Entertainment Center: TVs, Stereos, VCRs and DVDs - Cable TV signal amplification--will it be needed?

I am planning to add coax lines (cable TV) to a number of rooms in my house. When I'm all done, there will be a coax plug in 10 different location. I don't expect more than 3 to be used at ony one time (a internet modem and probablt not more than 2 TVs going at at time), but I want the flexibility of having the outlets present to account for future changes in my house/family.

I will bring the signal in, then split it. Two main questions:

1) Should I have a separate run of wire from the splitter to each location, or can I split off a split line? If so, how may times can I do that before I will see loss of signal quality?
2) Should I expect to need a signal amplifier for all those lines, even if only a few at a time will actually be serving a device?

Thanks

Try to minimize all the splitters. Splitters often go bad and cause signal loss.

How many lines are coming in from the outside junction box?

You may not need an applifier if only using a few of those outlets at the same time.

Are you using RG6?

Hot,

Thanks for the reply. So, if i should minimize the splitters, that means I should just use one 1X10 splitter, rather than splitting a cable down the line?

One line coming in from outside. Yes, all cable will be RG6.

Guy

Yes, you can use a splitter like you said. To prevent possible signal loss, you could install a amplifier before it enters the splitter, that is if you have power abilities.

"So, if i should minimize the splitters, that means I should just use one 1X10 splitter, rather than splitting a cable down the line?"

It's better to do that than to daisy-chain splitters from one TV to the next.

Every time you split the cable you lose signal power regardless of how many TVs are connected. It's the splitter that causes the loss, not the TVs.

The insertion loss on a 10-way splitter cuts the signal at each output by more than -12dB, which is just about all of the signal power that enters your home.

In order to see a good picture, each TV should receive at least +6dB of signal strength. A good signal from the cable company enters your home at (ideally) between +10dB and +15dB.

If you put in just one splitter on a +10dB cable, the loss is 3.5 dB and your two TVs will see 6.5dB. A three-way subtracts 5.5dB or so. Each of the three TVs will see 4.5dB -- a borderline signal.

As Hot said, you can add an amplifier to the line before the splitter. In your case, you'll probably need a 15dB amp to make up for that 12dB of splitter loss. That's because you'll need a 2-way splitter before the 10-way splitter to insert your cable modem. Cable modems use a "return path" to send information, and the splitter loss works both ways. It's not a good idea to attenuate the cable modem's signal.

So ... From the cable input, use a two-way splitter. One output goes to the input of the amplifier and the other goes directly to the modem. The output of the amplifier goes to the input of the 10-way, and each splitter output goes directly to the TVs.

The cable itself also introduces loss. The longer the cable, the more it attenuates the signal. The problem here is that it doesn't attenuate all channels equally. Channel 2 won't be attenuated as much as channel 72. The cable company overcomes this loss by equalizing the line at their amplifiers (called "slope"). Unless your cable runs are more than 100 feet, and as long as you use RG6 instead of RG59, you should have no problems.