When we last checked in with installer John Tamburello, he was 60 stories above Manhattan, completing an elegant multiroom system in an art collector's apartment (Sky High, May 2006). Before that, we watched as he hooked up a home theater for Men in Black director Barry Sonnenfeld, who told us that John "seems to live on pizza and cold coffee, and always exhibits flu-like symptoms, but is strangely very smart, informed, and easy to work with" (My Digital Adventure, September 2005). When we recently caught up with John on a summery day in May, he was busy handling four installations in various stages of completion.

•Photo Gallery

Wanting to get a sense of how an installer juggles all this delicate, complicated work, we tagged along as he put the finishing touches on two of those very different jobs: a whole-house system in the lush, affluent New York City suburb of Irvington and a full-blown home theater in the midtown Manhattan office of rapper supreme Jay-Z.

Installers rarely have the luxury of focusing on one job at a time. Because it typically takes about a month to wire, hook up, and program an upscale multiroom system, the installer and his team frequently find themselves dealing with a number of tasks simultaneously. "I've usually got three installations going on any given day," says John, "plus a number of service calls for jobs we've already finished." Including him, there are eight people in his company, Central Media Systems, which has offices in both Manhattan and Peekskill, New York.

When we arrived at the Irvington home of Dan and Margie Rosenfield, John and programmer Scot Eigenfeld were upgrading the master-bedroom system, installing a 42-inch Panasonic plasma HDTV on an OmniMount articulated arm and providing surround sound by way of a Polk SurroundBar placed on a closet shelf above the TV.

•Photo Gallery

The Rosenfields' whole-house system began not with a home theater but with a car. Going through a midlife crisis, Dan decided to indulge himself with a 2002 Porsche Carrera 4S. But not having any place to put his sleek silver beauty, he tacked a new garage onto the house. And realizing that he needed a guest room, he had one built above the new garage. Once he saw how good the new garage looked, he decided the rest of the house could use a makeover. Then came the luxury kitchen (his wife's payback for agreeing to let him get the car), the exercise room, the karate/yoga studio — and on and on, until the house had grown from 4,500 to 6,300 square feet.

Along the way, Dan became dissatisfied with his various entertainment systems and decided to beef them up as well. "The renovation took a year and a half," he says. "We had six big TVs, and every time we'd finish a room, I'd give one of the workmen a TV." The house now holds nine HDTVs, ranging from a 23-inch Westinghouse LCD in the karate studio to a 50-inch Pioneer plasma in the family room. "I wanted a 60-inch in there," says Dan, "but every single model on the market was just about an inch too wide for the wall unit we had made."

By the time architect Arthur Chabon, builder Bill Fiorito, and John's team were done, Dan had systems in the family room, living room, kitchen, exercise room, karate studio, master bedroom, guest bedroom, and his son and daughter's bedrooms and "teen lounge" in the basement. And for a while, he was happy to keep the systems independent of each other. But as frequently happens, Dan soon wondered if it wouldn't be better to be able to share music between the rooms. Having just suffered all the many inconveniences of a renovation, the Rosenfields were in no hurry to breach the recently repainted walls, so John offered a wireless solution: placing Sonos ZonePlayer modules in each room where they wanted to share music and using a Sonos controller to operate this system-within-a-system.

Because Dan and Margie are world travelers (when we visited them, they'd just returned from the Galapagos Islands), Dan wanted to use photos stored on his home-office computer to create slideshows on the family room's 50-inch screen. John's solution was to hook up a D-Link media player, which allows the photo files to be sent wirelessly between the two spaces.

With the Sonos system in place and the master-bedroom system up and running, the Rosenfields' installation is doing everything they want it to. But Dan and John have been thinking ahead. A black-belt karate expert, Dan had a 16 x 24-foot studio dug out beneath the patio. At the moment, four Monitor Audio Radius 90 speakers placed near the ceiling let Margie and him listen to music while he's working out or she's doing yoga. "But I also had John wire the room for 7.1-channel sound and a flat-panel TV, for whenever my knees go and I can't use the room for karate anymore," says Dan. The wires for the TV are behind a large painting, while the wires running to the locations for the surround speakers are indicated by thumbtacks stuck in the ceiling, painted to match the room.

•Photo Gallery

It's only 24 miles from Irvington to Manhattan, but it would be hard to imagine two more dissimilar places than that sleepy suburb and the volatile, driven world of New York rap — in this case, the world of master rapper Jay-Z, who is also president and CEO of the Def Jam and Roc-A-Fella record labels. His office — with its dark wood floors and paneling, black-and-white photos, silver accents, and spare, elegant lines — stands in sharp contrast to the Rosenfields' sun-drenched, comfortably lived-in interiors.

•Photo Gallery

On the day we were there, John was adding Xbox 360 Elite and PlayStation 2 game consoles to the office's home theater system. Peer into most offices — even executive ones — and you'll be lucky to find much more than a 19-inch standard-def LCD TV and a stereo minisystem, but the rig here rivals any enthusiast's home theater. "Jay-Z wanted something simple," says John, "but with some kicking playback for any hip-hop demos he might be working on."

The office originally had nothing but ceiling speakers, which were laid out so they could accommodate a surround-sound setup. "But the ceilings are too high for the sound to have enough impact," says John. So he convinced Jay-Z to go with Usher V-604 tower speakers for the left and right front channels and an Usher V-603 for the center, and then conceal them behind removable panels, covered with grille cloth, surrounding the TV. The combination of the Usher front speakers, the Usher V-601 speakers for the surrounds, and a Sunfire True Subwoofer Jr. creates a powerful home theater experience.

One of the best things about the system — and this goes for the similar setup in the conference room as well — is the way it's integrated into the décor without disappearing completely. The components are on display and easy to access without being distracting or getting in anybody's way. But the system has no problem making its presence felt whenever it's fired up. John and his team's many skills are evident — as much in what you don't see as in anything you do — in both the Irvington and Manhattan installs.

A lot of people aspire to becoming a custom installer because they like electronics and they think it would be a dream job to spend every day working with great gear. And it is. But an installer is as much a project manager and a master diplomat as he is an A/V aficionado. In other words, people skills and a knack for getting the job done right and on time are just as important as any electronics prowess. John Tamburello has shown he can handle dedicated home theaters, whole-house A/V systems, office systems, and computer networks — as well as art collectors, businessmen, movie directors, and superstar rappers — with equal aplomb. All in a day's work for your average successful custom installer.

Jay-Z's Office — Partial Equipment List

Fujitsu P63XTA51UB 63-inch plasma HDTV 2 Usher V-604 speakers (front L /R) Usher V-603 center speaker 2 Usher V-601 speakers (surrounds) 5 Sonance Symphony S623TR ceiling speakers (background music) Sunfire True Subwoofer Jr. subwoofer Denon DVD-1930 DVD player Hughes H-20 high-def satellite-TV receiver Sonance iPort FS-2 desktop iPod dock Xbox 360 Elite game console PlayStation 2 game console Denon AVR-2307 digital surround receiver Crestron CP2E control processor Crestron TPMC-8X Wi-Fi touchpanel controller Linksys WRT-54G wireless router Exact Power EPDS-V power conditioner

Rosenfield Home — Partial Equipment List

FAMILY ROOM Pioneer PDP-5060HD 50-inch plasma HDTV Pioneer PDP-R06U plasma-display media receiver OmniMount 48ARM-S articulated mount 2 System Audio 510 speakers (front L/R) System Audio 510AV center speaker 2 System Audio 505 speakers (surrounds) Sunfire True Subwoofer Jr. subwoofer Sony DVP-NS90 DVD player Sony CDP-CE575 five-disc CD changer Sony SLV-740HF Hi-Fi VCR Nakamichi RX-202 cassette deck Sonos ZonePlayer 80 wireless music player Sonos CR100 controller D-Link DSM-320 wireless media player Scientific Atlanta Explorer 8300HD high-def DVR/cable-TV receiver Denon AVR-3806 digital surround receiver Adcom GFA-535 amp (for ceiling speakers) Universal Remote MX-850 remote control 2 Universal Remote MRF-300 RF base stations Middle Atlantic dual custom-rack shelf system TEEN LOUNGE Sharp Aquos LC-45GX6U 45-inch LCD HDTV 3 Monitor Audio Radius 250 on-wall speakers (front L/C/R) 2 Monitor Audio Radius 90 speakers (surrounds) Sunfire True Subwoofer Jr. subwoofer Sony DVP-NS 75 DVD player Sonos ZonePlayer 80 wireless music player Xbox 360 game console Scientific Atlanta Explorer 4200HD high-def cable-TV receiver Denon AVR-2307 digital surround receiver Universal Remote MX-850 remote control Universal Remote MRF-300 RF base station MASTER BEDROOM Panasonic TH-42PX600U 42-inch plasma HDTV OmniMount 48ARM-S articulated mount Polk SurroundBar single-cabinet surround-sound speaker system Toshiba SD-5000 DVD player Sonos ZonePlayer 80 wireless music player Tivo Series2 DT DVR Scientific Atlanta Explorer 8300HD high-def DVR/cable-TV receiver Sony STRDG500 digital surround receiver Universal Remote MX-850 remote control Universal Remote MRF-300 RF base station

Photo Gallery
More Installations
Back to Homepage
What's New on S&V