Calling all electricians for advice on wiring home

You have already answered your own question. Tell your electrician to run your new wire on the side of the breaker box NOT shared with your Fridge (or whatever).

You may have to move a few breakers to get that side of the breaker box "pristine clean," away from all possible noise generating sources in your home. Other than that, go with Hospital grade (or at the very least, commercial grade) outlets and 10 gauge wire.

If not 10 gauge, NO less than 12, even for a five foot run and the electrician is stamping his feet over the difficulty of pulling heavy Romex copper and telling you it won't matter.

You can also run a seperate circuit box(sub-panel) for all your audio only. I had one wired with 12 breaker spaces and of course then had the electrician wire the Sub- panel to my main panel. To make things even more interesting , I also heard that I should use my left side (6 breakers) of the sub-panel for amps and the right side for the rest(Line/phono stages, turntable motor CD player...) of my equipment but I have yet to confirm this.

My advise is to listen to Albertporter.

I just had my house wired with dedicated circuits.
I used 10/2 romex. And yes, my electrician bitched and moaned about how difficult it was using the 10 gauge wire too!

And since Albert won't push his own products here, I will.
His Porter Ports are worth the money to use. (And if not his, than use something similar, like the PS Audio Power Ports.)

It is worth putting in the dedicated circuits. I definitely noticed a blacker, darker background and better bass response.

BTW, you should do more than 2 outlets if you are doing both Audio and Video, IMHO. I did three circuits (each with two outlets) just for my Audio system. (One for my Amps, One for my Analog Equipment, and One for my Digital Equipment. It is important to get all the digital equipment off the lines that serve the rest of your Audio gear.)

Good Luck!

I am getting ready to do my place as well, had an electrician friend over 4 dinner the other night, and he will connect the work in the box for me if I run all the wires, a good deal. Any way, its worth doing from the feed back I got when I posed the question, and I cant wait to hear the difference for myself. Good luck on your project.