Plug and play technology is a big step toward standardizing the mechanical room.
One of the selling points of a radiant heating system, particularly a floor heating system, is that it is out of sight. No grilles in the walls. No registers on the floor. No baseboards along the walls. No bulky chases or duct runs. No lowered basement ceilings. In other words, nothing to detract from the architectural and interior design of the space É that is, until you walk into the mechanical room.
The mechanical room is a whole other world in which most home and building owners feel uncomfortable, at best, and terrified, at worst. I recall, as a boy, being relegated to the corner of the basement for my bedroom when my youngest sister arrived on the scene. It was a major change for a 12-year-old use to having a nice sunny room overlooking the backyard from a second-story window. In all fairness to my folks, my dad was hard at work framing in a new bedroom in the other corner of the basement for my younger brother and me. But for months we had to endure that unfriendly corner of the basement.