OTHER TECH

Nobody would call Charlie's system over the top, but supplying music and video throughout even an average-size house can rack up some staggering numbers. "We figured out that there's about 24 miles of wire," Charlie says, "which is insane for a 2,800-square-foot house. We actually had to call an engineer to see if the house would stand with that much wire in its walls. The builder was concerned because you have to drill holes in the studs to get these 1-inch-thick runs of cable through the whole house. He was, like, 'You're turning the structure of the house into Swiss cheese with all this f---ing wire.'"

Installers Jim Young and Wayne Tomblin feed some of the house's 24 miles of cable to the basement.

The wiring includes three kinds of bundled Monster Cable. For video, the bundle contains two Category 5 cables and two coaxial lines. For audio, there's 14-gauge speaker wire combined with enhanced Cat-5 cable. And for the computer network, there's enhanced Cat-6. The cables run to every room in the house as well as outdoors.

Some of those many miles of wire can be attributed to Jim and Wayne 's foresight. Honoring Charlie's keen interest in technolog y and allowing for his changing plans, they prewired many rooms for things like additional speakers and controllers. The guest room, for instance, has a standalone Philips minisystem and a 23-inch Philips LCD TV, with the sound going to two B&W Signature 7NT speakers above the bed.

"I kept the multiroom system out of the guest room," Charlie says, "because I want there to be a place where guests can go and just live in their own private little world and not be connected to anybody here." But if Charlie ever changed his mind, it would be simple for Jim to patch this room into the main system.

Charlie remembers when Jim suggested adding security cameras. "I said, 'Wouldn't we have to rip apart the walls?' And he said, 'Charlie, I put in a mile of wire you didn't e ven need because I knew you'd want to upgrade.' And now, on three occasions I've actually said, 'Okay, let's use it.'" For instance, Charlie had Jim and Wayne add infrared repeaters to the living-room walls so he can use a Pronto remote to adjust the volume from wherever he's sitting instead of having to go over to the Via! panel.

Now that the house is done and the system's up and running, have there been any surprises? "Yes," Charlie says. "Here's a perfect example. I discovered there isn't enough power for the patio speakers. The first time I tried them, I kept turning the volume up - you know, like, 'Come on, baby.' But that was it. It turned out we were running too many speakers out of the Elan 12-channel amplifier. So we ordered another amp just for those speakers."

The Via! DJ music server was also a surprise - but this time, a pleasant one. "I was scared to death of it because of the way it was described to me. I thought, 'Yeah, it's going to be really complicated.' But it's not . You just have to keep feeding CDs to store on the hard drive, which is no big deal."

Charlie has had a few months to get used to his system before moving on to his next projects, which include producing the Farrellys' contemporary take on the Three Stooges, due to start shooting in March, and producing a film in Sweden this summer. He still finds his whole-house system's sheer versatility a little daunting, but he's also eager to figure out exactly what it can do.

"It's like the first few weeks I was taking flying lessons. I thought, 'It's insane for me to think that I can get in this airplane, take off, fly around, and then land without killing myself. I'll never be a pilot.' But by the fourth week, I thought, 'Well, actually, I think I can do this.' And it's the same with this system. The more I play with it, the more I realize it's really pretty simple."