We expanded our house about 2 years ago. We gutted the entire house and doubled the footage. I planned and installed all of the voice/data/video wiring myself, since I have installed many networks over the years. I would avoid the bundled wire, unless you plan to install fiber, since the other wires are cheaper individually than the bundles are. They sell wire this way because it is less labor to pull one wire than 4 wires, so the wire itself is actually more expensive!! No advantage here if you're doing it yourself (and there is no reason why you can't)
Do use home runs (individual wires from evey point to your central distribution panel) for EVERYTHING!
Do use good CAT5 wire like Belden. Good quality wire has better transmission characteristics that allow it to exceed the bandwidth of the stated spec, especially in a house, where only (relatively) short distances are involved.
For 10 mbit ethernet (the speed coming out of a cable modem these days), only 2 pairs are required, but DO terminate every wire, in case you need to use a different one because one is broken during construction (errant nail, etc)
For future data speed (100mbit/gigabit), you should still acceptable performance with this wire, but you will never need this performance for data, since the bottleneck is the cable modem. The next major jump in performance will likely be wireless based, so the wire issues become obsolete.
Do run 2 CAT5 wires (one for voice one for data). In a pinch, you can split the 10mbit ethernet into 2 fi you have to. If you know ahead, better to run an extra one to selected locations.
Do NOT run data and voice on the same cable - just because it is cheap to run two wires, and you will find it to be much easier to work with separate cables at each end.
Run coax to each multimedia location. Two if you plan to have any video generating devices located there (DVD, HDTV decoder, VCR, cable box). If you have two cables, you can run the signal back to your panel, and use some cool video technology to distribute it to any TV in the house, while controlling it from that remote location. It isn't high-def, but it is basic cable quality without having to buy new players for each location.
Buy a cheap box with conduit holes pre-punched. You don't have to buy the structured wiring boxes, they are too expensive.
Do get a good 110 punch down tool that cuts the wires as it punches them down. Use a 110 punch down block to terminate the PHONE wires (not the data wires). Leave some slack in these wires in case you ever need to convert them to data (you will need to cut off the end and re-terminate them according to CAT5 specs)
Do get a modular CAT5 termination block and CAT5 RJ45 female sockets that snap in for all data cable runs.
Do use a basic video signal splitter(s) with a ground. Get an amplified one if you have too many runs and you lose signal quality. Or upgrade to a powered IR controlled video distribution system if you want to route different video sources through the house with switching capability at each TV.
Order all of your wires from the electrical supply company that your contractor's electrician uses, and get it on his account to get his discount. Do not buy from (B)LOWES or HOME DEPOT or you will pay 2x. (But feel free to window shop to get some idea of how the stuff works together).
Don't forget the speaker wires!
Check out the following web sites for more info
<A target="_blank" HREF=http://bwcecom.belden.com/>Belden cable</A>
<A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.levitonvoicedata.com/>Leviton voice and data</A>
<A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.leviton.com/lin/index.html>Leviton Integrated Media</A>
