Express - extreme and more expresses

Question

Short version: Is there any disadvantage to be had from placing an extreme downstream of an express?  Is there any reason why the extreme ought to be the centre of the network with other devices (expresses and possibly even another extreme) downstream of it?
Here is the longer version and my thinking:
I am about to move to a new flat which features two ethernet points in every room, connected by wire to a main box in the hall.
A big part of my current (and future) setup is about air-playing music to different rooms (often several rooms at the same time) using airport, and I am sure that doing this via ethernet will mean fewer dropouts, which is great.
I have been toying around with various different network shapes in my head.
The main thing that occurs to me is that it seems a waste to have my extreme plugged into the main network switch-box in the hall, which is near ceiling level, because I wouldn't really be able to use it for much there:
It is not where I need wifi coverage.
There is nowhere to put a printer near there.
There is probably not even enough space for an ethernet hard-disk in there.
In fact it's possible the extreme wouldn't even fit in the box.
I think it would be much better to have an extreme placed in the guest-bedroom where my computer desk will be, and where it can drive things like hard disks and printers.
However, I don't really want to buy a second extreme to give me one in the hall and another in the bedroom (I imagine I will buy a third express though).
So, I was thinking about two options:
1. Putting an express in the ethernet box, into an eight-way gigabit ethernet switch and from there to the various different devices in the house, including the extreme on my desk.
Internet
    I
Express
    I
8-way-Switch
I                  I              I
Extreme     Express  Express
2. Using the ethernet in the flat to take the inbound internet direct from the cable modem into the guest bedroom through the first ethernet slot there, into the extreme, then back to the box in the hall using the second ethernet slot, and from there use the eight way gigabit ethernet switch to take the signal to the various other ethernet slots (and in three cases to airport expresses in other rooms).
Internet
    I (ethernet to guest bedroom)
Extreme
    I (ethernet back from guest bedroom)
8-way-Switch
I                  I              I
Express     Express  Express
Does anyone have experience of either set up, or any views on what might work best?  Should I expect much loss of bandwidth if I am sending the signal over more of the ethernet cabling (as in idea two, where it will be much like Bilbo Baggins, going There and Back Again).
Thanks very much for any feedback.

Answer 1

Short version: Is there any disadvantage to be had from placing an extreme downstream of an express?  Is there any reason why the extreme ought to be the centre of the network with other devices (expresses and possibly even another extreme) downstream of it?
Yes, the Extreme is a much faster and more capable router.. it has much faster wireless. If you put an extreme in downstream setup to express it will be limited to 100mbit ethernet and limited to 300mbit wireless.
That is the short version.
Long version you have obviously thought about the problem.. if you feed incoming cable to the Extreme, route from there then feed it back to the main swith which is gigabit.. that is fine.. Lots of ethernet cables is no problem as long as they are Cat5e at least and tested to work properly at full gigabit. Ethernet is good for 100M runs on Cat6 (somewhat less on Cat5e), and can handle 2 or 3 repeaters so total length of 300M or more.. again somewhat reduced by poorer Cat5.. but in a house wiring should be no problem. A switch is a repeater for ethernet. So each time you have a router or switch it is effectively a signal repeater.
So yes you can get away with what you want by judicious connections as per your version 2 layout.