Arial help please

[sparkmanc]

Hi,

In my property I have a single co-ax cable coming from the ariel, down the front of the building and through the wall into a co-ax socket (Like you usually find.) I want to send the cable through the attic, into a splitter, and then a cable to each room, So each room has an arial, and the cable isnt visible.

What I want to know is if i were to get Sky in a few months, would they need a seperate cable, hence another cable on the front of my house? Or would it be worth running two into my loft, ready to be connected to?

Cheers.

 

[ChrisFrost]

You can do it with a single cable, and this will also work fine for Sky if/when you add it.

Your "splitter" should be powered, not a bunch of those cheap plastic Y splitters from Maplin. If you are going to add Sky then get a distribution amp with "pass through" for the 9v power so you can use Sky Eyes. These are how you can control the Sky box from a telly in a bedroom.

A word on TV distribution amps in lofts....

Lofts get very hot in summer and very cold in winter. There's also a risk of minor leaks which can go unnoticed for months. If you are going to put something electrical in a loft and leave it unattended for months on end then you need to make sure it can't cause a fire. Anything which plugs in to the mains directly (like most TV distribution amps) must be put in to a metal isolation box which protects it from moisture and with slow or prevent the spread of fire if the unit fails. There's also some rules about where the box can be placed.

To get round the problems of 240V powered equipment in lofts a couple of companies make TV distribution amps where the mains power supply is separate. The PSU is a box that lives behind the TV in the livingroom. The low voltage power goes up the same bit of aerial cable that carries the TV signals to the distribution amp in the loft.

 

[sparkmanc]

So would a RG6 1/1.0mm2 cable do?

Cheers for the advice mate.

 

[ChrisFrost]

RG6 simply describes a size of cable. It doesn't say anything about quality. You can get crap RG6 sized cable or fantastic quality RG6.

Have a look here: http://www.aerialsandtv.com/cableandleads.html#LowLossCoAx and read up why you shouldn't just go for "low loss coax". There's a link to the company's web shop. You can buy their Copper Foil Type Satellite Cable for £20 for a 50m roll.

Get your loft amp, connectors, face plates etc from one place and you can let them sort out the correct size connectors so you don't end up with plug ends that are too small or too large.

 

[sparkmanc]

thanks for your time. Appreciated.