Retrofitting Old House For High Tech

I will soon be buying an old Victorian house that was built in 1896. I am dreaming about how to make it as cool as possible with high-tech gadgets. What are your ideas?

There is a large room at the top of the house that I will convert to a home theatre. First, I will install wall-to-wall carpeting to soak up sound reflections. Then I will install room-darkening shades and a quiet window air-conditioner. Then I will move in my present home theatre equipment, which consists of a 55" 3D TV, an AV receiver that has bluetooth and room calibration circuitry, an Apple TV, a 5.1.2 surround sound system that includes Dolby Atmos speakers.

For the rest of the house, I'm thinking about high-speed wireless routers; speakers that can bring music to several other rooms; home security systems; programmable lighting; a NEST thermostat. What else should I think about?

 

if you are going to do all that, you should just have the house wired for a network and forgo the wireless except for laptops and stuff. You always get better speed from a wired connection.

plus what kinda budget we talking, there are a lot of nifty gizmos and gadgets avaiable.
why not wire the entire house as a "smart house"?
I knew the guy who first invented/developed the smart house tech back in the early eighties and got to see the prototype in action. Imagine in 1982 going to a normal looking house and the guy talks to it and it responds and turns lights and appliances on and off...IN 1982!!
A few years later I saw an article about him in the paper, he just sold the tech became a millionaire....again...yeah he was one of those guys, earn a million, burn a million.
guy was one of those eccentric "jack of all trades" type of geniuses, he was even a magician at Las Vegas, and pretty good too.
got a few stories there.....

sorry for rambling off on a tangent, haven't thought about Gus and his smart house for ages.
so yeah, you should just convert it into a full on smart house.

 

A woman to decorate it tastefully.

 

That I have! We are buying the house together. Almost like getting married.

 

In my experience, old houses are very difficult to hard-wire. There are always some strange obstructions in the walls. I think 802.11ac is fast enough for my purposes, but I'm not totally sure. Also, Comcast in this area sucks. I think the fastest download speed they offer is only 25 Mbps.

 

:cheers2:

 

Just discovered that Comcast offers a Blast internet service where you get 150 Mbps downloads for $79/mo. Sounds appealing if I become a cord-cutter and don't sign up for cable TV. I would prefer RCN's offering of 50 Mbps for $50/mo, but Comcast has the monopoly in the area.

 

There are a few videos on youtube that walk people through how to install programmable lighting effects in the home. Dance club style LED light strips inlaid in tile flooring. VERY cool. They also have tutorials for an 'infinity' (drop) ceiling. Which, all it is is a strip of drywall on each side of the room (dropped down from the actual ceiling obviously), LED lighting installed above said drywall strips, and a vinyl picture stretched tight just above the drop.

I'll see if I can find this guy...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-l09hAqXgKo

ejunky66 on youtube

Here's another one that looks SWEET!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w31NbqrYH60

I love this stuff. Just youtube 'led floor lighting' and you'll come up with all sorts of ideas.
The Infinity Ceiling tutorial should be on ejunky66's channel somewhere.

 

Thanks. I'm also interested in those mood-programmable lights, like the HUE.

Right now, I have a strip of little white LEDs taped to the back of my TV, creating a nice back glow on a huge tie-dye placed on the wall behind. Everyone who's seen it likes it.

 

How exciting for you! I LOVE Victorian houses.....Is the one you are buying haunted?

 

and does it have all that cool wallpaper from bygone eras?

 

Around here, there are a lot of haunted houses. This town has more houses that were built in the 1600s than any other American town, except for Ipswich.

It does have wonderful wallpaper, but I don't think it's all that old. Let me see if I can upload a photo or two.

 

It shouldn't be this hard to show you a photo. Has it always been so hard?

 

You can also automate the curtains and lights if you really want to have that mixed modern-classical feeling.