So I’m buying a house. I didn’t think it was ever going to be possible while living in the Los Angeles area, but I got a good deal, and now I shall be living and improving our new 4 bedroom 1800 sq. ft. place in Burbank.

Although a lot of work has to go into it, I have been spending a disappropriate amount of time trying to figure out how I want to conquer whole house audio. I think I have narrowed it down to two camps: Run cables, with the heart coming from my Receiver in my home theater, or a wireless setup stemming from my computer. Both have their pluses and minuses:

Wired – Negatives

• Must buy an amplifier (like the AudioSource Amp One)
• Must buy volume knobs to place in every room where speakers will be
• Must buy 500 ft or so of speaker wire.
• Must spend a weekend running the cable and installing volume knobs.
• If we want to change what is playing, you must walk into the den.
• Until I get a multi-room receiver, you can only listen to one source at a time.
• I would want to run wire to every room in the house, even though I don’t know if and when I would need it.

Wired – Pluses

• Not counting the time it takes, it is the cheapest solution.
• When I sell the house, can say “Home audio ready”.

Wireless – Negatives

• Cost. I LOVE the Sonos system, but will cost almost $1000 per room
• Will it actually sound as good over wireless?
• Not as built in. I will have a big white amplifier to hide in each room I want sound.
• I will still have to run speaker cable through the walls if I want it hidden.

Wireless – Pluses

• If we move, we can take the expensive parts with us.
• The Sonos has a BITCHEN remote that can change the music from any point in the house.
• Each room can play its own music, or they can sync them all up.
• Each amplifier you get allows for one line in. So I can have one Sonos Amp in my den with input from my TV, and another one in my office with the input from my computer. Now anyone anywhere else in the house can listen to the TV or music on my computer. Handy for super bowls or party’s.
• If I subscribe to Rhapsody for $10 a month, I can play it through the system. (I use Yahoo music now for $5)
• I can add to it in stages to mitigate the cost. Since I am not sure what rooms I want covered, I can buy an amp for $500 and additional speakers a year from now and add on. I can wait to buy speakers for the Wired system also, but it isn’t as easy to handle the wires later. I purchase my speakers through speakerxpert. They have great deals and amazing customer service.

As you can guess, I am leaning heavily on the Sonos system. But with a starting price of $1200 plus additional speakers, wires, and adding more amps for more rooms, it will easily be $2,000. UGGGGHHH.