vac. Even though I don't think Roomba is quite good enough today to be equivalent, in five years there will be something that definitely will be better, and in 10-15 years I think the last central vac company will go out of business because people won't even be interested in repairing them.
The biggest problem you'll have is getting adequate wiring to all the places that it needs to go to. Your LAN isn't the big issue; wireless works well. But what about an alarm system? You'll want two-pair to every door and window for an alarm; one pair is good enough but there's always one doggoned bad wire somewhere - the second pair is your safety net. What about audio / video? Built-in speakers or wall outlets for speakers? Where should they be located now, and after you rearrange the furniture a couple of times?
The suggestion to install conduits between the rooms and a central location is a good one - but keep in mind that having an outlet in a room doesn't necessarily mean that the outlet is where its needed. Unless you're got built-in furniture that defines where things will be located, choosing wire termination locations is your biggest problem. Attics and crawl spaces work even better - that way you can run a wire down a stud cavity and have it end up in just the right place - even years later.
And always remember that all power cables and outlets stay at least one foot away from any other wiring.
Think long and hard about what you want to accomplish, where the major pieces will be located, where outlets would be handy under all different room configurations. Then put in twice as many wires as you think you'll need and you'll be pretty close to right. Need a coax for video? Run two. Need speaker cable? Run two. This way you aren't stopped by bad wires, and when you get that dual-tuner Tivo or a 5.1 stereo system the wires you need are already there.
I would agree with your recommendation, with one exception. If you have adequate clearance in your attic, don't run the conduit back to the server closet. It costs more, and makes running the wires harder. If you can get around in your attic, just run the conduit from the end point in the wall, up into the attic. Then you don't even need the string to pull the wire. you just drop it down the hole, and it comes out at the base plate, but trying to pull wires through 50 or 60 feet of tubing can be a challenge. This obviously does not apply if you don't have relatively easy attic access. It's always nice when spending less money makes a job better.
Its correct name is Electrochromic Glass
http://www.google.com/search?q=electrochromic+gla
lots of info and prices
1 closet, 1 rack. with Sony m1000es for multi room audio/source control, sony 777es dvd player, Echent to play your dvds in any room .
And stocking a home like a future model space ship or something will create jealousy and resentment
Federation starships have an auto-destruct feature. If I was redoing a home in New Orleans (or anywhere else, for that matter), especially in this post-housing-bubble economic reality, I'd be sure to rig similiar functionality for my house.
If jealous gangsters took over my house, I'd just trigger the self destruct feature. bwahaha! Also good for foreclosure - "whoops, house burned down. Must've been a bug in all that cat 6a cable somewhere..."
Learn the rules so you know how to break them properly.
www.teslabox.com
I'm in the central Ohio area. I can't find a publicly accessible webpage with the costs from my normal supplier but Home Depot sells the cat5e at$91.00/1000ft and plenum cable at $219/1000ft. They are in line with what I pay. I can't find the costs for cat6. Are you sure your not buying 500ft runs instead of 1000ft at $55? It seems to be closer to what I would pay. I don't understand what would make the cost almost double for my area.
Well, I take that back, I just found 1000ft cat5 (I don't think it is E) for $69.99 Of course it is stranded. You would want solid wire for inside the walls and use the stranded for patching from the wall plate to the computer. You also have to make sure your using the right type of RJ45 connector on this, they have one rated for stranded cable and another for solid. The difference I think is the number of cleats that make contact when you crimp them. 2 cleats are for one and three are for the other, I don't remember which though. Interestingly they have Cat6 (solid) cable for $149 here.
Now I know it is hard to get an accurate reading from different sites with different prices. But this is in line with What I can find around here. Cat6 is typically around 40-50% more for the cable. PLenum cable is usually double or 3 times the amount of regular cable and if you need shielded (I know UTP is unshielded twisted pair, but you sometimes need to remove interference)you will spend about the same.
I'm going to check again come Monday, Someone suggested the price differences are only about 10% now. So it might be cheaper then I think. My supplier will price match if I can find it cheaper somewhere else. But I have to make sure it is the same stuff.
How do you know he's not building the home he's going to live in for the rest of his life, contributing to the New Orleans community, potentially doing all kinds of service work, laboring to improve the levies and helping kids in the area get educations and jobs?
Don't fucking judge someone you don't know, asshole.
+++ATH0
I know, I know, I could just figure out the timing, use a watch, etc. But you wanted high-tech, right?
Yes, you love this property, you want to put your stamp on it -- but what happened to the previous occupants? See justiceforneworleans.org.
To run cable, I vacuum a wad of kleenex tied to a string through a run, then use the string to pull the cable/cat5/whatever.
That works, at least some of the tyme. However as someone else said why not just run string through the conduit while it's being installed? Then when cabling, fiber, or wiring is pulled through the conduit with the string just include another string to be left in place unril something else needs to be pulled through as well.
FalconShould there be a Law?
that take you to a batcave!
now you be pimpin'!
My brother-in-law was a professor at Tulane University. His home was in the garden district that wasn't hit as hard. Nevertheless, his house was flooded and it filled with mold. We went down over Thanksgiving week and I have to tell you it was a very unique experience camping outdoors in a major city that was essentially a ghost town. We did have a proper thanksgiving dinner of Turkey hot dogs and Stove Top Stuffing... :)
:)
Based upon our collective experience, had my Brother-in-law chose to stay, this is my advice to you.
If you're planning on owning a home in New Orleans, you need to PLAN on having to gut & clean the first floor once every 10 years after it floods. It is much like living in Southern Florida where you just plan on getting a new roof after each hurricane season..
Don't bother trying to build a flood wall. We found out the hard way that the water doesn't come in through the walls and windows, it percolates up through the concrete slab itself! So, first thing, if you have a cement 'basement' or first floor, seal up the slab with an epoxy paint, then carpet it or put in linoleum. Paint the exposed 2x4's with a good mold resistant primer, then hang the cement wallboard used for bathrooms on the lower 4' of the walls. The upper 4' you can use mildew resistant wallboard or regular sheet rock. Do not use regular sheetrock mud for taping, use the slow cure mud that is sold as a powder and you add water and it dries (cures) in 60 minutes. Last, go purchase a bucket of 1" swimming pool chlorine tablets and drop them inside the walls ever other stud. This way, if the water rises up, the water in the walls will chlorinate itself and when the water recedes you are guaranteed not to have mold in 'them thar walls'.
Take LOTS of pictures of each step of the process. The reason houses are being sold as gutted is that this is the only way that the new buyer can be sure that there is no mold and the house is clean. You will boost your resale value through the roof if you show how much attention you paid toward preventing future water damage issues.
Alternately, you can skip all this and simply put up mini-blinds for walls and you can just raise them up whenever it floods and airing the place out will be a breeze.
Good security is based upon reality and common sense. Common sense is a function of having common knowledge.
For concrete to cure properly, you want water. True, you do not want too much water like a down pour, but you are puring concrete on the gravel, you want the gravel wet. Then when the concrete hardens enough that you can stand on it (about 6 hours in normal conditions), keep it wet. Especially on a sunny day. Lots of water. You don't want it to dry out for up to a week. The longer it takes, the stronger it becomes. You should have seen the horror in the contractors eyes when I started pouring water on the gravel before they even started pouring and then I told them to use 1.5 times the water they normally used! But now when I dropped a 5kg (10lb) hammer from 3m (10ft), it landed on the tip and it barely left any mark. It just bounced like a ball.
Also, 99% of contractors are trying to save money by not putting enough steel reinforcement in concrete pads and walls. Then you end up saving $500 on a garage pad that then cracks next year after a frost. A properly built pad will *never* crack. In my garage, there is about 1ton of steel in the pad. In winter when the ground freezes, the ground (clay) can shift so much that one side of the garage is an inch or two out of the ground! The pad bends (door frame changes shape a bit), but doesn't crack. Yet for some reason everyone still believes in North America that concrete pads always crack! Huh?
Of course, the consumer is screwed in the end when the concrete pads crack and foundations fall apart or you gen high humidity in the basements. (ie. concrete not water proofed - no you can't do it from inside the house!)
Anyway, pour concrete in cloudy weather. If there are showers a bit on and off, it is ok. It it sunny - not good. If it is puring down buckets, well, wait! The concrete needs to settle for 6h+ before you can and should pour buckets of water on it!
I'd say the best add-on is a 12 volt wiring system running through the house, with wall outlets at strategic points. Not replacing the 120 volt service, but adding the option as a parallel system.
Why? 12 volts is the standard for solar powered photovoltaic lighting systems. With LEDs coming down in price and cranking up the lumens, a solar cell system with a 12 volt battery system can light your home at least enough to see by -- and it would be free, free, free as long as the sun shines. Hell, you can use Sears DieHards as your battery bank. Considering the efficiency of LED's maybe just one, if all you're doing is keylighting. Consider it a bulletproof backup to the grid.
Of course, PCs run on 12 volt power supplies. I don't know how that would work out, but just mentioning it. There are 12 volt laptop adapters out there. And I'd think it would be child's play to adapt the outlets to USB power plugs, stepping them down to 5 volts. The painful part is that there are so damned many 12 volt plugs to choose from. The simplest is the cigarette lighter plug (actually sized for a cigar, if you ever noticed).
There are a lot of car accessories that run on 12 volts systems, and a lot of camping gear as well.
Best part is that it's difficult to be electrocuted with a 12 volts and low amps.
How about a voice-activated levee?
I'm busy retrofitting my wiring in a 36 year old house... The house had a hack job satellite TV install (2 drops/bedroom for Tivo support, but the multiswitch is in the attic, not an accessible closet, and some other strangeness. In retrospect, a cheap install for living room + master bedroom would have been the way to go, since I'm ripping it out now... but anyway...
Each bedroom currently has 1 phone location, and 1 coax location that I put in. The phone is daisy chained, wired outside of the house, all kinds of silliness, but the locations are perfect. For each of my telephone jacks, I'm replacing it with 2 Cat 5E runs (got Cat5E-350 MHz, for what that's worth), and 1 Coax run. I figure that whatever the technology I use in the future, I'll have 4 conventional phone lines run throughout the house (1 of the Cat 5 cables), Ethernet there (for a VOIP or other IP Telephony options), and coax in case the cable company puts a solution together... you never know.
Where I currently have coax for the satellite, I am putting in 3 Coax runs, and 4 Cat5E runs. Why? Well, DirecTV's future calls for not being able to carry antenna over the satellite cables, so a dual-tuner system will need 2 Satellite + 1 Antenna run (my local HDTV OTA feeds rock, the over-compressed MPEG 4 feeds look horrible). In addition, with the addition of F-Connector -> RCA Adapters, ($7 at radioshack or home depot, $1 or so if you plan ahead and buy online), and you can carry component video over it. I realize the the future of video looks to be HDMI, but it has so many problems and confusions, and component distributes so nicely, that if they never "close the analog hole" then you can do nice things with that option. With 4 Cat5E I have a phone wire, 2 Ethernet wires, and a "spare" wire, because Cat5E is SO DAMNED useful (can run an RS-232 Serial port over it, an IR repeater, etc., just about anything.
I ran everything into a dedicated closet that I put in, that is doubling as the home theater closet. Right now the video goes over the 3 coax cables as component, but the plan is a projector in about 6 months, which is going to sit inside the closet and project out. To keep that cool (as I anticipate having multiple computers + AV gear), I put an AC duct in, but near the floor, and a bathroom vent fan at the top, that will be controlled via a temperature probe. If the temperature near the projector gets too hot, vent it outside, and the cool air comes in whenever the AC is on.
For audio, I have 7 speaker locations, plus 2 coax for the subwoofer (they have connections for L&R, why not pull it), so the 7.1 system terminates in the closet. I am currently pulling the whole house audio solution. I chose NOT to pull it into bedrooms, because I think that bedrooms are self contained. But all the main rooms in the house (plus two reserved for two speaker sets outside, others may want 3) are getting in. I am NOT planning on multi-source at the start, but I'll pull a Cat 5 + a 4-conductor wire to where the volume controllers are. In the future, I can switch to a fancy multi-source system, but I really can't see a time I'd want different music in the dining room as the kitchen... music carries, and I want whole house for entertaining. Then you run 2 2-conductor speaker wires to the speaker locations from the volume control.
Security wire is important everywhere. You can go wireless, but if you can pull the wire, the wired alarm systems are more reliable (never need to change a battery), and with the new glass break sensors, you only need to get to the middle of the room. Oh, and if you pull 4-conductor wire, you can get combo glass-break/motion sensors, so you're all set.
If I had the walls down, I would have two conduit runs to each set of wall outlets, cat5 in the low voltage run and standard electricity in the normal run. As I don't have the walls down, I just made sure to get a neutral wire everywhere and picked Insteon as my automated lighting solution, but there are wireless solutions and ho
CAT7 is available now, check out NORDX wiring standards. CAT7 is for 10 Gigabit Ethernet over copper; however do NOT treat it like CAT5. Also CAT6 (Gigabit) also should not be treated like CAT5. Be sure to read the specs of what you can and cannot do. Today CAT7 is about 4 times more expensive than CAT6. CAT6 is affordable by most people. Putting conduits like several suggested is a good idea, then you can use a pull string and pull new cabling in 2, 5 or 10 years down the road for a full end to end cabling upgrade.
l ights01-740463.jpg) , along side the CAT# wires, so that you can tell your n00b visitors... "See that? Those are my email packets going out to the Internet".
Good luck... and if you want bonus pimp points, be sure to run those stream / river like Xmas lights (http://badtux.net/uploaded_images/fsm_christmas_
Adeptus
No trees were killed in the making of this post; however, many trillions of electrons were horribly inconvenienced.
Step one would be to look up a dictionary and find out what the word "pimp" (n or v) means.
Here's a typical one:
One who finds customers for a prostitute; a procurer. intr.v. , pimped , pimping , pimps
Now if the OP really wants to do that with his new home, I guess that's up to him, but I wonder how many of us are qualified to advise him...
Make connected audio system in all rooms, including bathrooms. This way you can listen to podcasts while doing something in house.
Power over Ethernet is for ordinary Cat 5e Gigabit Ethernet, it just checks for a magic resistor value and, if so, runs voltage over it.
PoE is a matter of switch choice, not cable choice.
Test your net with Netalyzr
Right now, phone is Pots, but you can plug a laptop into the ethernet drop there, or a television into the coax (if I ever buy enough multi-switches to make everything live)... Also, you can have an uplink line (nanny-cam, whatever) on the coax and then modulate that out a channel on the antenna line... Lots of options, and once I'm pulling cat5 to the box, a second wire and a coax doesn't really add anything other than th 8-13 cents/foot for the cable...
The reason for the 3 coax + 4 cat5 for the TV location.
Current plan - support next gen DirecTV DVR (or Dish) that needs 3 coax for dual tuner + OTA ATSC feed, 2 ethernet drops for any equipment there (AppleTV or equivalent? Video game system?), phone (for the Satellite box to dial home), and a spare cat 5.
Future possibilities... bring distributed video, where ALL the equipment sits in the AV closet, and all I have in the room is: LCD on the wall, in that case the 3 Coax converts into Component video, and the spare Cat5 carries IR. I contemplated wiring each room for in-ceiling surround sound, but it's just cost prohibitive in my retrofix, but if I was doing new construction, I'd WIRE a 7.1 system for each room, and where the television goes, have a termination block with 7 speakers and 1 coax for the subwoofer...
The poster in this case appears to be a single guy, but who knows what the future will bring. He may get married and have kids, so the spare bedrooms won't need much for a few years (5+). He might get roommates, in which case, the roommates don't want central controlled AV, but might like having the 7.1 system prewired so they don't have to run their own. Who knows what gets computer geeks to spend an extra $100/month on rent, but Gigabit to the room, high speed in the closet, satellite television feeds).
I also can't predict the next 10 years of home entertainment. 3 years ago running dual coax everywhere to get Tivo support was a huge upgrade. Now, you want triple. I think that it is likely that I'll move all my tuners into the Network closet, making the remote connections in the bedrooms tuner-less (pulling content over Cat5), but who knows. It is VERY possible that the 3 component cables become a distributed component network off a multi-zone AVR, or become dormant in an all Cat5 world. It is very possible that my system will look like the following:
1 Big hard drive RAID connection storing video, a 6 tuner ATSC box, grabbing ALL OTA entertainment... The four main networks plus the silly CW and MyNetworkTV or whatever they become... I might then bring in DirecTV for sports and Dish for International programming, and cable because it's cheap to get basic stuff. I might figure 2 tuners for DirecTV and Dish are sufficient. I might need different packages to get different HD options, I have no clue, despite having HDTV for almost 5 years, the stuff is still new... When we got cable at my parents house 20+ years ago, I'd never imagine that I'd want it in the bedroom, we just had it for HBO. Now I can picture running a Cat5 connection to the bathroom to be able to continue watching a movie while on the can... It sounds silly, but if you have 8 people watching a movie, and you've spent 2 hours coordinating while the kids get to sleep, etc., maybe you need to hit the restroom and don't want to pause for everyone, but want to keep watching... I'm not doing it, but I can picture it.
Conduit is the solution of course, so you can upgrade. But if conduit isn't an option, more coax and more cat5 means you can do whatever you imagine. With Cat5 + a balun option, you can run all sorts of neat stuff. With my 3 Coax + lots of Cat 5 living room, I have a neat option. When I replace the Television with a projector, then I have this spare wire in front. But if I leave the Coax for Component, and then use the Cat5 and some RCA over Cat5 (jacks at HD, nothing extravegent), then I can plug the Gamecube (or Wii I suppose), Xbox, or PS 3 into the front of the room, making it easy to access, and send the s
No.
While greenboard is good for short dousings, the minute you get water infiltration behind the sheetrock, it wets down the back paper and you have to tear it out anyhow.
Also, in the event of a sustained home inundation, you have to rip the walls out anyhow to biocide against mold and mildew.
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
My experience is that you only plan so much. I rewired a Victorian house from the ground up, and the country it was in doesn't "do" ducting so I had to come up with my own flame retardant solution. It had wooden floors, and I went underneath each one to prep a duct run and re-lay every single pipe in the house (heating etc), with a small service panel worked into the flooring where required (the trick is to make it all inconspicuous - I hate tech in view other than in my workroom).
:-). I numbered cables at each end with where the other end would go, and network devices had a location code (i.e. switches with multiple ports). That saves a lot of time if you do have a breakage or decide to change your mind. I never had one, but the links between data room and switches were all laid double just in case (cable was cheaper than my time :-).
You have no idea what an advantage it is to be able to rip open the central riser and drop a cable because you decided that you want to add {whatever} to your technology. Speaker cables, new sat dish, the works, all no problem.
Oh, and if you decide to build a tech room, use open slot industrial ducting on the wall and under any desk. I have bars of it on every work desk, which means I can just take the covers off, run a new cable and close it all up. Super tidy, little hassle, no trip hazards, just make sure you route mains separately.
Last but not least - think of servicing needs. The best design allows someone else to take over, so keeping plans up to date is worth the investment (but don't go nuts - have a life
Good luck. It's actually quite fun to be able to make a place really your own.
Insert
The house I live in was future-proofed in 1947. The owners obviously spared no expense pimping it out, with the highest of high tech for the time. And let me tell you, it doesn't work.
Every room is wired for sound, with its own volume control and channel selector for four audio sources, which could be supplied locally or from the cable audio service (yes, such a thing really existed back then).
Of course, cable audio is no longer available, stereo and surround sound have been invented, and four audio sources seems remarkably little nowadays.
There were also other gadgets such as multiple doorbells with natty little indicators showing which doorbell had been pressed. But nowadays the tradesmen all use the front door anyway.
There were gas sockets generously provided. Yes, gas sockets! Back then you could get portable gas appliances that just "plugged in", but they long since stopped selling those due to safety concerns.
On the wall of every room was a clock socket. Try buying a mains-operated wall clock nowadays - the market has chosen AA batteries instead. And even if you could buy such a clock, you couldn't get the specialised plug that would mate with the clock socket.
I could go on, but my gist is that the world is going to change more than you can imagine, and CAT cable of any specification will soon, inevitably, become obsolete.
So put in lots of power outlets, because you're always going to need power. Put in some strategic conduits to provide access to places that will be hard to get to with surface wiring or wiring in the walls.
But apart from that, just put in a few toys that interest you now. Anything more grand is inevitably futile, and you'll never get back the cost when you sell.
Paid Q&A/Research
I'd love to hear your reasons for stating why wireless is better... Other than that you made very good points. But I have made great pains in order to retrofit an older house to accept CAT5. IMO there are no benifets in going wireless. Less speed, less security, higher cost... Honestly what people see in wireless when it comes to home networks I will never understand. Perhaps it is the american way to go the easiest route regardless of the price to their wallets or privacy.
I'm sick of following my dreams. I'm just going to ask where they're goin' and hook up with 'em later.
Don't forget security. With all that tech your dwelling will be littered with, you'd have a seriously beefy security system. I only have the fundamentals down such as:
* multiple cameras
* automatic recording on sight - perhaps the recording software can be taught the profile of a human so the cameras don't switch on for cats and dogs etc.
* monitoring from anywhere in the house - I'll assume the house would have several systems, plugged into the network where anything and everything can be done.
* monitoring from outside - you'll want a server so you can check on the status of your belongings whilst on holidays
* Automatic notification that something has been picked up on the cameras that is 'suspicious'. Perhaps you could receive text messages?
There's a lot one could do. All of the above would be cool. Also, You'd have to have the following for enjoyment purposes:
1) Central storage area for media, applications and file systems for thin clients
2) If i was doing it, I'd only have thin clients, all loading their profiles/file systems from the one central file server.
3) Don't forget media streaming capability. Having several thin clients with accompanying monitors/sound system means you can have the same or different media playing in every room of the house.
Have fun and invite me over to gawk when your done!
Giving IE users a taste of their own medicine since 2005 - http://pods.-is-a-geek.net/
For 10Gig E:
n frastructure/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=188501097
Cat 6 will work (maybe) for shorter distances. Article linked below says will work up to 55 meters, but remember reading another article that says otherwise.
Cat 6a and Cat 7 will work up to 100 meters.
The adoption curve for 10Gig E isn't as fast as GigE, but in 5-10 years I'd be surprised if it isn't commonplace.
http://www.networkcomputing.com/channels/networki
Ask a professional! Here's the URL for 'Hubbell Automation Consulting'.
http://www.hubbell.biz/
Send an e-mail over to Jeremy, he will take your layout and create a fully Mac-based house. The systems he installs will allow one Mac-mini (or equivalent), to manage everything in your home. The lights will come on when it gets dark, some will come one at random when you're away, the system will water the garden when it gets dry, etc. etc. etc. You can go for better than CAT-5 cabling, and yes Apple will be adding new gizmo's sooner than you will be able to save the money to buy them all - but the smart money's on keeping things simple and adjustable. The house must be able to function even when the computer's are off - and this is where Hubbell's systems come into their own.
Um, in Holland houses are securely anchored to the ground, and everything is made of brick, brick brick (even some town streets :-P ), simply because it's in a major combined river delta (rhine and maas), and you can get decent quality clay 'most anywhere just by digging a hole. (This is less handy when you're digging a garden, back-breaking work that.)
The traditional dutch method to survive flooding was to locally raise the land by a couple of meters, after which everything else floods first, and you'll probably be ok.
More recently people set up clay walls instead. (Did someone mention plentiful supplies of clay?), which keeps the water away from the houses. Sometimes these walls also have wave-erosion-protection made of (imported(!!!)) rocks. (Yes, The Netherlands imports rocks. Not much rocks to be had in a river delta.)
Of course, once you set up walls so that the rivers and seas can't get in, your next problem is dealing with rainwater that can't get out. So then people install ditches and drainage canals on the land side, and put multiple-redundant pumping stations to put rainwater (back) into the rivers and lakes and seas. Rivers have a tendency to flood, so people leave swaths of land on the river-side of the levee (or dike) which the river may flood. To prevent erosion and mere incidental flooding, this land has its own small wall, usually toughened with extra rock. Rivers have this tendency to raise the land around themselves very slightly by the laying down of sediment, so typically if a dike breaks in a river area, the water will collect in some known low points, where you just have to make sure you didn't build anything beforehand. If your waterschap (water management area) is near the sea, your land will likely be roughly equally high (or low) all over, so you'll need extra dikes to zone your land so that if one section is flooded, the other section will stay safe.
A bit later in time, dutch started to figure they could install similar systems in bits of sea that had never actually been land before. The water mills don't care much, and will just pump the land dry anyway. You then need to terraform the resulting land further to remove salt and make it suitable for agriculture. Then install infrastructure and build houses. (This is how the province of Flevoland was born). Particular skill is needed to make the new land look somewhat natural, and somewhere where people actually want to live. There is a lot more detail to it than this.
The engineering skills can be learned in the Netherlands at several large companies and particular universities (I think Delft is your best bet).
Hadn't heard of the floating houses before. Typically the ground floor is concrete or (ta-da!) brick. If you were smart enough to move all your electric gear and stuff upstairs on time, your house will still be standing just fine after a (nowadays very rare) flood. "Just" wash it down and sweep it out.
Studies show that most pimps live with their mothers, so why bother?
The big thing to realize is that technologies change. Don't build in a specific cabling system, rather build in wireways that allow you to pull new wires when the technology changes.
The same applies for building things into the walls. Building speakers into the walls is a mistake on multiple levels. Home theater tech is evolving relatively rapidly. People's tastes in speakers change with time, as does the music they like to listen to. Speaker choices for in-walls are for more limited than for freestanding speakers and finally getting good speaker perfomance usually means trying to decouple the speaker from the room acoustics. Building the speaker into the wall does the reverse.
I agree with all the others on tubing, that and huge junction boxes and you can go nuts when all the rest is done. Just remember if you put everything in one central enclosure, make it big and ventilated. Also, if any 3 phase high current runs (not sure about US, this is used as feeder where I live) its best to use cable as opposed to wire runs in a tube, as a cable it wont make much of a magnetic field (the twisted wires in the cable cancel eachother). If you want a good listening room, it might be worth treating the walls as it can make a huge difference in sound quality. http://www.stereophile.com/reference/31/index.html is a good start.
Personally I would never put speakers in the wall, and would rather buy 2 good speakers for stereo than 7 crappy ones for surround :)
Separate heavy wire power runs to this room is a good idea, to avoid appliances etc. interfering.
Good luck!
Although I honestly have no idea what is reasonable pricing for wiring these days, when I wired my house a few years ago I did a lot of research on pricing. I bought from CyberXLink. They had (at least at that time) good pricing on the wiring, and very good pricing on the keystone terminating jacks.
Here's what they currently charge for 1000ft:
CAT6 Solid = $102
CAT6 Plenum = $245
CAT5E Solid = $66
CAT5E Plenum = $155
What planet did this guy say he was from?
You're living in New Orleans - Hot and wet. I've done up a flat in Hong Kong where we have similar climatic conditions. Your no 1 issue will be environmental control to prevent your gear from decaying.
- Dehumidification: You have a flood damaged property and I assume there is still a lot of water in your foundation and the walls. You will need to have an above standard dehumidifier to keep indoor humidity below 80%
- Air-con: You'll probably air condition your flat. If you don't work at home and/or nobody is in during the day your indoor temperature and humidity will go up and down again as soon as you return and switch on the AC.
I have insulated my place well and installed double-glassed windows. This reduces the temperature spikes, saves a ton of money and is nice to the environment. I also combined the server cabinet with a wine cooler storage shelf to not having to permanently cool two places (and to get the space needed for a NAS approved by my wife). The construction cost of insulated walls, windows and roofs paid off in about four years but Hong Kong has high energy charges and it could take longer for you.
You can think of adding solar panels, solar warm-water generation and of using the AC to heat your pool should you have one. There are a lot of options around to help you reduce your energy needs (good for your wallet and the environment) but often contractors do not know any of these often very simple measures.
Other issues:
- Conducts for every cable: Your house (hopefully) outlives most technologies
- Cable plans: Draw a sketch / photograph every wall so you know where cables and pipes are and you don't drill or nail into them if you want to hang a picture five years from now
- Storage: You can never have enough, put clever cabinets into the garage, utilise the space under the roof, etc.
- Living or planning to live with a GF/wife? Have a work room for each one of you. Your relationship will last much longer.
- Light: Don't use in-built light, you will change them after a few years (except in corridors, etc.)
- Light fixtures: Use commodity fixtures and refrain form using some that need special bulbs that are often extremely expensive to replace.
Good luck!
I'm in the process of converting my existing 27 yr. old house to be more "modern" in a similar. I have specific things I want to achieve so I've been researching along those lines. If I could start fresh, that would be awesome. You have a good change.
First, I am converting a coat closet into a switch room. I am installing (within the next month) a 24-port Gig/E switch. The switch will be on a UPS. For eaceh of the 8 locations that will have a network jack installed, I'm running two inputs. All wiring is cat6. I'm also including in each wall jack a 3rd port to act as uplink (but only one can be connected in the switch at any given time) in case I change the room where my cable modem or other broadband connection originates (already changed twice and it was a pain. I'm also having a 4th for phone uplink in case of DSL. I have to move my DSL source and it is 4 walls over now and don't want phone company to have to come and do work and me pay. So, this solution works nicely, just put the DSL modem in the closet and connection the phone line from the phone jack to the input jack (cat3) and voila.
I had to install a ventilation vent on my closet door, some simple fans in the closet to blow upward, and a vent shaft leading out of the closet to the roof to exhaust the heat. We are also adding an AC vent into the closet to keep cool if need be. For this networking, I paid less than $600 total including 1,600 ft. of cat6 plenum. Also, at the top of my vaulted living room ceiling, near the dead center of the house, I have a wireless tranceiver device (802.11 a/b/g/n) for my wireless needs. Since the router supports vlan, the wireless is on its own vlan sharing the internet connection so my cell phone (pda phone rather), laptops, and other wireless devices (air conditioner) get their pipe without wires and so I can browse the internet at least. I keep it on vlan off my main network to keep snoopers out of my personal files and media center which has over 700 DVDs on the hard disk (these are not bitorrent, BTW: I own the DVD's, I have about 150 more to copy before my entire collection is archived). Mostly these are just season sets that I've accumulated over the years.
My AC thermostat is ethernet aware. SO I can program rules governing climate control. I have motion sensors in each room that are also thermo, so it knows if someone is sleeping and I have rules governing that to, whether climate should normally be off during the day unnocupied but a some is home sleeping, then keep the climate control, etc. I have thermometers in near each air vent to sense the temperature. The vents can automatically open and close depending on what is needed. I have rules that govern when each room receives are. 2 of our rooms are empty and unoccupied so usually they are exluded, the 3rd is my office, so it has rules, the bathrooms always are governed (gotta be comfy on their), etc. It was a pain to install the equipment in the vents to control whether the room should be active or not but it is not very expensive. Considering I'm doing all my own labor and an electrician friend next door helping me, I spent less than $800 ont he AC stuff.
Also on another vlan is a home surveilance system. I have two cameras outside (front/back) that can see in the dark, then I have two inside (living room and main hallway). Intrusion alarms on all outside connecting doors/windows have a wireless transmitter that also can hear broken glass incase the perps don't open the window but instead break the other one. Police are automatically notified. My fire alarm, too, is monitored.
Each of my toilets have water sensors and will shut off the water valve leading to the tank if too much water is sensed. If they start to overfill, then before it does, it'll get sensed and water will shut off before it spills over. If the water runs too long in the tank for some reason, it'll shut off to prevent excess water loss. Washer also has water sensors incase it leaks, it'll shut off the water valves to the washer, to
If I had the money, time, and inclination, here are a few things I would think of for a modern house; they're pretty mundane but modern-practical: Insulate the house, with HRV. Whether your issue is heating or air conditioning, electricity is expensive and modern climate control uses electricity. It's financially sound, and ecologically good. I would design a "gray water" system. Water that's not sewage - from sinks, washer, etc. - should go into a tank to use for watering the lawn, flushing toilets, etc. This is probaby a better thing for the midwest that in New Orleans - I don't know what their water situation is like, obviously there's whole (muddy) river of the stuff running by. Any such system will have to be heavily designed to prevent cross-contamination and allow for gray water to go down the sewer when the tank gets full. I bet in the midwest, they still wouldn't let you water the lawn with it (or you'd just run the kitchen tap to water the lawn) so you need underground seep watering. The house of the future will have electronic appliance power control because the Enron of the future will charge you for peak use. One of the problems is that our power plants are sized for dinner-time cooking and the rest of the day, the plant runs at half-power. Each appliance will have the smarts to determine it's current and short term (next 6 hours?) power needs and adjust the power use accordingly. Since appliances aren't there yet, this means that the big power users would be connected to a box with a relay and computer interface. So, your freezer would be run during off peak - provided you don't open it, it will survive a 2 hour delay in being run. (Here's where integrating a temperature sensor would be a plus). When the air conditioner or furnace kicks in, some other devices kick off temporarily. A really smart freezer would cool itself down extra ahead of time to survive no power use for 5 hours... Your air conditioner would stop cooling when nobody's home... however, peak metering would require smarter meters. The appliances aren't there yet either. so instead, we'll all just pay generally higher prices. As previous posters have mentioned, CAT5e or Cat6 everything. Here. the phone company uses DSL for cable TV. I strongly suspect that a form of ethernet will be the most practical way to distribute HDTV around the house (think AppleTV); and the middle cable pair can be used for telephone. So put a drop anywhere - by where a TV, desk, night table, etc. would go. Wireless is all very well for surfing, but when everyone has one, there's got to be degradation from neighbourhood interference. Another nifty feature I saw was an infrared relay - an electric eye at each TV location, that runs down to an IR LED in the basement. All your electronics are located there, and any remote commands are relayed to the rack in the basement - so your DVR MythTV or cable box can feed the whole house from there. Required a pair of low voltage, IIRC and electronics at each end. Finally, all joking aside, you DO have to consider the next "big one". At the very least, have a door into the attic and another onto the roof. Allegedly many people were found drowned in their attic. The prettiest, most practical way to do this is probably a small attic room with a dormer window. Not sure what more there is to help. Locate whatever you can higher up - don't put electronics, etc. in the basement that can go in the attic (Electrical panel?). The next middlin' one may flood halfway up the first story. What else can be done to mitigate problems? I don't know. Use steel 2x4 for non-load bearing walls? Make it 2-storey, where the main floor is essentially garage and family room (like a walk-out basement) and the living area is the second floor? Have a survival kit in the attic - water, food, inflatable boat (and oars!!), etc.? Good luck!
By the way, don't buy in New Orleans. It is a nice place to visit, however I wouldn't want to live there. Too much corruption. They make the Hollywood's version of what they want us to think the "wild wild west" was look law abiding.
Now, let me get back to answering this letter from a guy in Nigeria who needs my help on freeing up some money... just kidding.
...that way you can just float the hell out of there next time it floods.
Well, I have been told the prices are going up because of all the metals being used for the wars. So there could be jumps from there. But that sounds about right, the cat6 is 50% more or almost double the cat5 and plenum follows an "I'm just expensive" route for pricing which is sad. A lot of homes could benefit from plenum cabling too.
Being both a electrician, contractor and lifetime resident of New Orleans, I figured I'd drop my two cents. A.) All this sarcasm and shit talking about flooding again is really counterproductive to any discussion I would expect on Slashdot. Depending on where in New Orleans the house is it could never flood again. I would say that even during the May flood of 1992, only perhaps 25% of houses got ANY water in them, and it was more like inches to a foot. Katrina was a catastrophic collapse of everything that has protected the city since the turn of last century. I wouldn't expect it to happen again within your resale window. B.) When I wired my personal house, I put Two RG6 coax and Two Cat5 into every comm. box, two in each room. I used Leviton's superbly overpriced termination equipment and plates for the walls. Since it was a smaller house, I didn't have a closet to make a heated and cooled "equipment room" so it had to go in the attic. I have a DSL modem going into a Linksys wireless router, then going into a 16 port linksys switch. It has been up and running for about 4 months and it is perfect. Oftentimes when my brother and sister are at home, there are five or more computers on the wireless, friends on the deck and in the trailer on wireless, etc. I also put 5.1 surround in the living room, in the walls (just for the two rear surrounds). The room was a little too small for the rear surrounds, plus the framing of windows and doors behind the viewing area would have made it tough. The touch that really makes my day is a set of boston acoustic 5.25" speakers in each of the bedrooms and the dining room, a pair of polks outside facing the deck, and a off the shelf switching system. I bought one of those microwave cabinets and placed the switch and a separate reciever in it, so with the interior walls insulated like they are you can watch TV in the living room (surround) and blast music in all three rooms and outside without any interference between the two. C.)As far as placement, like I said, I put about two in each room, just to be safe. I have one Cat5 for the phone, one for ethernet. One upstream cable, one down stream. I put a modulator on the back of the main living room TV, sent it up the upstream cable hookup to a amplified splitter so everyone in the house can watch Sat, even without a receiver. I put a Communications Outlet (CO) above the kitchen counter, one behind the refrigerator to serve either a fridge TV or a media center for the whole house audio, and two in every room but the bathroom. D.) In hindsight I would have put a weatherproof set outside on the deck, one in the bathroom up high for a TV, and I would have put RCA's between the whole house audio amp and the home theatre home amp. The final cost I would estimate to be around 500-750$ but I also had a few peices. Again, this cost is for me doing it myself, another electrician would have charged more, and the specialty contractors that do this kind of work even more than that. Please feel free to contact me if you have any more questions about my setup, some specific advice relating to your exact setup, or even if you want some help, I can give you a price (for Slashdot members!) just above cost. My email is mikelj@gmail.com. Good luck, and thanks for helping to rebuild the NOLA.
Agree with parent comment. The hardest thing when retrofitting stuff is getting wires "through the floor". Running 1" PVC pipes from basement to attic, with access panels in closets, will make it a lot easier to install The Next Big Thing (TM) when it comes along.
:-)
Also, particularly in a Southern location, make sure you're using high grade (e.g. Plenum grade) wires.
dave
(My moderator points ran out, so I'm posting this instead of modding parent up
Consider providing 2 "classes" of wiring to each room. One class is normal wiring, for lights, etc. The second class can be reserved for electronics, preventing some of the power surges from things like microwaves, etc.
Also -STRONGLY- consider whole-house surge protection, not just for the 110 v, but also for phone & cable feeds. (Our townhouse complex once got hit by lightning. Stuff connected to power wiring was OK. Stuff connected to phones or cable, like TVs, VCRs, cordless phones and computers with modems, were fried.)
dave
Don't make it the nicest house on the block (which is not hard to do in New Orleans), otherwise you are going to get hosed when you sell it.
I think that I would want to light many areas of the house with LED lighting, It is efficient and does not create heat which would reduce the air conditioning costs. I also think that I would put quite a bit of effort into building an efficient house because we can almost bet we know which way energy costs will continue to go! To that end, I think that after sealing the shell of the house, I would want to apply the closed cell expanding foam insulation - not only to help with insulation costs but also to prevent mold growth and insect infiltration.
I'd locate much of my A/C, electrical, and electronic control systems in the attic where they may stand a better chance of survival if the worst were to happen again.
I'd use a security system that is built for a business rather than a home. This way you could use an RFID system for most entry doors and many different sensors and cameras for internal and perimiter security.
Technology does not end with geek toys. I'd want to install the higher tech appliances; they are efficient and offer a wide variety of options that make using them easier.
Finally, I don't think many people need a real "panic room" but I would build one closet larger than normal and rig it up to make it harder to break into (this is where you can store your valuables) and build access to the attic into it. The attic access is just in case the worst happens again. This quazi panic room should be able to lock from the inside and have battery backup for lighting and perhaps a cel phone for comminications (a pre-paid phone stocked with minimum minutes would suffice). In the attic, I would leave a cache of supplies including non-perishable food, life jackets, and an axe (for roor access). A good sized cooler can hold enough food for several days for a family (don't forget a can opener).
If you really want to help yourself and equipment stay comfortable, perhaps put about 1kw of solar power into the house. Get about seven 160w solar panels, and a grid tie inverter. Mount the solar panels on the garage or a patio, or the roof, and then you could run a window air conditioner all day, etc etc.
Since the solar power stuff would be on the roof and walls, even if the house got a 'little' flooded, that equipment wouldn't be damaged.
Uh, Linux geek since 1999.
Before you gut it (you want to be sure there are no reservoirs of mold growth) have a qualified asbestos consultant test the house for asbestos. No point in having a cool high-tech house that makes you sick.
I'd also consider solar power, and geothermal. Geothermal would probably work exceedingly well in New Orleans. You could pump a LOT of heat out of your home and into the ground (54 deg F). It won't be too long before energy is a lot more expensive than it is now.
I'd also make sure that the server closet is sound insulated (at least double layers of sheetrock all around.) I'd put an AC supply in the wall high in the server closet and a return near the floor to keep all of that gear cool.
I'd give some serious thought to laying out the house so that utilities are on the ground level and living and storage space is up high.
I'm a mechanical engineer so those are the sorts of things I think about.
Here's a thought. The future is always unpredictable so build with the possibility of upgrades in mind. I'd say instead of installing fiber now go with cat5 or whatever and spend the extra $$ on installing nice cable runs to every room. Put pvc pipe in the walls so you can run whatever wire you want in the future.
-- QED
I'd add air ducts into the walls, so you can vent your equipment properly. I recently just vented my Linux machine, running 24/7, out into my garage using a dryer hose kit. It ain't pretty, but it does keep my office much cooler. (which is especially helpful in the AZ summers) Luckily my office is right next to the garage so I could do this, but you would never want to just vent it into the wall! If you had some air ducts with some controllable fans to pull air, it might make doing this much easier.
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
There is only one thing you can say confidently about leading-edge technology: someday you'll be replacing it with something newer. Since your walls are uncovered, you have a golden opportunity to install conduits and junction boxes from the living spaces into the attic, crawl space, or basement. When you want to upgrade, there will be no cutting holes in walls and trying to snake the cables where you want them to go. Plan ahead: prepare for the inevitable upgrades!
I would make either the floor or the crown molding a removable addon that houses a channel for wiring. No amount of wiring you do today will match your needs in 10 years. So why not make it possible to modify/replace/augment the setup easily.
I'm sorry, I'm to tired to be witty at the moment so this message will have to do.
The article poster was mentioning about "rebuilding" a house in NOLA, so I thought I might offer a couple of things.
Depending on how much gutting you intend on doing, many housebuilders have started installing waterblocks in a main access point in the house, such that you can cut off any faucet just like it was a breaker. One is Manabloc. Here's a good site for some more info. http://www.mvsupply.biz/manabloc.htm
Another thing to think about installing is an in-wall pest killer/repellant distribution system, that can be filled/primed/whatever from outside the home. Since this is where insects build their homes, this can be a great idea.
Another good idea is that anywhere you have wiring or plumbing going through walls, close the holes off so that there is not a flame path if a fire should start. Kind of goes along with the concept of Plenum.
Now, for my thoughts, not things I have seen. I say install at least three seperate sets of patch panels in the house. You want cat5e/cat6 for RJ45/RJ11 etc style wiring. You can always custom crimp cables to fit from the wall to the phone, and many '45 jacks nowadays fit '11 connectors and hold them in place for short periods of time.
The second patch panel should be a set of coaxial patches going to each room, preferably two to each room as a minimum, since DVR sat connections require two. I would recommend picking up multicolored coax connector blocks to help differentiate in-room, for instance, telling your wife/husband/technophobe to check and make sure the two blue blocks have wires connected, because how many spouses know how to read a wiring schematic correctly the first time?
The third patch panel should be for speaker wiring, provided the distances aren't going to be too great, or attempting to drive too large of a signal. I would personally hide these third panels all over the house, one in each room where you have speakers. You can make the counter or shelf connections for these patch panels hidden on the wall, and with builtins you can put them to the side instead of the rear, for instance where the TV may connect.
The only problem you get into here is the multitude of cables on the rear of a good AV setup.
Another patch panel you may want to install is if you plan on putting in many security cameras around the house, you can install the coax or rca cables ahead of time for the cabling so that you only need to hook the cameras up after the fact. For instance, run a cable to each eave corner on your house, and install cameras later at your leisure. Just think it out ahead of time where you may want to put more than one camera for this to work. Also, install horizontally mounted-door protected GFCI outoor outlets next to each coax plug.
You also want to make sure that there are seperate AC returns from each room, instead of one huge sucking hole in the middle of your house.
Don't be afraid to run network drops all over the house, network cable is relatively cheap nowadays. Use cat6 when you know you'll want to put a computer their, and cat5 everywhere else, possibly even putting singlegangs for the cabling on the other side of or the next over stud from where you install any electrical outlet.
2^3 * 31 * 647
> "I just got pre-approved to buy some gutted property in New Orleans....
> If you had a blank canvas to start with, what would you do?"
Loosen the house from its foundation. Wire up a NOAA/NWS emergency notification receiver to trigger on any report of local flooding. Have the trigger set off a set of gas canisters that inflate a flotation collar on the house. You have the option of using anchors and cables to keep the house near its original location the next time the Bad Water comes, or just ride the house out into the Gulf along side your deceased neighbors.
"I may be synthetic, but I'm not stupid." -- Bishop 341-B
My wife mentions that ANCHORS might have been a nice technology to invest in.
Not exactly what you need it for, but where you need it for.
Rethinking email
- Are you really comfortable being part of a process which uses disaster, criminal neglect, and the mass displacement of tens of thousands of American citizen as a means of urban renewal?
- Who are you expecting to save your behind when you and your neighbors are doing the backstroke in your living rooms (FEMA has already demonstrated a poor track record here)?
- The land you are building on is either below sea level, or with rising ocean levels (i.e. global warming), increased storm severity (again global warming), and ongoing distruction of the Mississippi delta, will very soon be. How will you protect yourself longterm from an unplanned aquatic life?
- Have you had your land checked for chemical and biological contamination... (benzene, dioxin, stachybotrys, and coliform bacteria make for lousy neighbors)?
- With the severe social impact in the more devasted areas of New Orleans, crime is off the chart. Does pimping out your crib include bullet proofing, and having a secure entry and exit to avoid increasing random street violence?
- How high is the water table? Is it higher than your kitchen table?
- Are you going to provide a high, dry, easily accessible place for storing emergency supplies, meds, fuel, power sources, first aid, communication, transportation (raft(s), bikes, whatever), tools, direct access to roofs and high platforms (many of the people who died in New Orleans, died in their atics, trapped by the flood.)
- What kind of home will you design that can survive a class 5 huricane, tornadoes, flood, and armed neighbors who didn't prepare for devastation, but survive after the initial onslaught?
I know these topics are not fun, in fact they're seriously depressing, and if I had two brain cells to rub together, I would sure as "drunken tourist throw beads on Fat Tuesday" make certain my new home (built in a recent disaster area) wasn't gonna carve decades off my life expectancy. By the way, this isn't personal, I'd be having exactly the same kind of conversation for anybody buying property to build a home on; the San Andreas fault, lava flows in Hawaii, mobil home parks in tornado alley, and Florida beachfront property. I hope you have a great big fat home owners insurance policy that covers you from everything including the second coming.Once you have a home that is built on four story anchored piers, and is capable of rising and dropping 30 or more feet without damage, I'd say you're ready to pimp your houseboat out any way you feel like. In fact, building a house/boat which can be freed from it's anchorage in a really bad situation, might well be in your best interst.
1) Do your entire roof with solar power panels. Hook them into your house. They'll probably never produce enough to need to store excess or feed back into the grid, but they should help your bill a bit.
2) Wind generators on your roof or backyard. Or both. Again, not going to be generating massive levels of electricity, but enough to make a difference.
3) Plan where your computers and televisions will be. Install conduits there that lead directly into your hot-air ducts. Then, run that heat through your house during the cold times, or through your hot-water system during the warm times.
4) A touch-screen PC in your kitchen right near your counter. Use it to load up recipes while you cook. Much better than having a cookbook falling over all the time. Make sure the face of the touchscreen is easily replacable if it gets messy from batter-splatter.
5) A security system that stores everything it records off site, and will drop a GPS-enabled tag onto anyone who trips the alarm. Because what good is all this tech if it's not protected? And what good is proection tech if it will get stolen? And what good is unstealable security tech if it can't help you locate the stolen stuff? =)
UTF-8: There and Back Again
The UV water purifier isn't needed here in New Orleans. Our tap water has been and continues to be some of the cleanest and best tasting in the country.
I find your comment really funny. Just curious, were you trying to be sarcastic? I once lived in southeastern Louisiana for a long time. New Orleans water always tasted horrible to me. It was difficult to describe. I don't think it was mineral deposits nor chlorine, just *something* else... I don't think I was alone. Many others I new well (who had lived in NO) joked about the tap water there...
OTOH, Baton Rouge puts high amounts of chlorine into their water (one can use a swimming pool testing kit on it!). I've also lived in smaller towns in the area who had water that tasted just like bottled water -- no bad taste, no chlorine smell.
I'm sure a lot is done to purify New Orleans water.... However, I doubt it is enough.
ive been working in optics for a while now,several years back we made lens/prism optics that were placed through somebodys house,fiber optics were run throughout,connecting all the lenses(ie.remote light sources)and attached to one massive light source in the basement.one single light for the entire house. uv air filters in the HVAC hardware,theres also flat glass touch sensitive stoves, fridges with tvs and internet hookups.
if i were you,the only problem id have is coming up with $900,000
ive always wanted an elevator too.......
Posted by kdawson on Saturday June 02, @04:03PM
from the geeks-gone-wild dept.
Obviously you need some prostitutes and some drunken teenaged girls to rape in your bus while filming pornographic movies of them to sell to all your friends. Then you should feel right at home.
(It is apparently impossible for slashdotters to talk about a new home without referring to prostitutes and porn.)
Actually, better is to arrange the master bedroom facilites such that you can stick laundry machines right there. Why ship clothes to the basement just to haul them back up in a few days?
So you need space for the machines, a spill pan for the washer, wetboard instead of drywall, plumbing, and 220VAC for the dryer. There's probably a bathroom nearby, you may be able to use the plumbing from there.
Also, mount the machines at waist level. put cabinets or drawers underneath. You want frontloaders for efficiency anyway, so why stoop?
I used to joke about things like this in a residential home but in the light of some of the recent floods its actually not a bad idea. http://www.klsecurity.com/waterproof-harddrive.htm
http://www.jltmobile.com/water.asp
Too bad you cant just order a waterproof house from Sears. Oh wait, they make boats for that.
I personally think CAT5 will go away for home use. It's just pointless to make 30 runs of CAT5 all over a residential house for ethernet jacks that MIGHT get used in the future. I would expect a daisy-chain style network to work better in the home. Personally, I think a high-speed HomePNA network will eventually win due it its simplicity.
Anyway, if I were in your situation, I'd try to have a large closet, with good ventilation, near the center of the home. I'd also try to run a conduit near the center of the home as well. When I was in a fraternity house, we had a lot of conduits from the 1960s that we used to run networking throughout all four floors. Assuming that THE home networking standard will be something other then CAT5, by giving yourself easily-accessable conduit, you can upgrade with minimal headaches.
No, I will not work for your startup
Scott Adams asked a question similar to yours. Here are the suggestions he got back.
m l
http://www.dilbert.com/comics/dilbert/duh/tour.ht
i'd hit it so hard, if you pulled me out you'd be the king of britain [bash.org]
YOU COULDN'T RESIST, COULD YOU?
You just couldn't do it! You couldn't stay away! You HAD to start it up again!
Oh, man. Alex, you are the losingest loser that has ever lost.
+++ATH0
Our kitchen is right next to our master in a ranch layout, but we have basically a closet.
I agree, Ideally you have a "clothing room" with space for hanging clothes, two washers, two dryers, folding area, ironing board, and other stuff attached to your bedroom. Put a desk and shelves in it to catch bills, an a door you can close to the rest of the world...
Narcissists wear their twisted little black hearts on their sleeves.
+++ATH0
I do realize that internet psychiatrists who did not go to university for psychiatry that make psyche evaluations of others without educational certifications end up wearing egg on their faces when they are shown to be just delusional thinking they are.
You just can't resist using your own talking points over and over again, can you? No wonder you're a homophobic conservatard, Alex.
+++ATH0
Sorry dude. It seems like everyone can't get over the fact you're building in New Orleans. Maybe if you build elsewhere we could give you some real constructive advice.
-50 DKP for lame post!
I know you quite well, APK. You've let your own true colors shine through over and over again.
Move out of your dad's house. Really. You'll feel so much freer!
Why did you start this up again when you claim to feel so put upon if someone trolls you? I didn't go looking for you again, you came to me.
Is it because I'm the closest thing you've ever had to a friend? Wow. That is really, really sad.
Hey, whatever happened to that "online stalking" lawsuit you were going to file against me? It's a month later and no papers served! I'm starting to get bored over here!
+++ATH0
that you are still replying to me proves you are APK.
Get a life, Alex. Then get help.
+++ATH0
Jason, I'd really look at HAI (Home Automation, Inc.) http://www.homeauto.com/ --as they've been around since 1985 and are manufactured in your backyard!!! I'd run Cat-5. You can use lamp and appliance modules to tie into HAI's system and you could tie in your 7.1 surrounds to whole home audio w/ their Hi-Fi. Their coolest product that I'd Check out is Snap-Link--their USB thumbdrive that you can plug into any computer in the world to monitor and change your home's temperatures, lighting, security, surveillance videos, audio, shades, the list goes on and on. And you don't even need a computer running at your home--it connects directly to HAI's home controller, which isn't computer based. It works just as easily when connected to an Ultra Mobile PC and used as a wireless touchscreen in your house. Use it securely at home, at your office, or in an internet cafe in China--it leaves no trace of your home behind! http://www.homeauto.com/Products/Software/Snaplink .asp
a normal person (i.e. "not APK") would have stopped replying to me by now, or at least stopped making speeches.
You just can't stop making speeches, though, can you? It's part of how you're wired: anything perceived as an "attack" MUST BE MET with allllll the reasons the attacker is wrong, stupid, and evil. You can't ignore anything.
Such a sad, pathetic, 50 year old little boy you are, Alex.
+++ATH0
A photo of starkruzr:
h hranch_clown.jpg
http://www.clownscharacters.com/htmls/scooterpie_
hahahaha
starkruzr you are just some 30 year old punk who cant take it when he is shown as wrong. You are the one here in this thread who tells others in this post thread not to judge others and yet he does it himself and calls others names and casts dispersions on people to no end. You are no one special so what qualifies you to do so? Show us accomplishments of yours online or in publication that are of some worth and not judged by your family and friends but by third parties with actual skills in the area noted, and then you can start to remotely say you have done anything of note or worth, and can prove otherwise. It truly seems that whenever others do posts that get the real miserable little loser that you are to come out in your writings calling others names and saying they are crazy and such when you have no phd in psychiatry to back it up in the first place, is always the case with you. You are a miserable troublemaker based on your posts history here at slashdot that has somekind of paranoid delusion that everyone is alex, adk, or whomever and I think you need the psychiatric help, though I am no phd in that area, it is fairly obvious. The clown photo of yourself is funny. Did you work as a clown or something?
You told me I was "too young to be in grad school." Don't you remember, Alex?
I don't think "everyone" is you. I KNOW that only you are obsessive enough to keep this going and keep rambling on and on about whether or not I have credentials in one thing or another.
+++ATH0
And, you starkruzr have been judged by myself, as to your being this:
h hranch_clown.jpg
http://www.clownscharacters.com/htmls/scooterpie_
Change the post title to "Pimping out a new CLOWN named starkruzr" @ http://slashdot.org/~StarKruzr !
I too have wired up my house over years or renovation projects to it. Documentation
was a pain (something that is a kitchen today may not be a kitchen later, and I don't
want to label connections to it with the word Kitchen) so I came up with a
numbering system for the rooms in my house. Since I'm in a rowhouse, I only need to worry
about two of the three dimensions. The first number is the floor,
the next number is how far back into the house the area is, the last number is the type of space
Each area of the property in the house is numbered X-YZ
X = Floor number
0 = Basement
1 = First Floor
2 = Second Floor
3 = Attic
4 = Roof
Y = Section of house (going from front to back)
0 = Front Yard
1 = First series of rooms
2 = Middle Series of rooms
4 = Back series of rooms
5 = Back porch
Z = Sub rooms
0 = Main Room area
1 = Closet
2 = Closet
3 = Bathroom
4 = Hallway
5 = Hallway
6 = Other
7 = Other
8 = Other
9 = Stairs
Overwhelm and devastate with the attackers own list of misdoings. You had it coming telling others not to judge anyone and you did so by casting profanities at others such as myself. You only deserve it. Judge not lest ye be judged.
Of your Windows IT Pro trainwreck.
That's all I really have to say to this.
+++ATH0
http://www.windowsitpro.com/articles/index.cfm?art icleid=41095&cpage=200#feedbackAnchor
Others can read and do the judging for themselves, not having you judging others and casting profanities their way in doing so as you have done here. Do not as I do, but do as I say, right Jarrett DeAngelis? Judge not, lest ye be judged.
Your pages-long rants reveal you as a complete lunatic. Good job.
If there were anyone other than you reading this thread, they would now understand eeeeverything about you. But since there isn't, guess I get to just look back and laugh!
Thanks! And this was going to be such a boring Tuesday!
+++ATH0
you judge everyone and anyone replying to you calling the apk or alex (whoever that is)
I judge you to be incapable of communicating in English, APK.
+++ATH0
Judge not lest ye be judged.
"Don't fucking judge someone you don't know, asshole." - by StarKruzr (74642) on Saturday June 02, @11:57PM (#19368165)
Says it all about YOU, in your own words (profanity & all).
You're boring. Bye.
+++ATH0
"You're boring. Bye." - by StarKruzr (74642) on Thursday June 14, @12:27AM (#19501181)
t icleid=41095&cpage=202#feedbackAnchor
And, you're an obsessed internet psycho cyberstalker, who posts under different guises online in clear attempts to harass others online (with your arstechnica friends Jeremy Reimer & Jay Little):
http://www.windowsitpro.com/articles/index.cfm?ar
Anyone can read that, & judge for themselves - "Judge not, lest ye be judged".
"Don't fucking judge someone you don't know, asshole." - by StarKruzr (74642) on Saturday June 02, @11:57PM (#19368165)
Says it all about YOU, hypocrite ("Do not as I do, but do as I say"), + in your own words (profanity & all).
I would recommend using a universal remote... you should also set up a way to have your heat, cooling, and lighting preferences dialed in so that when you get home, your house is allready at your temperature. You could also set your appliances up in such a way that it will do things like washing your dishes and cleaning your cloths fairly autonomously. Set these up so that they can be accessed from your macs remotely... and your all set.