Multi-Room Audio Distribution System and Home Cinema – West of Melton Mowbray
During the refurbishment of his home an existing client specified an upgrade to his home cinema system in the Living Room, and addition of multi-room audio throughout the property.
The ground floor of the property was being completely renovated and extended, but the first floor was not being touched, and although access through the vertical centre of the property allowed for cable routing if required, in-wall keypads for the audio system were not an option. Instead Sonos was chosen for its ease of use in this retrofit scenario, and two ZonePlayers were placed in the loft to provide music through in-ceiling speakers in the Master Bedroom and Bathroom. In the extension space was granted in a Utility Room cupboard to house the ZonePlayers powering the Kitchen, Dining Room, Shower Room and Garden.
In the Living Room the client was having the fireplace rebuilt and so opted to have a 50” plasma recessed into it, with in-wall centre speaker for the surround sound below that. Front left and right channels were fitted via speakers standing either side of the fireplace, and a pair of in-ceiling speakers cater for the rear channels above the main seating position. Provision was made to expand the system to 7.1 if required in the future, but currently the client uses the additional two channels of amplification in the AV amplifier to provide extra drive for the floor standing speakers at the front.
The home cinema is driven by a Pioneer receiver, with sources available from Blu-Ray, Freesat, HD-DVD, Playstation 3 and a home theatre PC, purpose built by us to his specification. From this the client streams all his Blu-Ray and DVD movies, from an additional NAS drive, which also stores his music collection for streaming through the Sonos system. A gigabit network switch connects all necessary equipment and networking points installed throughout the property. The home cinema system is controlled via a Control4 home controller, which also interfaces with the home theatre PC to give full control over all aspects of the system.
Finally, the client chose to house all of the equipment in a Middle Atlantic rack, and have it recessed into a purpose built cavity under the staircase, hidden out of the way in the Living Room, and finished with a smoked-glass door.