About to plaster a room: Future-proofing for home-cinema

[admin_exported]

I'm just about to plaster a room prior to redecorating. I've just had my whole house rewired and I'm going to mount a TV on the wall.

I'd like to avoid having too many visible wires but I think I'll need a few audio cables, scart, HDMI, power, aerial, broadband etc (haven't decided yet) wires running from the wall to that TV. My TV aerial point (I'll be using Freeview for now but may move up to Freesat or something else), power connections and Hi-fi amps will all be in the same place - a corner a few feet away - so a single point for them would be fine.

I was wondering if there is a universal junction-box that I could embed in the wall behind the TV that would allow me to connect to the HDMI / aerial / power / broadband / audio etc with short hidden cables. The junction box would have a single fat wire that carries all of the connections to a second junction box to somewhere near the power / hi-fi / broadband / TV set-top box etc.

Thing is, I want to do this only once and be ready for future changes - so it'd need be be a fairly comprehensive connection collection.

Is there such a wonderful invention or would that be too good to be true?

 

[Anonymous]

I don't think that there is such a thing, you could try some inwall casing.

 

[True Blue]

IMO the best way would be to chase out the runs that you will require and then insert cable trunking big enough to accomodate the wires (dont forget your rear speakers). Before you clip the top onto the trunking place a piece of string in it, with 6 inches spare at either end. Then when it has all been plastered in, all you need to do is connect the wire to the string and pull. Also good as you can upgrade in the future. Just remeber to make the trunking wide / deep enough to accomodate the plug.

You can then (if required get fascia plates like the ones from Audio visual online, but most manufacturers make fascia plates and connector plates if you require them.

eg http://www.hificablesdirect.com/b/16/QED/c/58/Wall-Plates-/QED-Wall-Plates-.html

 

[Anonymous]

As far as I know such a beast doesn't exist my friend.

The best thing you can do is, as the other posters said, chase in some oversize cable trunking and put in every cable you think you're likely to need and put in a bit of old speaker wire or something to pull new cables through. Put in some extra coaxes for potential Freesat connections and maybe a couple of extra HDMI 1.4 in case you go 3D. Of course this all costs money so if you have enough room in the trunking(s) you can put them in as you need them. Try and keep the power lead away from the other cables if you can.

Make sure you chase it in nice and deep to prevent the plaster cracking.

I 'luckily' have a timber framed house which meant I was able to feed all my cables behind the plasterboard. If you have a stud wall you may be able to do the same, which makes it easy. You could even consider putting up a stud wall on top of your existing wall (quite extreme but makes it easier in the future).

Alternatively you can get surface trunking to do the same job with less work and is easily accessible afterwards.

Hope this helps.