Shove It Where The Sun Doesn't Shine

There’s nothing media centre folks like more than a fuss and a flap about the noise that their HTPC emits. It’s the profusion of fans – CPU fan, case fan and the killer of them all, the power supply fan. And then there’s the sound of the hard disks spinning and the DVD drive too. Worriers go to no end of ingenuity and guile to quieten those infernal whirling devices. For some though there is the simplest of solutions; shove the HTPC and the rest of the gear where the sun doesn’t shine, in a cupboard. This way the HTPC can make as much noise as it likes. And because the HTPC won’t be seen, you can divert the hard-earned dollars you would have spent on a fancy HTPC case into something more useful like a higher specification mother board, more memory, or a better graphics processor.

Stashing the gear in a cupboard is not only a tactic to kill the din – aesthetics are an important part of any home entertainment system. Minimalism is good: A wall-mounted panel TV flanked by a couple of speakers, and nothing else, is hard to beat. But you need to hide the cables otherwise your installation will look naff. And if WAF is an issue, you'll score stellar points by stashing the gear out of sight in a cupboard.


The cupboard is to the right of the photograph. The woofer spoils the look a bit, but hides the power plug.

Putting the gear in a cupboard is not for everyone. Some don’t have a cupboard handy, or don’t have the room to custom build one. Others will be wedded to one of those hideous hi-fi racks, or worse, a TV and media stand peddled by Harvey Norman or IKEA. Others simply like the wow factor of the tin on display in the living-room and glow with pride as their mates cock their heads around the back to admire the spaghetti of wires.

Here are the basics for a cupboard installation. Obviously, you need a cupboard in the same room as the TV and speakers. If you don’t have a cupboard, see if you can make one – a recessed cupboard in a wall will look superb if done properly. You are going to need to run some cables from the gear in the cupboard to the TV and speakers. Lots of Aussie apartments and houses have stud walls and false ceilings; hiding cables in the walls and ceilings is the way to go. If your room has a concrete floor and concrete walls hiding cables is going to be a challenge. Don’t even think of using that unsightly plastic trunking stuff though, there are better ways to “hide” cables.


The woofer in all its glory.

The hardest part of a cupboard installation will be running the cables from the HTPC and sound amplifier in the cupboard to the TV and speakers. As a minimum you’ll probably need to run a VGA cable from the PC to the TV, and speaker cables to the speakers. But you’ll be lucky if this is all you need. Typically you might also need an HDMI cable, a pair of coaxial cables for the sound from the TV’s inbuilt HD tuner, a woofer cable and a CAT5e for the infrared remote sensor. And for completeness you might also need to run a power spur to the cupboard.

Take your time and do your planning before you start hacking away at the plasterboard. Sketch where the gear is going to go and work out your cable runs. You’ll definitely need a stud finder to do the job properly because tapping the walls with your knuckles is useless. Running cables through stud walls is an art form and a topic worthy of an article in its own right. Daunting as it might seem at the outset, if you do a good job, hiding your gear in a cupboard and running the cables through the walls and ceiling will give you a minimalist looking installation that will be worth the effort.


The wires lead to a cupboard on the right. Steel stud walls are the “easiest” to work with because they have service holes every 500mm. But keep the Scotch bottle handy for when your nerves need steadying.

A few other points need addressing; infrared devices, heat and noise. Infrared remotes need line of sight to the device. Obviously if your gear is tucked-away in a cupboard you won’t have line of sight. The solution is an infrared repeater. It might sound a bit Heath Robinson, but basically you have an IR receiver near to the TV connected by a CAT5e cable to a repeater located in the cupboard. From the repeater you run thin wires with sensors attached. The sensors stick to the infrared receivers on the devices. Such systems work well and cost about $150.


The only wires that should be visible.

The HTPC and sound amplifiers generate heat. If you put this gear in cupboard it may get warm in there. But the operative word is warm, and not hot. It shouldn’t be necessary to add ventilation to the cupboard. But each installation will be different depending on the gear and the size of the cupboard. You can add a fan or some vents, but adopt a suck-it-and-see approach to this.

And then there’s the noise. Yes, the premise of this article was to kill the noise by hiding the gear in a cupboard. But even in a cupboard you may still hear a bit of noise. With luck the noise will be barely audible and nothing like as loud as having the HTPC sitting in a rack next to the TV. And that’ll give the worriers one less thing to fret about.