The Top 5 Home Theater Wiring Installation Tips

So now you have your brand new home theater system components sitting in their boxes in front of you and it's go time. You have to somehow connect all of these foreign objects together and make it all work. For many people this is a really intimidating scenario, but actually if you follow a few simple guidelines it doesn't have to be all that difficult. So here are the top 5 tips for home theater wiring installation.

1. This may sound corny but read the manual. I know that there are lots of you folks that prefer to just pick up a screwdriver and dive in, but you cannot believe how much you can mess up by not taking the time here to read the installation instructions through and get a good feel for what you need to do in advance. In fact, you may somehow get the system to work without doing that, but odds are that it will never perform as well as it should simply because a few steps were left out while it was being installed. So save your self the extra grief and just read the wiring installation instruction manual before you get started.

2. Use the correct gauge wire for your installation. Remember that when you have to run wire for longer distances it requires a heavier gauge to be able to successfully transmit the signal. Here is a simple general guideline that you can use: for lengths under 100 feet 16 gauge wire should be adequate, up to 200 feet 14 gauge wire will work and over that you will probably need 12 gauge wire to make sure things work properly.

3. Whenever you are making any kind of home theater wiring installation whether it be from one component to another or from a component to the speakers, make sure that both components are powered off when you connect them. Many is the heartache caused by someone turning on components before making the connections and experiencing high sudden power loads that damage their brand new equipment. Avoid that by always keeping the components powered off as you make wiring connections.

4. Gather your cables and wires together in advance and make sure that they will stretch far enough from each installed component before you begin installation. It's really frustrating to find out that one of your wires or cables isn't long enough after you already have everything else set up.

5. A common mistake that many people make when installing their own home theater setup is stacking the components like the receiver, dvd player, cable box and so on, so closely together that they have no room to breathe. Often they will even put them inside a closed cabinet too, which only compounds the problem. So before laying out your system try to think of a way to provide plenty of air flow between each component which will allow it to run more efficiently, last longer, and perform better.

If you plan ahead to set aside plenty of time for your home theater wiring installation, you should be able to get it done with little problem and frustration if you use the tips provided above.

Thad Pickering writes on many consumer related topics including audio and video. You can find out more about surround sound setup and surround sound installation by visiting our Home Theater website.

Car Stereo Wiring 101 - A Must Read!

I have come across a lot of car stereo systems over the past 10 years or so. There are so many "techniques" to installing head units. Everyone has their own opinion of what is right and wrong when wiring up a system, but just because it works doesn't make it right.

I asked Majestic Modifications what their opinion was on the subject. How do they install so many units and always get it right?

First, if applicable, always use the harnesses. The aftermarket wiring harness will usually take the guesswork out of the installation. These harnesses attach to the vehicle's factory wiring harness and gives you a color coded installation. You just attach red to red, yellow to yellow, etc. But is that all an installer should know?

Starting with your digital multimeter, find the power sources in the harness. One source will be continuous 12 volts, the other will be the ACC (ignition) 12 volts. These two will go with the yellow and red wires from the aftermarket head unit's harness. They are labeled accordingly. It is usually a good idea to attach the ground wire to the frame of the dash. A lot of head units come with a connector for this already attached to the ground wire. Secure these in place with some solder and shrink tubing. Slip the shrink tubing over one of the wires to be connected and move it out of the way. Connect the wires and dab a little solder on the wires. Let cool and then slide the heat shrink tubing over the connection. Heat with a heat gun/hair dryer to shrink the tubing to fit.

You can try to look on the internet for the wiring colors, but good luck. They will tell you the "typical" wire colors, but chances are it will be different. You can try two techniques to find the right wires. Clip the rest of the wires from the factory harness. You can test the speakers with a good 9 volt battery to see which speakers are which. Two wires connected to the same speaker will make it pop. Note which speaker makes the pop and attach it to that speakers wiring from the head unit. I like to turn the unit on and make sure the wires are the right polarity. A reverse wired speaker will not have as good a sound as a properly wired one. Continue the technique until all the speakers are connected.

The other way you can trace the speakers down is to turn on the head unit, but be VERY careful to not cross any wires. Start with a pair of wires, and attach them one at a time until you get sound. Note which speaker it is and attach it to that speaker's wires from the wiring harness, taking not of polarity. Continue until all the wires are in place. Zip tie the wire together and neatly tuck them behind the head unit.

Be sure you have a good ground wire connection. Be sure that RCAs or signal wires are running away from any power wires or sources, and are not run parallel to them.

If you want a neat trick, you can attach the 12 volt acc to the illumination wire, and you will be able to turn the unit on with your parking light switch. Take note, that anytime the unit is on, the dash panel lights will be on too, but you won't notice them in the daytime. The illumination wire is used to turn the factory radio lights on at night.

Not having the wiring harness for your vehicle is not a do or die situation. If you can get the harnesses, save the hassle and time and use it. If you find yourself in a bind, then follow the steps above and get it installed correctly.

Majestic Modifications is the complete car customization concept, specializing in car accessories, cold air intakes and performance upgrades, body kits and exterior accessories, glow gauges and interior accessories, wheels and tires, mobile video, car audio and electronics.

Using Virtual Wiring In An Age Of Instant Solutions

The subject of this article is virtual wiring or wires. So what do I mean by virtual? Usually if one wants to connect a digital signal to a relay then one has a circuit which drives the coil, this pulls in the relay contacts and this creates an isolated switch which may be used to provide power to a light or other suitably rated appliance. If the distance between the initiating signal and the appliance is great then one has a choice of either extending the digital signal with a long piece of wire or extending the switch side with long wiring. This seems to be a simple solution but in many cases, extending the wiring may not be the answer if the extension is complex, not aesthetically pleasing or many wires are involved.

The solution is virtual wiring and this can be implemented in a number of different ways.

1) If some wiring already exists then by virtue of multiplexing (combining many signals into one compound signal) and demultiplexing (taking one compound signal and expanding it again into many) electronics on either side, existing wiring can be used if an increase in the number of switches is required without laying extra cable.

2) The mux/demux solution can also be implemented with the use of fiber optics, where the compound signal is transported by means of modulated light.

3) Another transport medium is rf (radio frequency) In this age of Zigbee and other wireless standards, the compound signal can be transmitted through the air without any visible means. The simplest implementation would be a switch (or eight or more) on the near side being closed, detected by the monitoring electronics, assembled into some kind of protocol, transmitted wirelessly, received by the far unit, disassembled and the relevant relay or other switch mechanism would then be toggled. This would allow lights, appliances and other devices to be controlled without the addition of any control wiring.

The natural extension of this type of virtual wiring is to extend analogue signals as well. An example of this could be an appliance/device that needs to be set at a particular value. This value could be read (using a A/D converter) at the near side, assembled and transmitted as described previously and then output to the device in question as an analogue signal (using a D/A converter).

The one drawback of this type of signal extension method is that there will invariably be a delay between switch pushed/signal read and the corresponding action on the far side. Usually however a small delay is acceptable and other high speed methods exist for signals that require a higher bandwidth.

Marc Jarchow
47 year old entrepeneur providing MODular ElecTRONics solutions for the Professional (custom instruments for your business), Educator (can be used as a training aid), Entrepeneur (can be packaged with your logo) and Hobbyist (make your own home based products) using low cost modules to create whatever application you have in mind. This is all done via modetron.com