If your walls are drywall and not plaster you could always make a small hole that the crown will cover and fish your cables down to the location. Most interior walls are not insulated so it makes it pretty easy.

dberube1

Crown-molding related: I put new crown molding in my house several years ago and not less than a week later came across the idea of using crown molding to create accent lighting. I could have kicked myself for not having discovered earlier when I could have put it in along with the new molding! Here are some links to the kind of lighting I'm talking about:

DIY method:
[www.ronhazelton.com]

Pre-made method:
[www.oldhouseweb.com]

JFitzpatrick

Funnily enough, I've done the cable-in-the-coving [crown molding] in the last 4 rooms I redecorated back home. I wasn't aware of anything like wiretracks being available, so I did it my own way - a wire staple every couple of feet holding a zip tie loop with the cables inside. I used it mainly for CAT-5e cabling, running to vertical in-wall conduits where appropriate (mostly solid plaster walls). Cover over with the coving/molding as usual and repair the wall with skim or Polyfila.

Digitalwanderer

Great idea. But $200 for 10 pieces of 8 foot of channels. I'll pass. It would be good if you are constantly changing your A/V setup dramatically. Or if you do not have drywall. As for most people, you should just wall fish it.

If you are worried about exposed wiring. Place tv up on wall. Mark where the connection goes. Take it down. Then wall fish. It is not too hard (I'm also not going to say that it is easy as pie).

sven.kirk

I actually had this idea too but I had never seen it implemented anywhere, much less sold as a product. It just seemed like common sense to hide the cables in the baseboards. Guess this validates the idea.

Mark

Mark

@ironchef: You're just going to end up with a conduit running up from the floor too?

This might be a better solution for someone who has a flat screen mounted on the wall about 5 feet up? So the conduit will only be from the cieling down a foot or two.

chris-mcc

crown molding isn't very good for hiding cables, btw. You get a nasty looking conduit running down from the ceiling.

Baseboards is a better bet.

ironchef

Good idea, but yeah, $200 is steep when you can do it yourself. For those of you wondering about the wires to the molding, you can use this in a situation where you have 2x4 construction with drywall. Put the wires in the wall behind the tv and run them up the ceiling and then back out and behind the crown molding. I have to do this because my room doesn't have an attic and running wires through the ceiling would be a nightmare.

dr.coop

@chris-mcc:

Not necessarily. Your desk typically hides the ports. if you ran the wire from the ceiling, that's way harder to hide.

ironchef

It's not that hard to actually fish wires. It takes a few tries to get your technique down, but the results are great. I've been in the low-voltage industry for around 10 years, and fishing wires in walls that entire time. A stud finder, steel fish tape, and some patience will get you a very professional look. For those, like me, who don't have a stud finder, a long, thin, screw driver works too, although it leaves a hole to patch.

As long as your not afraid of patching a few holes, you can pull wire behind the wall, ceiling, or floor nearly every time. Preformed concrete can be the exception.

mnslinky

A word of warning for those thinking about fishing wire through your walls - there could also be electrical wiring behind that wall, and you don't want to hit it with your drill while making the holes. Go slow, and stop as soon as you are through the wall board.

Justice

buy some cable ties and tacks. Whatever snake oil these guys are selling can be achieved for 1/100th the cost. By it's very nature, crown moulding creates a channel - just make sure you don't put a nail through your wires when hanging the moulding.

gamehendge2000