Hey all,

My build is not exceptional but, I've used gearslutz as a point of reference for over a decade so, I feel obliged to give back. Hopefully, even it just 1 person can draw some information from my build, it'll be worth it.

I'd like to start off by thanking Jason Foi, Soundman2020, Starlight, and bert stoltenborg for helping answer some preliminary questions before I started. And a secondary/passive thanks to Rod Gervais, John Brandt, avare, and all the regular contributors to this forum. Your knowledge and discussions have been an invaluable resource.

I'm an audio engineer at heart. But, like many gearslutz, I have my hand in a lot of aspects of audio, music, and media. I'm going to tell you right now, I have no intention of recording drums in this room It's primary function is a mix suite with some instrument, vocal, and foley recording here and there.

My primary goal is to be able to monitor at a reasonable level without disturbing the rest of the house - particularly sleeping children. Secondary goals are minimizing footfall overhead and having a balanced sounding room.

After reading all the usual recommended publications I planned for an optimal room dimension and design. Then I started building.... lol... So, theoretical and practical don't always match up...

The interior of the room is approx 16.5'long 11'wide' 7ish'high - with a 3' jog in at the back. I've gone for a double wall construction with 2 layers of 5/8" type X drywall on the outside of each wall with R-12 fiber-glass in the studs. Most of the walls are separated with a 1" gap. The wall behind where my desk will go has a wider gap (7-8"?) just because of where the joists are located for anchoring the walls - which worked out because now I have a place to run ventilation. Here are some pics of where I'm at now... You'll see some pics of the products I've used. I'll follow up on the reasoning.

So, based on the experienced knowledge I've seen on the forums, a few "gearslutz dividing acoustic building decisions" I made are:

- No greenglue. I opted for 2 layers of 5/8 type X (109lbs/sheet). Based on the cost and trouble of having greenglue in my build, I decided that what minute effect it would have, isn't worth it.

- R-12 insulation. I see a lot of people using mineral wool/Roxul. I almost did, but with a little more research into the double wall construction I learned that Roxul is designed for treating standard walls. The double wall MAM build I'm doing functions on a completely different method of isolation. It's about creating a spring inside the walls for the transmission to bounce around in and die. Soft, light fibre-glass is the way to go. You don't want to inhibit the movement of the air, you want to help dissipate the energy by converting it to heat energy (in the fibre-glass) as it bounced around in the cavity.

- I don't have the headroom to do a true room in a room, so I used the Resilmount A48R clips to secure the walls. It's basically an L bracket with a rubber/neoprene decoupler that attaches the top of the inside wall to the joists above.

- Because the floor is a massive slab of concrete, I didn't think a fancy 5-10mm neoprene under the sill plate with decoupled fasteners would make much of a difference. I just got some standard closed-cell sill gasket. I don't know if it does anything for structure borne transmission but it will help seal up any gaps under the sill plate.

Here are a couple of pictures to show what I've done with the ducting for ventilation.

There was the usual 5" duct coming off the main to feed heat/cold from the ceiling joists where the studio is going. I pull that out because:

- I didn't want to have to punch a big hole in the finished drywall ceiling

- I didn't want to have the duct taking up room in the joist cavity where I want to put my R-12.

- I didn't want any opportunity for extra footfall from the main floor to travel through that duct and transmit more vibration around the room than was necessary.

- I live in Canada. It gets pretty cold in the winter. Don't ask me why they do it, but in every house I've ever lived in, the HVAC pumps the air from the basement ceiling joists (I guess because in an unfinished basement, the builder has to put it somewhere...). This is a pretty inefficient way to warm a space - pumping hot air from the ceiling... Anyway, I moved the feed to in between the studio and spare bedroom walls where I have soft insulated duct that will feed the studio and bedroom from close to the floor.

I'm still trying to figure out what I want to do about a cold air return. I might build one of those serpentine type boxes under the stairs and have it vent out just outside the bedroom entrance...

In the close-up pic of the duct, you can see on the left where those cross-braces are sitting (need to be re-attached) where I've patched and taped up the old feed out of the top of the main branch. On the right is the new position of the elbow that used to come out of the top.

I got a branch so I can feed the bedroom and studio. I know it's not ideal, but that guest bedroom will be almost always vacant.

Theres another pic there where I couldn't move the duct because it feeds the living room above the studio. So, I just replaced the typical galvanized steel duct with the insulated stuff.

PS - the picture on the box is very misleading (to me anyway). This 6" duct is close to 9" - its REALLY "poofy."

Window....

I've struggled to figure this one out. It's awkward because the exiting window (that MUST be replaced. It's so bad...) is about 33"x14" but because I'm doing a "room in a room" The interior "window" can only be like 4" tall... And, I'm not interested in blowing out the foundation to lower the outside window opening so they line up in a more reasonable way. That's a can of worms I'm not willing to opening. I already found foundation patch-work on the other wall.

Anyway, after looking up all kinds of windows, researching cutting my own glass (4"x33" ain't an easy window to find... lol) I finally came across glass block. Remember that stuff! I don't need either window to open. So, instead of blowing my budget on fancy windows and stuff, I think I'm just going to do a glass block window on the outside and then one on the inside.

Glass block is heavy, insulated, translucent. It's really quite perfect.

The windows will be a bit offset but, I don't mind. I'll hide any ugliness with some fabric or something. At least I'll have some light getting in.

In other news,

The electrician was in on the weekend to replace the old breaker panel (24 circuit 100amp which was full) with a new 30 circuit panel and run power for lights and outlets in the studio (among other places in the basement).

I opted to have him leave loose runs so, rather than punching a bunch of big holes in my drywall for outlet and fixture boxes, I'll just surface mount everything. That way I only need to make small holes to feed the wire through, then a bit of acoustic sealant and I haven't ruined the integrity of the wall too much.

Update:

Window - Out with the old, in with the.... old

I ditched the older steel-framed slider and found some glass blocks on Kijiji. We framed them, dropped that in and sealed it up. I'll make another 4 block window for the interior wall so I can have some light but also isolation and privacy. I'm also thinking of spray-painting white every part of the cavity that will exist between the windows. I think it will maximize light reflection.

The plot thickens!

We have to rough in the plumbing for the basement bathroom because the vent stacks and water for toilet/sink are going to be inside the outer leaf at the back of the studio. Smashy smashy...

A couple other things.

You can see I've started to toss in some insulation into the ceiling, I also replaced some of the old pieces against the foundation sill plate and taped in some proper vapour barrier (which was never there).

There's also the nugget of an idea for the cold air return "serpentine box" that will go in under the stairs and vent out from this small vent opening (I found at Restore for $1 )

Anyway, once the rough pluming goes in (in the next couple days), I can get back to dropping in the rest of the insulation, building and installing the second window, and frame in the doorways (the most nerve-wracking part of the build...)

Cheers.

It is great to see a plan come together. Well done!

Thanks, Starlight!

Update time!

Last time I posted, we had installed the glass block exterior window. Now I've built a frame for the interior glass block window. It's not shown in these pics but after the dry-fit, I cut an angle into (or off of?) the back of the window frame so that I could tilt it without it touching the exterior wall. I think it ended up looking pretty good!

Plumbing for the adjacent bathroom is finished, so I was able to proceed with the rest of the insulation installation.

All of the res channel has been installed on the ceiling. I'm not sure about the spacing. All I could find about proper spacing for a ceiling was to either go 24"OC for 16" joists or 16"OC for 24" joists (who the heck has 24" joists anyway...?) but none of those recommendations were using 2 layers of 5/8" type X drywall. According to the Home Depot online specs, 8x4' 5/8" Type X weighs 109lbs per sheet. So, we decided to go 12"OC for the res channel. Maybe that's too many connections to the joists but, I'd rather lose out on a couple STC points than get pancaked in my studio.

I purchased some PL acoustic sealant but I need to return it because I realized it's not like the GG sealant. The PL stuff is more "rough work construction" type stuff. Black, ooey, gooey, messy, not paintable... My bad. Though it's the best stuff if you're sealing up vapour barrier, sill-plates, etc... I can't imagine the curses a mudder would have for me if I sent them into my basement with that stuff all over the edges/corners...

I'm going to get into some funky business under the stairs soon, with regards to a cold air return "box."

Cheers,

Hey There,

It's been a while. Though, I have been working on the studio! I swear! In fact, it's kind of why I haven't posted in a while. Things have been ramping at my day job since everyone goes on break for Christmas, I've just been cramming in work on the studio whenever I have any time at all. I threw up 1 sheet of drywall this morning before I left for work

Anyway - Updates....

Drywall is nearly finished. I just have to put the second layer on the last 1 and a half walls. I guess technically I haven't done the "outer layer" on one section (that would be the interior drywall for the bathroom) but I did a REALLY preliminary test where I blasted a bluetooth speaker (I know, I know... it has nothing below 150Hz) - about 79dB and with only one mounted - and completely unsealed - door closed I was getting about 50dB of reduction on the main floor (I was looking for 20dB to achieve my primary goal of not disturbing sleepers on the second floor). Needless to say, this terribly flawed test still gave me a great amount of confidence and relief in the build. I've been carrying a knot in my stomach for a few weeks now, doubting everything. Having no idea whether all this effort was going to amount to anything.

TIP - When you're drywalling - especially the ceiling! - make sure, EVERY time you cover your res channel, screws or marks you immediately mark them again. We did our best to try to remember to do that, but you know, in the moment you can get momentum and next thing you know, we've got the tape measure out and we're trying to find 16 on centre - or worse yet, the studs or res channel that aren't placed in the standard spacing :S oops!

And mark your joists so you don't screw into them! We got lucky. Had a few misses going into the res channel but luckily, never hit a joist!

Doors are more or less ready to go. Frames are in, I've temporarily hung 1 door to check the fit (also helps to keep the hammers and drills quiet during night time building). So, I don't know if this was a bit mistake... The doors I bought are fibreglass filled with rigid or some sprayed in foam? I dunno. They're 1 3/4" thick. They're not light, but I think I'll need to slap a sheet of 3/4" MDF on each of them. I probably would have needed to do that with a regular door anyway... In hindsight, I should have just bought some flat slab doors. Oh well!

I ordered some automotive/trunk seal/gasket off amazon for the door seal. I got the biggest one I could find (1/2") to make it easy on me. But, I'm going to wait to install it until after I add the 3/4" MDF to the door as this will change the location of the jamb.

Lots of GG acoustic sealant. Especially since doing that rough test, it really made it apparent how much sound travels through the smallest of cracks/holes. So, every seam, gap, and missed screw hole (doh) gets some GG TLC.

At this point there's not much left to do. I got some 1" backer rod to stuff in between the bottom of the drywall and the concrete floor. I got that really gooey acoustic sealant (local building store closing down - it was $5CAD/800ml tube) which I'll install "backwards." I'll squeeze some sealant into the cavity then press the backer rod into it. This will squish the sealant into all the cracks/seams, plug up the gap, and leave a clean finish for doing the flooring. If I put the backer rod first then sealed it, I'd have that awful stuff exposed to make my life hell while installing the floor.

I'm rambling... here's a few pics.

The doors are up and the drywall is done!

We did a crude test to see how the doors would perform without adding mass to them and found that yes, they are the weakest part of the build. When they say your doors need to be heavy, they're not suggesting it. If they're not at least the same mass as the wall you're putting them in, they will be the weak link.

So, we added some 3/4" MDF to the doors to get them up to fighting weight. I'm happy to report that my first real test of isolation (with door seals in, latches on, etc) was a great success! When the taping and painting is done (next week), I'll get some gear in there to do some proper test.

I had a failure with the door latches at first, though... In hind-sight, it was a bad idea. You can see in one of the photos, on the interior door, there's an extra latch at the top and bottom of the door. My initial plan was to use these spring loaded ball catches to hold the doors closed, but obviously when I got them on and pushed the door shut, there wasn't nearly enough tension to hold it shut. They're pretty wimpy.

Anyway, I had tried THREE on the interior door before conceding to a traditional passage turn handle. I was trying to avoid cutting a big hole through my door but, practicality beat out theory in this circumstance. Honestly, though, with my ears, it doesn't seem to have ruined the effectiveness of the doors.

I installed the 1" backer rod around the whole perimeter of the room in the gap between the drywall and the floor. I don't know if it's necessary but, in my mind, I know that area isn't air tight, which is the name of the game so, I went for it.

I also went over all of the seams with GG sealant. The mud/tape will help close up the gaps visually, but better to trust the sealant for stopping air-flow.

Hi, thanks for sharing your tips and progress. I’m currently planning on converting a room into a home studio for plans to compose, track vocals, mix and listen, maybe jam with a friend etc. Going to go the room within a room approach, but my question is why not frame a second ceiling on top of the new walls for complete decoupling from old ceiling? I understand Rez bar essentially does the same thing for probably cheaper and you lose less height. Did you come across this in your research at all? I’m considering leaving 2” gap then doing either 2x4 or 2x6 new ceiling joists completely not touching old ceiling with roxul safe & sound & 2x layers of 5/8 drywall. The weight of drywall might demand 2x6 so I’ll have to measure how much ceiling height I would lose.

The other issue I have is there is a bifold closet door in the corner of the room which I’m not too sure what to do about. I could put a solid hinged door on the inner wall but not sure what to do for the first door/wall as I definitely want to keep access to the closet.

Anyways, thanks for sharing. Looks great and can’t wait to see the final product.
James

I appreciate your tip not doing green glue and will likely follow your path there. Very expensive.

If you've got the height for it, then all the power to you! For me, I only had abbot 7'3" of space to work with. Plus a small window and length of duct I had to consider. Maximizing the height of the room was important to me. I've had a few basement spaces now and as a rule of thumb for myself, if it's low enough to hit my head on it, I'll hit my head on it...a lot.

Consider the scope and cost of framing a while additional ceiling as well though. It will be a bigger job. I did the res channel with r-12 bat insulation in the joists and 2 layers of 5/8 type x. It did a very good job from keeping music traveling up to the main floor. Though, you'd probably get better isolation from main floor foot fall with a separate ceiling frame. Just make sure you take into account everything so you don't sell yourself short - i.e. Flooring thickness, ceiling thickness, will you have ceiling mounted lighting and/or absorption?

It's hard to understand the bi-fold door situation but I would get rid of it. Either fully drywall the area or if you must access that spot, reframe it for a single door. Remember that however massive your walls end up being, your doors need to match that mass or they will bee the weak link in the isolation of your space.

Hey There,

It's been too long... The studio has been finished up for quite some time now, but between COVID and working from home with 2 little ones, it's been quite a time!

I thought I'd start up again with some photos I've come by of things I may have skipped over.

With regards to floor isolation, because it's the basement foundation, I'm not too concerned with mechanical transfer through to the second floor (where everyone sleeps). So, we just put this pink sill gasket under the framing footers and RAMSET right into the concrete floor. Doesn't seem to be any noticeable transfer, even right outside the door.

The resilient channel we used was this stuff I picked up from Home Depot. Very nondescript. But, In my reading, it would seem to be the most effective in decoupling the ceiling drywall from the joists above.

In this third pic, you can see I've replaced the standard galvanized steel duct pipe with the soft/insulated type. This supplies HVAC to the living room above - currently it looks and sounds like a daycare in there.

Here's a pic where I'm holding one of 30 or so Resilmount A48R clips. We used these to fasten the headers on the wall frames to the floor joists above. These aren't cheap - I think I paid $8 CAD/clip. It was quite a time lining these up and squeezing in between the joists, around the ductwork, to fasten them in place...

The next pic, you can see where I've cut into the side of the supply duct with a Y joint to feed HVAC to the studio and the spare room (where the picture is being taken from). I wasn't concerned about sharing the duct because the spare room is rarely used, and if it is, I'm probably not in my studio. What I often see in Ontario, is that builders slap in some rough ductwork in the floor joists above to feed HVAC to 1 or 2 spots in a basement. But, it's pretty useless because 1) you don't need AC in the basement in the summer time. Plenty cool. 2) the heat never makes it down low enough to do anything in the winter. So, I ran the ducts low so the warm air had a chance to disperse in these rooms.

Next pic shows the rough in for a bathroom that will eventually share a wall with the studio. We did this so we didn't have to undo any studio build down the road. Turned out to be quite a lot of digging and extra plumbing work. PEX is really a dream to work with compared to copper....

Stay tuned for some more on the finished studio.

Here's another post of some forgotten pics.

First pic is when the dropped off all of the first bunch of materials. 200 2x4s, 15 bags of insulation, 6600lbs of type X 5/8" drywall. My father in law and I had to carry those sheets down 1 at a time together because of the weight and lack of space in the narrow stairwell. Probably the toughest part of the build :P

Next is the main supply duct that runs through the studio. In the empty joist cavity was where the branch came out of the top and vented out down into the "studio space." We took that out, covered it up, cut a hole in the side of the supply duct and installed the elbow there (earlier I posted a pic of the Y with insulated duct that I installed for the studio and spare room). The space between those 2 walls was 8-10" to facilitate the ductwork, otherwise all of the double wall gaps were only 1" between the frames. In hindsight I so wish I wrapped the ductwork in some MLV or something before I boxed it all in... Live and learn.

These next 2 pics show how we had to get a little creative with the framing around the stairs. Not really in a position to be able to re-configure the stairs, I needed to get that outer wall in that position to fit under the support beam that spans the house. Because of space constraints in the joists, around the beam and ductwork, it had to be there. A little awkward, but it's fine!

Next pic, some miscellaneous progress...

Next pic, from inside the studio, all of the insulation (regular R-12) going in. You can see the ductwork coming off the supply. The black hole on the right is where it feeds into the room.

Next you can see we've installed the bulkhead and continuing with the insulation. Again, I wish we did more there. I was strapped for space though. I'm 6'1" and I can now walk through the doorway (under the bulkhead) without any forced slouching, but only just... You can see in one of those empty joist cavities, the Resilmount clip in action. We use a very wide head cabinet screw to secure these clips to the framing. I wanted to make sure the head wouldn't slip through the opening in the centre of the rubber/neoprene section of the clip.

Next - Insulation is all in (eerily dead in that state), and we're installing the res channel. Something to note about this stuff, you're meant to use this res channel that only secures on one side - there are other types of channel that secure in the middle or HAT channel. That stuff is not meant for this unless you're going to use those decoupling clips to hold it in place. But, again, I was trying to maximize my space. I only had 7ish feet to the joists, so I opted for low profile. Also, because we hung 2 layers of 5/8" type x (very heavy, get a lift for god sakes) we put the channel 12" apart. Make sure to triple check and always mark your joist lines and channel lines so you know where to and WHERE NOT to screw... you don't want to screw the drywall into your joists or the channel was all for not. You also don't want to be missing the channel and having 700lbs of drywall hanging over your head by only a few good screws!

Next one, I had to cut these little blocks to glue into the cavity of the I-beam so I had something to screw the sheet of drywall to... a silly little job that took me a couple days to figure out.

I think I'm back now where I left off...

So I sent a lot of time trying to figure out what to put on the walls! I knew I'd be spending a lot of time in here and wanted something interesting to look at. I thought it was some kind of patterned wall-paper but anything I thought I liked was either super cheap and ****ty or REAAALLLY expensive. I wasn't prepared to spend 15% of my build budget on 1 wall of wallpaper lol... So, I went to Home Depot, bought up a bunch of bright samples, got my family and we just went to town! Here are some pics of that fun day

I don't want to write a diatribe about the panels I made. Nothing special. Just thought I'd give a bit of a rundown incase it can help anyone come up with ideas on how to build their panels!

Pretty standard frames made with 1x3s. Cut to fit a 2x4' piece of Roxul Safe n Sound. Wood glue and braid nails.

The frames were pretty straight, a couple were a little wonky so I stacked them into this tower with a humidifier inside with a sheet of plywood on top. I let that run for a couple days then let it dry for a couple days then realized that was super dumb and that process could MAYBE work over the course of a year or 2... lol. Bottom line, just buy straight lumber.

Anyway, they weren't THAT bad, so I just moved along. Only one of them ended up being that warped when mounted but it's in the corner so you can't even tell.

I found a bunch of these wall hooks on clearance at Home Depot and figured I could make use of them.

So I added in this cross piece that I notched out with a mini circular saw where the hooks would fit inside of. I did the notch because the hooks weren't quite long enough for comfort. I didn't want the cross piece to slip off.

When mounting the panels I made sure to squirt some GG sealant in all the holes I made. I was very diligent in that throughout the whole build.

So I did some REW measurements as I mounted the panels. And then using this neato website http://www.acousticmodelling.com/multi.php to see some great data about just how much of a difference it makes when you set the panels away from the wall. Without having to rethink and rebuild a bunch of stuff, I just used some scrap 2x4 as spacers between the wall and the hooks. The improvement in room response was quite a bit with that simple addition. Unfortunately, I'm an awful record keeper so I didn't save the REW readouts before and after the spacers.

Very nice! I know how satisfying that can be when you finally sit down at your desk and you realize what you've accomplished! After I did my last build (4 houses ago alas!) a client burst out with "I'm sitting in your dream!" from the couch behind me as I tweaked her mix. Enjoy yourself!

Honestly, and I think I've mentioned this earlier in the thread, but if it wasn't for my father-in-law (Mr. I can build anything) I'd still be framing...

After 12 years of working in studios and "suites," building my fair share of acoustic failures (and a few successes) as a teenager through my 20s, plus reading Rod's book and the Master Handbook of Acoustics I had a pretty confident grasp on what I wanted and how I was going to get it. Pulling the trigger on that first batch of materials was all I needed to get the ball rolling. It was only a few months before we were done the studio (plus a full spare bedroom and roughed in bathroom). The glass block window, the doors with added MDF, even the omission of green glue between layers of type x; they were all confident educated decisions. Yes testing shows that GG helps, however, the cost outweighed the benefit, especially since I was doing 2 layers on a double leaf system. Now, the room isn't without it's weaknesses. I can hear my son playing trains on the floor above me, but it doesn't bother me. In fact, I like it... What it does do is offer a great deal of sound reduction of what I'm doing inside to what people hear outside... and that's nothing at all by the time you're at the second story. So, I can go in and do whatever I need/want to do without being fearful of waking a sleeping baby (that's not to say they don't wake for hundreds of other reasons, though lol).

And I digress as usual. Mcintalker, yes. It is satisfying to sit down and enjoy a room I've put so much thought and effort into. I also, very deliberately, stayed away from black design. I'm in a basement, I need brightness and colour! (yes I do have a couple recycled black acoustic panels hanging in the background that need reupholstering)

Ventilation.... Aside from acoustically treating a finished space, ventilation is probably the trickiest most daunting part of building a room/studio. You've seen how I fed the room with HVAC - and that thick insulated 6" run worked really well. It's silent, even with my ear right up to it. And, I made sure to install the vent opening as low as I could get it so that warm air had a chance to spill out into the room before floating up to the ceiling.

I had originally planned to build one of those crazy involved serpentine boxes for the return vent and install it under the staircase outside the studio. Only thing about that was I didn't really like the idea of the return being so close to the front of the room - where the incoming vent is. I didn't think it would offer maximum circulation in the room. Plus, it would have eaten up a lot of precious storage space under the stairs

So, I looked at this little jut in the back wall we had to make to be able to install an access door for the electrical panel. I decided to put the return vent at the bottom of that little section of wall and then just run a zig-zagged length of insulated duct within that access opening. Now, that length of duct isn't really for sound isolation, it's actually there to create a barrier to keep the cold air that lives between the walls from pouring into the studio when the HVAC isn't running (and forcing air pressure through that return vent). It's kind of like a P-trap but for air

So, anyway. This seems to work well. I work in there all day with the door shut and I don't feel like it gets stuffy or anything. It's quite comfortable*

*It's quite comfortable after I changed the 8 35w incandescent bulbs out of the front room lighting to 6.5w LED bulbs. My GOD by early afternoon I was practically getting naked there for a few months! But, then summer came around and it didn't bother me so much (because the AC was pumping and the basement is cool). But then fall came and I couldn't deal with that heat again. I'm so glad changed those bulbs. The room is VERY comfortable. I don't have to open the door, or turn on any lights, or adjust anything. It's just nice. All the time. Which might actually turn out to be one of the most important things to have in a room! If it isn't comfortable, you're not going to enjoy being in there.

Glad to hear all that! I had fixed several rooms up for previous studios and I actually bought that particular house because of it's basement and features. That was 20 years ago and I'd love to do another one
We planned to build a barn for each of us to have our own spaces, when we bought this property, but came to realize we really wanted them to be in the house. Our lifestyle really feeds off having access to the core of the house, the pets( 2 small dogs and a cat who we love dearly and continually take care of LOL) and then of course the kitchen and bathroom(s). So rather than build the barn, we've plotted to sell and move at some point....
With COVID, our lives aren't much different than before other than fewer grocery trips and masks/gloves and wiping everything down. We are semi retired and love to be home doing our thing(s)! I'm quite happy to deal with what I have and focus on what I CAN do with things as they are!

Your space looks very cheery and comfy and totally useable... I'd would say fun,too! Well done, you! I have no doubt that it will serve you well.

Best of luck to you!

Nice man. I'm in the early stages of building a John H. Brandt designed room in my basement. Mostly for mixing and writing but I'll be sending some Cat5 cable to my living room(baby grand piano in there) and to the garage(for a leslie, guitar amps and the odd drum track)

You're right. Once I ordered the drywall it was kind of the push I needed. It's amazing how much work goes into all this stuff, especially building it, especially with 2 kids. I'm just about done the first layer of FireCode drywall on the ceiling and it's been almost a month.

Cheers from Niagara

Jake

Yea, COVID has turned the lifestyles of many on their heads. Certainly mine.. I used to commute 50km on the train into Toronto to work, now I commute 5m by stair into my basement...

Thanks for the kind words. I'm quite happy with how it turned out.

That's awesome Jake. I'm excited for you!

I found, even with the lift, the type x on the ceiling was still tough work! I'll do the same at some point and run cat5 to my living room where my piano lives ( it's a 140 year old "upright grand" that can't be tuned more than a half step down aka A-415hz lol. But plays and sounds really nice). I do also need to run some additional cat 5 for networking, server, etc as it looks like I'll be working from home for a while!

Are you running phantom power on the cat5? If so, can you share your wiring diagram?
I’m having a hard time getting straight answers from the internet on phantom over cat5, and I don’t want to delve into the focusrite rednet Dante stuff. Although it looks really cool I just don’t want to spend more money on more gear. I might be leaning towards dsub connectors.

Nevermind. MediaGary and I hashed it out here.

D-Sub or Cat5 or ...? (for studio wiring)

I guess if a Cat5 cable is shielded it will carry phantom power.