[jackal24]

I have a finished basement room that I am planning on turning into a home theater room. I am new to home repair/modding. How do I run wire around the room for speakers, new lighting, etc? I would like it to be hidden, but if I just run it in the walls, I think that I will be running into studs. There is not a crawl space, and I don't want to pull out the drywall. Any ideas?

 

[Techy]

without cutting the walls open, assuming a drywall ceiling, your only option is exposed wiring, or wiremold.

http://www.legrand.us/Wiremold/Race...gle-Channel-Raceway/500700-Small-Raceway.aspx

 

[jackal24]

I was afraid of that. Is there baseboard or crown molding that can hide the wiremold?

 

[user1007]

You could hide the speaker wire enough so someone would have to be looking for it along the baseboards and I suppose you could dado a channel for it in the back. You should be able to hide cat5 or whatever computer wire there too.

If your lighting additions happen to run the same direction as joists you can pull wire.

As a longstanding art gallery guy, why not explore track lighting? In addition to the usual tracks we think of, with fixtures you twist and turn to lock in place? They make some delightful tracks that are little more than two wires. Fixture contacts rest on the wires and in dim lighting or against a dark ceiling the track becomes almost non-perceptible.

With tracks you just need to tap into an existing fixture and you can then run in all directions. Put or move the fixtures where you want them now and in the future.

 

[jackal24]

The track lighting is a great idea. I was more worried about hiding the romex than i was about the speaker wire and hdmi (high voltage vs low). I didn't even think about track lighting. Thank you.

 

[user1007]

The track lighting is a great idea. I was more worried about hiding the romex than i was about the speaker wire and hdmi (high voltage vs low). I didn't even think about track lighting. Thank you.

You are welcome. And do look into the non-conventional thin wire tracks I mentioned. A trip to your local lighting store might be in order soon? People ignore such places thinking they cannot afford what is sold there. Nonsense. What they should realize is they cannot afford the limited choices, quality and expertise of box stores. And if you don't ask for a discount off retail at a specialty store? You will not get it. At a box store you will get $1.25 knocked off the thing in a beat up box someone returned from last years parking lot liquidation sale.

And why not hire an interior or lighting designer if you are not sure. Immediately you will be dealing with their connections to markup from the wholesale market. Most charge no more than your butler, maid, pool boy and chauffeur and live off their marking up what you really want. And I promise, you will really like the experience.

Keep us all posted on this.

By the way, my fave laser projector, capable of projecting a 100 inch wide image incredibly sharp save for atmospheric degradation, is down to about $500 full retail with cables and interfaces. Size of a pack of cigarettes and just a bit heavier. Hooks up to a laptop, smartphone and so forth.