I considered that! However, I've had troubles with IR repeaters in the past, and prefer to just have the IR sensors on all the gear visible and facing me.

Most of the gear was stuff I needed access to anyway: Game consoles to put discs into, the Rio Receiver so I can squint at the display, the docking station for the empeg, etc., I even wanted to see the front panel of the audio amplifier so I could see what the volume level was set to.