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I bought all of my HDMI cables at Monoprice.com in the US. They will ship it to Canada, but for what I needed I was able to ship them to buffalo and go get them (I tend to do that a lot). It worked out because at the same time I bought from them LCD mounts, speaker wire, optical cables etc.

I have a wire shelving unit in the basement. I have on it my multi-zone amp (to drive the living room and the dining room), my cogeco PVR and my Zotac XBMC box. All of the speaker wire terminates in the media niche and then down to the basement to the amp. My PS3 sits in the niche so I can play blu-ray/games without running downstairs, but if you have an HDMI switching amp you can save yourself money on long cables (ie, I just needed 2 longish ones -- 1 from TV to amp in basement and 1 from PS3 to amp. The cogeco box, xbmc box have 3 ft cables because they are on top of the amp. To control all this I have a logitech 900 rf. It works almost perfectly.. I still have some work to mounting my centre and installing my dining room in-ceiling speakers but some day I'll get it all done

Thanks, Dev.
Gotta say, I have a basic knowledge of all things tech. I'm a bit lost though.
You have your PVR in the basement but can access it on your upstairs TV's? More than one TV on the same box?
You can control the volume/amp, etc from upstairs even if it's in the basement?
I think we so need someone to help us figure all this out.
Right now, we just have a basic Panasonic surround sound/DVD player, etc., cable box, PS3 and Wii. Can't figure out how all this works. Hubby was thinking of cutting into the conduit, adding another piece and having a small conduit running from the conduit above the fireplace to the shelves in the niche. I think there's an easier way.....but I'm feeling lost.

I am there with you neighbour!

Lot 19 a.k.a Firebreak home!

They finally started the base board flooring which is a good sign.

Went by our homes yesterday...gotta say..the neighbourhood is looking very nice!

All homes (except firebreak ones) are up and most have the exterior done too.

Looks good guys, those overnight stays were well worth it!


p.s.
is anyone else suprised that the new release of Vistas, there was no price increase from the May release?

There are some Vistas still left for sale. I went by the sales centre yesterday, there was a lineup of people to get their Structurals done.

I have a remote control that works via RF (radio frenquency) instead of infrared. It has repeaters too so I put the module in the niche, and run the dongles down to the basement components. You can do this with a infrared repeater too. The Harmony 900 does it but its a bit of a sticker shock. I got both of mine at good deals so it didn't hurt so much.

Because you have the Wii and the PS3, I would probably want to keep these items in the niche. In that case, you might as well keep all components in the niche. If you have a very basic surround system, it probably doesn't do HDMI switching. So you have a few options, but it also depends on the number of inputs on your TV. I also don't know if the cable box is HD and has HDMI or if its just a standard-def box. I don't have a Wii so don't know if the output on that is HDMI. Also don't know what the audio inputs are to the panasonic surround system or if the DVD player is built in or separate. I would toss the dvd player and just use the PS3.

If the surround sound does HDMI switching, its easy -- plug all components into the surround sound, and 1 25' HDMI cable from surround sound to TV.

If it doesn't hopefully it has a few optical audio-in -- then you run HDMI from each component (PS3, Wii, Cable box) to the TV and then optical (or toslink) cable to the surround sound. Concern here is always how many inputs does the TV even have. My Samsung has 3x HDMI, but 1 is on the side of the TV and I'd never want to use that one because then you don't hide the cables.

If the surround sound doesn't do HDMI and doesn't do opitical/toslink, its probably time to think about replacing it. Amps that are in the sub $400 range can do both.

Thanks for the replies re: AV stuff. I'm not sure I fully understand but that's okay. Oliver went in and added extenders to the conduit above the fireplace so now, there are conduits running to each shelf just to have it there if we need it.
For mirrored floor plan people, I was just reading another neighbourhood thread talking about their laundry rooms with the mirrored plans. Washers should be on the left, dryers on the right especially if you are getting a front loader washer as this is how the doors open. But for those of us with mirrored plans, or at least for us, they switched it so the dryer is on the left, washer on the right which means the doors will be really inconvenient on the appliances. We called Joe who immediately agreed that the washer should always be on the right. But he called back later to say, sorry, it was built according to plan and it won't be changed. I'm highly unimpressed but seems like there is nothing we can do. Really bad planning on Mattamy's part especially when others have already complained about this. And there is no structural reason to make this change but they just mirror everything without thinking it through. Grrrrr.

I hear there are kits you can get to switch the way your washer opens but like I have an extra $100 for something that they should have just done right in the first place.

Guys was at the site tonight...noticed all the houses have no insulation on the outside wall. Samreen house does have insulation on the outside wall, but it looks like they did it themselves...anyone else put insulation in their garage?

We didn't put any in....I just assumed it would be fully insulated!

Nope, I called Joe, only inner walls are insulated...thats so lame...I would have paid for the insulation...

I ask Joe at the pre-construction meeting if the outside wall of the garage would be insulated because I saw a number of houses under construction at the time that had this wall insulated. He told me that they would insulated that wall if the outter wall of the garage is beside a living space of the next house and it fell within a minimum distance that would require a certain fire rating. So they would add the insulation to boost up the fire rating and use thicker drywall on that side of the house in that area as well. They didn't do it to increase the R value of the garage but rather to meet minimum fire rating between houses.

when you say outside wall, you mean the garage walls right?

Good to know to pick up some pink panther and line them up before the drywall goes up if thats the case.

Actually, the insulation I noticed they use in garages is either yellow or white. Rona sells white insulation FYI. Good to match up the colours, so it doesn't stand out as compared to the other homes. I would have not noticed the other home on our street if I had not been looking into the insulation ordeal...

That's really annoying about the garage. At the design centre, Oliver even asked about the garage being insulated and she assured us that because there is a living space above it, it would be fully insulated.
Kinda like when we asked about getting operational windows in the basement, but she told us that all windows would be operational. Well, they are not. Apparently, (it took a week to get a response) but because we got a lookout basement, not all of the windows are operational.
The last email I got, I was told that she'd look into seeing if can get that option of making them operational.
And don't get me started about my reversed washer and dryer!
I'm trying to stay excited about the new house but.....argh.
But the street is looking awesome!
Who has the first closing date?

Useful information about insulation R values...

http://www.insulationsmart.com/what_will_i_save.htm

I think the first closing dates were mid-October...must be the first houses on the south side of Coombs.

We have our framewalk tomorrow morning. So much tougher with a baby now! We had to have my mother in law come over today and stay over night to watch the baby so that we can check out the house together tonight and go to the site tomorrow again. I am crossing my fingers that there are no major screw-ups!

Has anyone looked into moving companies or are most people doing the move on their own?

Also does anyone know of a good carpenter that could built a custom wall unit?