TJ, the shorter the better and to my knowledge there is no max other than thenfurther you go the more loss induced by the cable. I’ve run up to 70m with 2.5mm cable with perfectly decent results.

Stumpy01, the Stealth speakers are full range. The Amina’s aren’t. I’ve done quite big Cinema’s with Stealth and they’re great. They do an in wall sub as well.

If it was me, I’d go for Artcoustic and try to get the wife to agree. Less painfully installation and good sound. OK a fat pair of speakers is better but not an option in this setup.

Artcoustic, I was trying to remember the brand when I mentioned on walls!
You can even submit your own pictures / art work for the screen.

some of those cat 5 recipes have high capacitance I believe so maybe not so good for ‘extreme’ usage.

The Van Damme 2.5mm blue jacketed stuff is pretty good, and there are cheaper versions of the same ‘OFC studio’ cable.

With long cable runs the key is keeping the resistance down – very skinny cable in long lengths causes series resistance which changes the frequency response and transient accuracy through the upper bass and low midrange (it raises Qes if you care). The end result is excess boom.

I was thinking of sheilded cat6 as they will be following similar paths as the power cables.

Max distance would be about 25M I should imagine (as I the cables are going to have to take a funny route.

At the moment, I am just working out what needs to go where, and as the house currently doesn’t have a roof this is all early days.

I was thinking of using in ceiling speakers in two bedrooms for background music, and routing the speakers back to a comms cupboard via cat6 and then connected to an Amp/Squeezebox

At 67ohm/km that gives you ~1.5 ohm for 25m – that’s a lot. With ceiling speakers it probably doesn’t matter but you can simulate it by testing them in situ with a resistance of that size in series.

I will give it a go when I get to wiring them, I might be able to put the comms cupboard somewhere closer to reduce the wire length.

I don’t see getting the lengths down to sub 12M though.

What sort of resistance should I be looking at max?

<5% of the speaker impedance is the rule of thumb, so 0.4 ohm or less for 8 ohm speakers.

maybe better off with some sort of wireless/powerline streaming to an amp with a remote control that is somewhat nearer to the speakers.

Netstreams do an ip amplifier module which might work for you. They are about £700 though. We had some here for a test install , they’re probably getting dusty in a cupboard somewhere… I’d have a Google and see if something similar for sensible money is available.

I am wondering about that.

My current plan is, sorta like this:

Squeezebox touch in Living room connected to local speakers. (zone1)

Kitchen – Squeezebox Radio and some ceiling speakers (zone2)

Bathroom – ceiling speakers wired back to comms cupboard (zone 3)

Bedroom 1 – ceiling speakers wired back to comms cupboard (zone4)

Bedroom 2 – ceiling speakers wired back to comms cupboard (zone5)

Whole house will be wired with cat6, so I was going to run some extra cables into the ceiling space, even though I mighten connect them for a while.

Not sure how I will drive the ceiling speakers yet, but I know I don’t really want to put devices in the ceiling voids if at all possible.

so why do you think cat 6 is a good speaker cable?

Woah! I didn’t expect a mass dabate (hur hur) over this!

I can hear the change in some high frequencies……

3F: Correct me if I’m wrong but I always understood that a speaker classified as ‘monitor’ was designed to have a very accurate soundstage and response curve in a very tight sweet-spot because they were essentially listened to by one or two people sat very closely together (i.e. at a mixing desk etc.) Whereas ‘normal’ speakers have a greater sweet-spot. If you listen to monitor speakers, surely this explains why certain frequencies drop rapidly as you move away?

Regarding suggestions to get in-wall speakers fitted: Unfortunately the building work has swallowed the available funds currently, and Mrs BOAS will not want to sit looking at holes in the walls for the next 12 months while I save up for equipment she doesn’t see the need for!

Thanks for your inputs chaps!

so why do you think cat 6 is a good speaker cable?

Because, I have to wire the house for data anywhere so to run another cable isn’t a major hassle, especially if it would work for background music.

If its truely awful, I will use proper speaker cable ….

I’d use proper speaker cable TBH.

I know there’s a huge amount of snake-oil around speaker cabling (I’m sure the search facility would enlighten you on the amount some have spent on ‘directional’ cables 🙄 ) but then there is some science to back up SOME of the claims, and from my personal experience the resistivity and capacitance in some (cheaper?) cabling does make a difference.

Most of the speaker cables that people have made with cat 5 and cat 6 involve ‘weaving’ them to keep inductance and capacitance at reasonable levels, but I think they can still be problematic with certain amps that don’t like high capacitance.

And you are wanting very long runs of speaker cable, so I would definitely avoid.

I used some 2.5mm² speaker cable from CPC about £50 per 100m (from memory), I was under the impression CSA mattered on longer runs, although mine are no longer then about 20m via a speaker switch, and sound fine.

On cableing I would go for some fairly basic proper speaker cable

couple of quid a meter stuff should be fine – thats what I used and I have loads of cabling

Just seen the speakers below and wondered if it might be a solution for some?
http://www.whathifi.com/news/systemline-builds-apples-airplay-into-active-ceiling-speakers-for-no-system-sound

Interesting thread and a common dilemma.
If the room is going to be very “live” with acoustics compounded by a vaulted ceiling, I’d say you’ll need to compromise on ultimate audio quality. Especially since you mention that you have a proper system in another room. Therefore, if background music is the realistic aim, I’d go for a higher speaker count run at lower levels. It helps to alleviate the problem of the room sound imposing too much. As somebody mentioned, it’s more or less the same as sitting closer to the speakers.
Definitely ceiling or in-wall speakers for this project. As mentioned, either KEF or B&W are good choices.
If you want the choice of having them flat when not used and pointing at you when required, KEF do some motorised ceiling speakers. They’re rather spendy though!

If budget allows, why not run the room design past an acoustic consultant before you build? At least with some basic acoustics predictions you could iron some of the nasties out at the design and build stage rather than try to fix them afterwards?

…why not run the room design past an acoustic consultant before you build?

*sigh*

I have difficulty persuading Mrs BOAS that speakers are a requirement in the first place. If I were to employ someone to do an acoustic assessment I might as well remove my dangly bits and hang them in place of the speakers.

I’d go for a higher speaker count run at lower levels.

Good point, and one I have made provision for with speaker cabling in the walls and floors. I’ve made a guess as to where placement would be best – I just hope I’ve got it right as the plaster is on the walls now!

JWT: Nice idea, but, well, how do I put this, I’d repeat the dangly bits scenario before owning an iAnything.