AV Patch Panel - is there such a thing?

[Sarkster]

Hi,

Just had a look on tinternet and cant seem to find what im after, essentially in an oblong room with you sitting in it half way across the longest wall, right back against the wall, I would like to mount a plasma half way along the other longest wall. I would like to have a hi-fi stand in the corner of the oblong room with all of the kit in it.

But I hate wires...


Is there such a thing as a panel to be fitted behind the plasma in the wall with, say, an RGB scart, HDMI or 2, Component, Phono and VGA plugs, and a load of good quality shielded cables leading to another identical patch panel thing that I could fit to the wall by the hi fi stand and plug everything into the tv via that? (no smart alec 'ahh but what about the wii sensor' questions, either. I havent worked that one out yet!

Thanks

[charlesr]

You'll lose quality at the connections. You are introducing 2 more for each cable. I have my cables coming straight out of the wall.

But in answer to your question, I've not seen something like that.

[Sarkster]

Ahh ok, so im guessing you still had to keep the boxes close to the tv in tht case?

What did you do charles? bury trunking in the wall to pass the cables through?

[ascender]

Your room layout sounds the same as mine. I went from having an AV unit in the corner, to wall-mounting my plasma halfway along the longest wall and then getting a new AV unit to go directly under it. I had the same thoughts about leaving the AV unit in the corner, but decided it was a cabling nightmare and besides, having it under the plasma meant I just put the centre speaker on top of the unit.

As far as cables go, you can either trunk them or just drop them down without trunking. Simply cut a small hole under your plasma bracket, then one down near the back of where the AV unit is going and just drop the cables down. If you can do switching in your amp then its nice and easy to drop down just a few cables. If you struggle with insulation getting in the way, get a flexible length of plastic curtain rail or pipe and tape your cables to the end before pushing it down through the hole.

[kernow]

You'll lose quality at the connections. You are introducing 2 more for each cable. I have my cables coming straight out of the wall.

But in answer to your question, I've not seen something like that.

I was about to say the same thing, more joins = more resistance = less quality.

[Salsa Party Animal]

You probably need a good amp with HDMI and load of input/upscaling stuff. then use a long hdmi cable to your TV. It is only way. You could also look for suitable media cabient to put underneath TV if necessary.

[EvilBoris]

Some TV's have a separate input box with 1 cable going to the TV so you can place your Plasma and your boxes a way away from each other.
I know someone with a JVC set like this and there is a Box you buy for the Pioneer Kuros that does it.

[CMcK]

http://www.pioneer.co.uk/uk/products/62/490/11786/PDA-V100HD/index.html

I have that Pioneer box. Would be very good for a long cable run as it acts as a repeater for the HDMI inputs.

[EvilBoris]

and it fully integrates with the panel, so you don't need to have separate remotes or flick through stupid menus to get to things.

[CMcK]

I'm using it with a Loewe TV so no on screen displays but that keeps all the inputs free.

[charlesr]

Yeah, I buried tubes in the wall and fed the cables down them. For the speaker outlets, I used standard single plug socket wall units and a blanking plate that I drilled a hole in. The speaker cable came straight out of that and then into speaker. For the plasma, I'm going to have just a hole in the wall hidden behind the plasma (not done this yet).

[Rick]

There are CAT5 systems that do this i think. I don't know what they are like though...

[Rick]

http://www.bluedelta.co.uk/milestone_system.htm

[Sarkster]

Thanks for that guys.

I think ive decided on sinking a single HDMI into the wall, then banging everything into an Onkyo A/V amp and outputting through that single HDMI (unless someone has a reason why that is a very bad idea (tm))

[ascender]

That's what I've done and it works very well tbh. I've got a couple of HDMI going in to it as well as a couple of component inputs as well.