I'm writing quite a bit on my blog, but a little cross polination would be good.
This is the plan for wiring network cable in the rooms. The middle and smallest room is probably the best computer room. There is one closet. I intend the massive storage server to be caseless, built on wood braces into the closet.
I don't like that I would spend so much time in the smallest room, but it makes sense. Yoga requires space, so the larger bedroom will not fill up. An air mattress can be thrown down quickly. If there is a reason in the future to repurpose the rooms I don't have to rewire and move computers.
Route
Network wires will run to each room, Master Bed, Master Bath, 1st bedroom, 2nd bedroom(to closet), Kitchen, Living Room, Living Room Ceiling (future), Wash room, Garage. That's pretty much every room except the water heater, A/C, 2nd bath, and backyard. These were considered, because I like the idea of letting a server monitor the appliances. Perhaps control the house temp over the internet. The security panel could be in or near one of these and a network access to it might be nice.
Wall Plates
Wall access gives me some concern. I'm not a fan of the full 2 X 4 wall plates for "phone" connections. Then I found these Quickports at HomeTech. They provide 1-6 interchangeable jacks that can be used for anything; SVideo, RCA, Speakers, Network, Phone, etc.
Which brought up another project. It would be very nice to run a closed cable wire through each room. The bedroom TiVo has the cable box and records the most. Instead of depending upon MultiRoom TiVo, which can be slow, I could watch the house cable line and broadcast to all the rooms from the bedroom. Get a Radio Frequency IR blaster to allow changing the channels from the Kitchen or Living Room. This would basically be one long cable wire through the whole house with splitters for each room. I don't know if cable can do that.
Cable Choices
There are four overlapping choices of cable. Plenum vs non plenum and Cat5e vs Cat6. Plenum cable is designed to run in air ducts, which are great conduits of fire in a building. So plenum cables are flame retardant. Cat5e is very common. It conducts frequencies up to 350 MHz. Cat6 is the most recent Gigabit standard with frequencies up to 500 MHz and 50% less signal loss compared to Cat5e. The price comparisons are below.
Plenum Cat6 : $600 per 1000 ft
Non Plenum Cat6: $300
Plenum Cat5e: $325
Non Plenum Cat5e: $150
I favor the Plenum Cat5e. Signal loss and cable length shouldn't be too bad on this small house. Fire resistance looks pretty cheap for $150. And I like the idea that fire fighters wouldn't have to breathe in toxic gas from burning network cable.
Anyway, I'll need some 4 or 6 port wallplates, lots of blanks, network jack per room plus closet, a panel in the closet, a drywall saw.
I don't know what I'm doing, so I'll do this in phases. Phase I is Master Bedroom, Closet, Living Room.
Parts List Phase I:
3 4-Port Wall Plates $2 x 3 = $6 (Rooms)
1 12-Port Wall Plate $4 x 1 = $4 (Closet)
8 Cat5e Ports $5 x 8 = $40 (2 extra)
20 Blanks Ports $3 x 2 = $6 (2 extra)
1 Basic Wire Tester x 1 = $30
1000ft Wire x 1 = $325
10 1 Wall Box $12 x 1 = $12
1 2 Wall Box $4 x 1 = $4
Fish/Puller ? (Can I make one with fishing weights and the old car speakers I replaced last year?)
Crimper? (Do the ports autocrimp?)
Total: ~$500 (Most cost is in the wiring)
Under Carpet Kit
Adjacent Room Kit This shows a Flash video of how to cut a hole in the wall with the drywall saw and install the wall plates.
Magenepull Cable Retrieval System