Graham Harrison wrote:

Just bought a new (well 2nd hand!) house originally built on the 30s and
extended in the 80s and then again in the late 90s. We don't have an
outside TV aerial and I'm thinking of getting one installed. That has set
me thinking about how to then distribute the signal though the house. It
used to be easy, bring the wire into the house, split the cable and away you
go (bear in mind it's over 20 years since I last did this).

Use a masthead or loft amplifier to boost and split to numerous TV
sockets in all teh rooms. Works well for me.

Now, it might
be nice to make it possible to view the output from a video machine situated
with one TV on a different TV.

No, not really. People want to control the thing themsleves. Theres
enough battling going on on our house over what to watch without 'er
indoors randomly changing stuff in my den etc :-)

get a video for every room that needs one. Cheaper in the long run.

With the emergence of PCs with TV (and huge
discs to allow video recording etc) the possibility of networking such a PC
with other PCs and also allowing another TV to view video from the PC hard
disc is another thing I'd like to allow for even if I don't have the kit
right now. And then, of course, there's the issue of controlling lights,
heating etc.

The best thing you can probbaly do is more or less what I did.
Run coax and a couple of cat 5's to just about everywhere, and leave the
arse ends of them coiled up in a room with a 19" rack in it, or indeed
the loft.

Not all of it is connected, but the cables are there anyway.

Howevr my experience of wiring up offices sugesst that teh concept of
future proofing is flawed: Who wopuld have guessed that 5 years on we
would be lifting floors and laying multimode fibres? Or trhat the
totality ofte p[hone wiring would be superceded by something else?

And of course Murphys law of employees alwas states that the one plave
She will want a TV/PC/slaer guided missiles installation is the one
place where there are no sockets, nor any chance of geting some..




I probably need to do some background reading first if only to rein in some
of my wilder thinking. I see there's a "Dummies" book on the subject; any
good? Any other books? Any web sites I should peruse? A different
Usenet group?

The house is on the South Somerset/Mendip council border. Anyone happen to
know an installer in the area?

Thank you for any pointers.