Re: C-Bus / Cat5e

[Chris Hunter <cjhunter@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

many thanks to everyone for all the replies ... it's clearly a
hot-subject !   'some good steers on what to choose for where, too !

So, 70GBP is not really all that silly a price for C-Bus, and it'll be
worth paying off the bottom for Cat-5e, too.   I guess EIB (mains-rated
cable) could be a good alternative to C-Bus, so I'll look into that as
well (some competition might be a good thing !).

Rather than C-Bus, we're actually going for Idratek - both of them use a
bus rather than a back-to-base approach, of course, so 'no need for more
than the one wire going / branching around the house (free topology,
etc).   Where the Cat-5e came-in, was indeed for all the other things -
LAN, video (the intercom will be Idratek, but some stations will have a
camera & / or screen - eg: front-door), CCTV (just four cameras), DVD
repeaters (ie: copy main screen image to kitchen & bath), telephone
(maybe not needed anymore), etc.   People often say they wish they had
more Cat-5e pre-run, and some have gone as high as six cables to each in
/ out node - ie: 6 x 4 = 24 lines (goodness !) to each position.

I was going to run two / three conduits to each position, one for mains
power, one / two for Cat-5e, in which case there would seem to be the
option of running the C-Bus away from the mains' - in which case it
would come close to the mains' only where it actually is wired into
Idratek modules, which might mean that with suitable attention to detail
in the routing, using Cat-5e rather than C-bus / EIB for Idratek might
be an option ... not sure !

Chris