Premiere Systems

OK, so I bought a house in the city and knew I needed A/​V help but had no idea where to begin… what was out there… much less how to get things done at a reasonable cost.
A little back story on me… I’m not the type to just find the cheapest vendor for services and I’m not easily swayed by businesses whose marketing efforts that make consumers THINK they’re inexpensive (in this case, the likes of Geek Squad).
I had been recommended to Première by a friend who had way more money to spend on A/​V than me, so admittedly I was on guard for $$$. But what began as a cautious in-​home meeting with a Première rep to discuss my relative disinterest in the world of «home theater» ended up being more enlightening than I had envisioned.
In the end, yes, I spent way more than I had planned… but that’s pretty much what happened with everything I bought… down to my coffee maker. What I got was an incredibly convenient set up where my TV’s all use the same, idiot-​proof, IP-​based remote (which means my wife and guests don’t have to take a course to turn on different TV’s). The remotes can even control other TV’s in the house AND the thermostats — features that have come in handy when my pregnant wife needs the thermostat changed in the middle of the night and I don’t feel like heading downstairs… or when our sons have another TV too loud when I’m trying to put our daughter down for a nap.
They «sold» me (for lack of a better word) on other services too… ones that I’m certain I’d have later determined to want — like an extended wireless network with a home server for auto backups of our family’s laptops (who DOESN’T need that?) and iPod docks that interface with the A/​V equipment.
Oddly enough, I’m not a movie junkie. In fact, I can’t tell you the last year in which I’ve watched a movie so I’m sure the tone of this would have been more about my Netflix & Pandora apps on my Blu-​Ray players if I cared in the least about that stuff. I just like the ease of use in watching the news, listening to music or watching my (few) TV programs in HD. Everything looks great, sounds great and was wired/​installed so professionally that I’m actually proud of the setup I have.
Among the things like most?
1) Everybody at Première is bright and professional. How refreshing.
2) Emails and calls were always returned promptly and thoroughly. That’s HUGE with me.
3) They have an engineering dept that provides detailed elevations showing EXACTLY where the brackets should be on the wall… where the wiring goes… how long the wiring should be. At first, this seemed like overkill but every time I look at any of the TV’s and see how they are centered… perfectly level… no cords in sight… it reminds me how important this function was.
The one regret I have… and I would recommend this to anyone who plans on working with an A/​V company on a system that requires programming time on an IP-​based remote control system (like Control4) — don’t go out and buy your own TV’s like l did. I tried to save a couple bucks by getting TV’s myself instead of getting them through Première and I regret it. I’m also reminded of it every day when I have to press custom buttons on my remote because the TV I bought doesn’t communicate with the remotes as well as other brands. I should have gone with all the ones they were recommending. I also wish they’d have told me why they were recommending their preferred TV’s because that knowledge would have been enough to keep me out of stores and offline scouring for TV deals. The ones that I bought didn’t have (what I would soon learn to be) «discreet codes» that make programming the remotes easy and most functional. I ended up paying much more in Première’s programming time than I saved in buying the TV’s. AND I’m left with a couple of TV’s that aren’t integrated into my system as well as the TV’s I bought from Première. My bad.