I decided something tonight… I absolutely despise my father’s new hobby of watching Sunday night football. Thankfully he went skiing today, within the next 30 min (time for food to hit the ole belly) he’ll be passed out on the couch and I can sneak in and turn off the foolish racket!
Couple cool things happened this weekend. First thing, it was incredibly sunny and I got to really experience the warm heat coming through the windows by taking my first sun induced nap.<
This Is the Real Thing… Mom Being a Paparazzi with the Camera[/caption]
The other greatness for this weekend is dad and I almost finished putting together the audio/video equipment rack. We would have completely finished putting this thing together, but ran into a damaged part that will need to be replaced.
AV Rack… Looking Rather Impressive Even without the Equipment
Where the AV Rack will Go
The Damaged Top Corner of the AV Rack
Looks pretty minor, but this dent was enough to keep everything from fitting together, and well… we could have beaten it straight with a hammer, but I paid enough for this rack to not have it being messed up before it’s even put together.
So what is it anyways? The FatcatTech rack is a 19 inch 44U rack that will hold all of my audio/video equipment in a very sleek/hidden away arrangement. Think multiple power amplifiers, blue ray players, gaming consoles, media servers… pretty much anything electrical and related to getting audio/video around the house will all be centrally stored in this rack. This will get all the noise/heat/clutter out of the main living area and allow me to switch/distribute whatever single I want to anyplace in the house. Only want 1 blu-ray player, computer, or gaming console? Well, if it’s stored here it can go to any, all, or any combination in between of the TVs throughout the house.
I’ve played around with some design software and my rack should look something along the order of this when it is all done.
AV Rack Layout
From the top the components would go something like:
- 4U Windows Home Server20 TB Media Server
- 1U Blank Space (for air ventilation)
- 2U Xbox 360 (there will be 3 total to remotely access, extend my Windows Media Center throughout the house)
- 1U Blank Space
- 2U Xbox 360
- 1U Blank Space
- 2U Xbox 360
- 1U Blank Space
- 2U Samsung Blu-Ray Player
- 1U Blank Space
- 4U Yamaha 7.1 HT Receiver (Zone 1 Living Room 5.1 Speakers, Zone 2 Porch Speakers)
- 1U Blank Space
- 2U APC Extended Battery Pack
- 1U Blank Space
- 3U APC 1.25KW Power Conditioner with Battery Backup
- 1U Blank Space
- 2U Emotiva UMC-1 Processor (Home Theater THX Certified for Family Room)
- 2U Blank Space
- 4U Emotiva XPA-5 Power Amplifier (200 watts RMS x 5, Home Theater FL, FC, FR, RL, RR)
- 2U Blank Space
- 4U Emotiva UPA-5 Power Amplifier (125 watts RMS x 5, Home Theater SL, SR, Outside Deck)
- 2U Blank Space
Ahhh… Sanctity! I just turned off the football game!
Other than overwhelming you with a bunch of stuff that’s floating through my mind and not done yet, how about a few pictures of the nearly finished garage.
Inside the Garage
Look how clean it all looks! We are very happy with everything here! You’ll notice the very thick R-15 garage doors, sheetrock on the walls/ceiling, and lots of lights hanging from the ceiling. I never really mentioned what I wanted for lighting in the garage to the electrician, but as with the rest of the job they did a great job reading my mind and installed plenty of light just as we’d want.
Notice the Low Headroom Tracks
Real Stairway to the Attic Room Overhead
Closer View of the Attic Stairway
They created a well insulated, airtight hatch by putting 5 inches of rigid insulation on the back of this sheet of Advantech. It’s a little heavy to lift right now, but nothing a heavy-duty spring won’t help solve.
Craftsman DC Motor Electric Door Opener
The really cool thing about this bad boy is it runs on a DC motor with battery backup. Loose power and I can still open/close the garage door. Just another one of those little features that could really save my butt someday.
It’s Staying Pretty Warm Even without Heat
I’m really excited for tomorrow. I think the guys are done enough with the garage that they’ll be heading back inside to where it’s warmer. Can’t wait to hang out with them as they finish hanging sheet rock on the inside. And then… My favorite helper, Andrew will be up later this week to help me tidy up things in the automation room. Looking forward to a great week!
Can't wait to see it!
Adding the light to the main control is an innovative product.