in the next couple of months, i am going to be putting together a total AV package that I plan on installing myself. i am a total noob when it comes to this stuff. I have a TON of questions (12 total!!) and was told this is the forum to get answers, so bear with me. all help is greatly appreciated!

first off, let me explain that my budget is roughly $5000us. this setup will be entirely for home entertainment - TV, movies (blu-ray) and lots of gaming (PS3, 360)

below are pictures of the room where i am going to be installing all this stuff. i am faced with many challenges in completing my project. #1 being the damn skylights (that i really really hate!). #2 being speaker size for a room with catherdral ceilings and open loft. #3 being running speaker wire for the front speakers (has to go across the catherdral ceiling - i have an attic but that location is not entirely reachable.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v633/atom631/av%20project/living_room001.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v633/atom631/av%20project/living_room-002.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v633/atom631/av%20project/living_room003.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v633/atom631/av%20project/living_room-004.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v633/atom631/av%20project/living_room-005.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v633/atom631/av%20project/living_room-006.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v633/atom631/av%20project/living_room-007.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v633/atom631/av%20project/living_room-008.jpg
also, the black rack with the cheetah on it will be the AV shelf. the devices will be scattered on the shelf. i thought that would add a cool touch.


My first question (skylights):

I was hoping that getting them the deepest tint that 3M has to offer would do the trick. If not, I know I will need to install shades. What do you think? Will a deep 3M tint be sufficient for daytime viewing? is there a AV specific tint on the market that i can get that works better than the 3M stuff?



questions 2-8 (room setup and size):

the dimensions of the room are as follows:

from the wall where projector will mount to wall where screen will be is 16.5'.
middle of the couch to screen wall is -11'
space between sconces and picture - 8"
depth of picture - 1"
size of picture - 79L"x55H"
from floor to center of picture is 7'
estimated height of projector - 9'


I have decided on the Epson HC1080UB projector.

the picture above the fireplace is staying and my idea is to install a motorized screen that will sit between the sconces and the picture. when i want to watch TV/game i will lower the screen over the picture. when not in use, i can roll it up and have a nice picture to look at.

is the size of the room adequate for a front projector setup?

is 16.5' enough room from wall to wall? i imagine that i will loose some footage b/c the projector wont be flush with the wall and neither will the screen.

is 11' enough distance away to enjoy watching TV without getting a headache or neck strain?

Is the space between the picture and sconces enough room to install the screen housing? 8" seems not big enough and i will probably have to raise the sconces.

will lowering the screen over the picture pose any problems? at 1" depth, i cant see it being an issue.

most importantly, what screen should i get? i want it to cover the picture entirely when lowered.

are there any modifications i need to make to this room to make it more AV friendly? obviously i cant black out the room as this is my living room where we entertain. i also am at the mercy of my fiance and she gets final approval of what goes/stays/changes.

should i use a wall mount for the projector or a shelf? does it make a difference?



questions 9-12 (audio related, so let me know if i am better off just asking these in another forum):

i am not looking to go high-end with my audio setup. i am focusing more on the projector/screen. so i am thinking a receiver in the 500-700 range should do the trick for me. as stated above my main requirements are True HD (is this 7.1?), sirius hookup and ipod hookup.

any recommendations on a receiver?

the speakers i would like to have recessed into the walls - for this size room, will any speakers do or will i loose sound b/c of the open ceiling loft?

are there any decent wireless speakers on the market? im thinking this might be my only solutaion to getting my front speakers wired w/o tearing a ton of holes in the sheetrock.

subwoofer location!! the spot that i want to put the subwoofer is actually behind the couch and pretty much directly under the projector. is this a bad spot for the sub? i really dont have a choice as i would face the same problem of running the subwoofer cable to the front of the room. the sub would sit dead center behind the couch about 5 back.

You might get some more answers in the general home theater/ game room thread.

thank you for the reply. i will xpost this thread over there.

Have you considered BenQ W5000 ? Its about $500-600 less than the Epson 1080ub. If you are not sensitive to dlp rainbow it is a great alternative.
Looks like you have a fair bit of ambient light from above and off to the sides at the back of the room. May be a Dalite HP screen to combat the ambient light in the room.
Onkyo 606 av receiver is probably the most feature rich receiver in the sub 500 price range. As for speakers how about the Polk surroundbar 50, that way you don't need to run cables. Wireless options are available, have a look at KEF wireless system. (http://www.kef.com/kht/wireless.htm).
16.5' is plenty deep. Its about the same depth as my room and my lens to screen is about 14'. At 11' viewing distance you probably don't want to go much beyond 100". The distance between the picture and the scones may not be enough, but that will depend on which screen model you get and how you mount it. You can use a couple of L brackets to hang the screen or built a housing for the screen and move the scones away from the screen.
Placement of the sub is not very important in the grand scheme of things, why not have it at the front. Vibration from the sub may shift the focus/zoom etc if it is too close to the projector.

Optoma GreyWolf II motorized screen is another retroreflective with good price. Go to the Screens sub forum to read up on various screen material. I think Retrorefletive screens would be your best bet.

thanks for the help.

the optoma grey wolf is right in my price range so that looks like a good choice.

the KEF wireless system, do you know if it will work with front and front-center speakers? my receiver will actually be behind me, so i will need wireless to the front speakers.

A lot of people prefer the High Power screen to the Greywolf II so I recommend you consider that. Motorized screen is cool, but you can use a pull-down screen just as well and save some money.

To best manage your ambient light you will want your projector mounted close to the viewer's line of sight to take advantage of the retro-reflective screen, so shelf mounting behind the viewers is the way to go. The viewing distance and resolution of your projector is just right, so long as you want a big picture.

I always recommend a fairly good powered subwoofer for surround sound. That way you don't need as much power in your receiver and you get satisfying richness in the movie soundtracks. Subwoofers aren't just for explosions.

I think you might be able to hide your speaker wires well enough by stapling them to the base of your wall all around the room, then running them up inside the wall right where your speakers are mounted.

thanks for the help.

the optoma grey wolf is right in my price range so that looks like a good choice.

the KEF wireless system, do you know if it will work with front and front-center speakers? my receiver will actually be behind me, so i will need wireless to the front speakers.

A retro reflective screen will not work for you unless you mount your projector very low. A retro reflective screen requires that the projector be mounted as close to eye height as you can. This is because the screen reflects the projector light back towards it's source in a relatively narrow cone (30 degree angle) and you want your eyes to be in the cone area. In other words you mount the projector a little bit above head height when seated. I have a retro reflective set up.

The 1080UB is a little bit brighter than the W5000, but the W5000 is an excellent choice and it would work well with rear shelf mount. At night time I would prefer the W5000, during the day I would prefer the 1080UB. Keep in mind neither of them will be great during the day if you can't do something about the ambient light.

You could look at the DaLite Contour Electric in a 106" size. If you got it with the standard 2" of drop at top then the total height will be approximately 63.5 inches. (6-1/2" case, 2" drop, 52" screen, 2" drop and 1" for bottom tube). I would probably look at Video Spectra fabric. If you can mount low on a rear shelf then you could go with retro reflective screen. In that case I would suggest the DaLite High Power screen. This screen has a lot of gain (2.8) and it rejects the ambient light. The biggest problem with this is the projector would be mounted in a walking path.

I think the above poster meant to suggest the Onkyo 605 not the 606. The 605 or 705 would be a good choice for you. It is a lot of receiver for the money. You can find the 605 for less a lot less than $500. In fact you can find the 805 in your budget.

As you know your biggest problem is the sky lights. If you can block off the ambient light then I would go with the W5000 mounted up high with a wall mount. For the W5000 the lens to screen distance (measured horizontally) will need to be 14'-2" to 17'-0" from the screen to project a 106" image. Keep in mind that you need to look up how much offset the W5000 has so that you can plan your mounting location to work with your fixed (as in locked in height due to mantle and scones) screen location. Hope this helps.

W5000 info:www.projectorcentral.com/BenQ-W5000-projection-calculator-pro.htm
www.projectorcentral.com/benq_w5000.htm

I think the above poster meant to suggest the Onkyo 605 not the 606. The 605 or 705 would be a good choice for you. It is a lot of receiver for the money. You can find the 605 for less a lot less than $500. In fact you can find the 805 in your budget.



I actually meant Onkyo 606. Brand spanking new to the market with a couple of new features over the 605 for $100 more.

I actually meant Onkyo 606. Brand spanking new to the market with a couple of new features over the 605 for $100 more.

Sorry, I have not been keeping up on the AVR's as much lately. I guess I will check out the new Onkyo's. Did they get a replacement out for the 805? Also if they have a replacement out for the 805 then you should be able to get one of those cheap.

I do not believe the 806 has been released in NA yet. But it should not be too far from now.

thats for all the info.

ok... so my projector will be about 9-10 from the floor and project slightly downward. Im guessing the center of my screen will be at about 7' (it has to clear the fireplace and the mantle).

i didnt realize there was so much involved in doing a front projector setup. definetly not as easy as throwing a plasma or LCD up on the wall!!

thats for all the info.

ok... so my projector will be about 9-10 from the floor and project slightly downward. Im guessing the center of my screen will be at about 7' (it has to clear the fireplace and the mantle).

i didnt realize there was so much involved in doing a front projector setup. definetly not as easy as throwing a plasma or LCD up on the wall!!

It is not that complicated. Use the calculator on Projector Central for throw and lumen output and read the reviews and O & M manuals for the projectors that you are interested in to get the image offset numbers and to see what image adjustment that they have such as horizontal keystone, vertical keystone, horizontal image shift or vertical image shift.

The offset number is based on percent of image height. If a projector has an offset of 20% of image height and you want a 106" screen then the offset is 10.4". A 106" screen is 52" high and 52" x .20% = 10.4". In the above example if the projector is table mounted then the bottom of the image will be 10.4" above the center of the lens of the leveled projector. If the projector is mounted upside down on the ceiling or inverted on a shelf then the top of the image will be 10.4" below the lens with projector leveled.

on the 3M tint, I use it in my front 2 bedrooms (they face south and get Clobbered by the afternoon sun) it does reduce the light, and more importantly to me, the heat is reflected back to the source (back towards the sun in the summer, back towards the bedrooms in the winter)

Will it make it dark enough for a PJ as light control? No, not without some help (Shades, drapes, etc)

Remember that the W5000 will not work with the Da-lite High-Power (HP) screen, because you have to mount the W5000 up high (to avoid interference with people).

The Epson 1080UB doesn't have that problem, and can be put on the top shelf of your "equipment rack" - in place of the Cheetah. However, the HP should be way too bright for the Epson in your room with a 100" screen (96" or 106" - my screen size recommendation for a 1080p PJ in your setup) - you would have to use a ND2 filter to cut it's output by 50% for night time viewing. It might be Ok in the daytime - with all that ambient light.

You really need to investigate a set of motorized shades (covers) for those skylights. That's the only way you can tame that light source. Another problem will be light coming in from the sliding glass doors in the dining room - that will shine directly on your screen and will be even worse with a HP screen. That light will compete with the PJ output, since it's coming from the same direction, and no screen can help you with that.

I have a 106" Da-Lite HP screen and my LR/HT is in the NE corner of my house. I have one standard sized window on the East side (shadowed by the neighbors high fence) and my large windows are on the North side, behind my pull-down screen, with heavy drapes. I sit 11' from the screen and it's just fine even for my 720p PJ (low mounted on a shelf behind the couch, and just above our heads).

Putting in a HT in your room will be a challenge. It will require a lot of thought and planning (you need to match the screen and PJ selections for best results) - but it will be worth it in the end. As you noted, it's not like putting up a flat panel TV set (which isn't a good idea over a fireplace anyway).

Lastly, you indicated position for a "Rear Center Surround". Scratch that - it would give you an 8.1 channel system and no low cost AVR is set up for that. Two rear channel surrounds would be better, since your room is going to be an audio challenge anyway - all those openings make your room a lot larger for audio calculations (you have to include the entire volume of all open areas connected to your room).

Wireless front channels are not a good idea, since that is where the majority of the sound is coming from. Most wireless speakers are designed for low power rear channel use. You can put up some kind of decorative molding (or rectangular box) around the room (at roughly 8' height) and run the speaker wires through it (and anything else that needs to go from the HT equipment to the screen area).

Remember that the W5000 will not work with the Da-lite High-Power (HP) screen, because you have to mount the W5000 up high (to avoid interference with people).

The Epson 1080UB doesn't have that problem, and can be put on the top shelf of your "equipment rack" - in place of the Cheetah. However, the HP should be way too bright for the Epson in your room with a 100" screen (96" or 106" - my screen size recommendation for a 1080p PJ in your setup) - you would have to use a ND2 filter to cut it's output by 50% for night time viewing. It might be Ok in the daytime - with all that ambient light.

You really need to investigate a set of motorized shades (covers) for those skylights. That's the only way you can tame that light source. Another problem will be light coming in from the sliding glass doors in the dining room - that will shine directly on your screen and will be even worse with a HP screen. That light will compete with the PJ output, since it's coming from the same direction, and no screen can help you with that.

I have a 106" Da-Lite HP screen and my LR/HT is in the NE corner of my house. I have one standard sized window on the East side (shadowed by the neighbors high fence) and my large windows are on the North side, behind my pull-down screen, with heavy drapes. I sit 11' from the screen and it's just fine even for my 720p PJ (low mounted on a shelf behind the couch, and just above our heads).

Putting in a HT in your room will be a challenge. It will require a lot of thought and planning (you need to match the screen and PJ selections for best results) - but it will be worth it in the end. As you noted, it's not like putting up a flat panel TV set (which isn't a good idea over a fireplace anyway).

Lastly, you indicated position for a "Rear Center Surround". Scratch that - it would give you an 8.1 channel system and no low cost AVR is set up for that. Two rear channel surrounds would be better, since your room is going to be an audio challenge anyway - all those openings make your room a lot larger for audio calculations (you have to include the entire volume of all open areas connected to your room).

Wireless front channels are not a good idea, since that is where the majority of the sound is coming from. Most wireless speakers are designed for low power rear channel use. You can put up some kind of decorative molding (or rectangular box) around the room (at roughly 8' height) and run the speaker wires through it (and anything else that needs to go from the HT equipment to the screen area).

The W5000 has vertical lens shift of nearly two picture heights. Not much different from the 1080UB. Also keep in mind the center of his screen is going to be approximately 84" above the floor. He should have no problem placing the W5000 on the same shelf that you are talking about placing the 1080UB. The W5000 is not as bright as the 1080UB and I think the DaLite High Power would be a good match with the W5000. I have not run any calculations, but there is a chart on AVS that allows you to calculate the gain based on projector height.

I also have a high power set up. I have a Marantz 12S4 mounted on an adjustable height pedestal behind my coach. I can position the projector so that the lens is anywhere from 3'-8" to 6'-2" (3" increments) above the floor. I have installed gas springs inside the pedestal so that the projector shelf can be raised or lowered easily.

I think the single rear speaker that he was referring to would have made his setup a 6.1 system. I agree with you regarding the skylights and speakers. If he does not do something about the skylights then he will pretty much have a night time use system and even then the moon may cause a problem every now and then.

mjg100 -- Oops & thanks, you're right. I keep forgetting that the W5000 is the odd-ball in the "Under $3K DLP category" - being the only one with lens shift. It's problem, for me, is that its throw is too long for my setup (without serious re-layout of my room).

For atom631's room, the W5000 would work, provided he didn't go with too large of a screen (which he isn't contemplating - at least for now). However, with its limited zoom range, he is limited to a 96" screen as the smallest screen he can use for his desired mounting location - I wouldn't go with a smaller one anyway, if it were me.

atom631 -- BTW, thanks for posting the excellent pictures of your proposed room. That really helps in making recommendations based on our "collective" experience.

mjg100 -- Oops & thanks, you're right. I keep forgetting that the W5000 is the odd-ball in the "Under $3K DLP category" - being the only one with lens shift. It's problem, for me, is that its throw is too long for my setup (without serious re-layout of my room).

For atom631's room, the W5000 would work, provided he didn't go with too large of a screen (which he isn't contemplating - at least for now). However, with its limited zoom range, he is limited to a 96" screen as the smallest screen he can use for his desired mounting location - I wouldn't go with a smaller one anyway, if it were me.

atom631 -- BTW, thanks for posting the excellent pictures of your proposed room. That really helps in making recommendations based on our "collective" experience.

I know, there are not many out there with this feature. That is what kept me out of DLP until I got my Marantz. Since I raise and lower my projector there are times that I need to make vertical adjustments. From reading the reviews I think the W5000 would be an excellent choice.

Hi Atom631,

I'm also a retro-reflective user like mjg100 and Claus. I have both a Greywolf and Hi Power. The advantage of the Greywolf is it will help out a bit with the blacks in an ambient light situtation. The downsides of the Greywolf is that it's lower gain, and has a visable 'texture' that some people find distracting. It also can't be cleaned. The HiPower is much brighter, and can be cleaned ( the ability to clean becomes very important when you accidentally roll up and squish a bug or two .. yes, it's happened to me many times!)

mjg100's caution about the fact that the beam will be in the walking path if setup for a retro-reflective screen is valid, but, I don't consider this too much of an inconvience in my setup. If someone is in front of you blocking the beam, they're probably blocking your view of the screen too.

You already have the one big feature that I would suggest in this type of setup. The screen wall should be pained as dark as possible.

I wouldn't worry about the Epson being too bright for night time viewing. The Epson's have a filter which engages in Theatre Black 1 and 2 modes, which cuts the light output considerably, which is good for night time critical viewing. The un-tamed, not colour accurate, torch modes are great for daytime viewing of high contrast material like sports and 'non dark' games. Leave the movie watching for after sunset. None of the high brightness projector / retro-reflective screen tricks will make a movie watchable during the day.

As far as audio cabeling is concerned, we use a bit of a novel approach. We have all our sources located with the projector at the rear of the room. All of the source components go into a switcher which switches both the component video and S/PDIF coax digital audio. We feed the coax digital audio out of the switcher into the VIDEO input of an inexpensive AV sender. We have the AVR and the AV Sender's receiver located at the front of the room. You just hook the VIDEO out of the AV Sender's receiver into the coax S/PDIF of the AVR. This takes care of our fronts and sub. We then use a product similar to the KEF one mentioned to send the surrond channels back wirelessly to their respective speakers. The advantage of this type of setup is that all of the video interconnects are short, and co-located with the projector .. so no long cable runs to deal with. The same with the audio .. no front to back or back to front runs.

Hope this helps,

Jonathan

Hi Atom631,

I'm also a retro-reflective user like mjg100 and Claus. I have both a Greywolf and Hi Power. The advantage of the Greywolf is it will help out a bit with the blacks in an ambient light situtation. The downsides of the Greywolf is that it's lower gain, and has a visable 'texture' that some people find distracting. It also can't be cleaned. The HiPower is much brighter, and can be cleaned ( the ability to clean becomes very important when you accidentally roll up and squish a bug or two .. yes, it's happened to me many times!)

mjg100's caution about the fact that the beam will be in the walking path if setup for a retro-reflective screen is valid, but, I don't consider this too much of an inconvience in my setup. If someone is in front of you blocking the beam, they're probably blocking your view of the screen too.

You already have the one big feature that I would suggest in this type of setup. The screen wall should be pained as dark as possible.

I wouldn't worry about the Epson being too bright for night time viewing. The Epson's have a filter which engages in Theatre Black 1 and 2 modes, which cuts the light output considerably, which is good for night time critical viewing. The un-tamed, not colour accurate, torch modes are great for daytime viewing of high contrast material like sports and 'non dark' games. Leave the movie watching for after sunset. None of the high brightness projector / retro-reflective screen tricks will make a movie watchable during the day.

As far as audio cabeling is concerned, we use a bit of a novel approach. We have all our sources located with the projector at the rear of the room. All of the source components go into a switcher which switches both the component video and S/PDIF coax digital audio. We feed the coax digital audio out of the switcher into the VIDEO input of an inexpensive AV sender. We have the AVR and the AV Sender's receiver located at the front of the room. You just hook the VIDEO out of the AV Sender's receiver into the coax S/PDIF of the AVR. This takes care of our fronts and sub. We then use a product similar to the KEF one mentioned to send the surrond channels back wirelessly to their respective speakers. The advantage of this type of setup is that all of the video interconnects are short, and co-located with the projector .. so no long cable runs to deal with. The same with the audio .. no front to back or back to front runs.

Hope this helps,

Jonathan

Sounds like a nice setup, but what about up-conversion of DVD's? If you have a HD DVD or BD player you need HDMI to be able to up-convert DVD's. Also the HD DVD and BD image is better over HDMI compared to component.

The problem is not with people walking in front of the seated viewer. The problem is the walk path between the back wall and the couch, behind the seated viewers. Someone not even watching the movie could walk through there and block off the whole image (not just a head in the screen) with out even realizing that they did it. I would still use the High Power, but I would mount the projector higher than normal for a High Power setup to avoid that problem.

Hi mjg100

I didn't want to overly complicate my post, but, we actually have 2 switchers. The first is a component / composite switcher, the 2nd an HDMI switcher. The primary use of the 'analogue' switcher is to switch the S/PDIF digital audio. It feeds the AV Sender. The HDMI switcher switches the video to the projector. Before overcomplicating things, we actually just used the projectors internal switcher to switch between the upscaling DVD via HDMI, and the 1080i component outputs of the Sat box and Xbox. It's actually even more complicated, as we have 2 projectors feed from this switching array.

In our case, the projector is table mounted behind the couch, so no issue with walk-behind beam blocking. In the OP's situation, it looks like his couch is pretty close to the back wall where he would have is projector mounted, so I don't know if he'd have a lot of foot traffic behind there while watching. My preference is to trade-off the occasional beam block for the increased gain. Others may feel differently.

The only other thing I'd add for the OP is that we use a 92" screen. This 'smaller' screen size also helps with ambient light performance. Since his viewing distance will be about 11', this size seems appropriate. It will also just cover the painting ( assuming at least 12" of black drop on the screen), and provide a picture about the same size as the painting.

Jonathan

Hi mjg100

I didn't want to overly complicate my post, but, we actually have 2 switchers. The first is a component / composite switcher, the 2nd an HDMI switcher. The primary use of the 'analogue' switcher is to switch the S/PDIF digital audio. It feeds the AV Sender. The HDMI switcher switches the video to the projector. Before overcomplicating things, we actually just used the projectors internal switcher to switch between the upscaling DVD via HDMI, and the 1080i component outputs of the Sat box and Xbox. It's actually even more complicated, as we have 2 projectors feed from this switching array.

In our case, the projector is table mounted behind the couch, so no issue with walk-behind beam blocking. In the OP's situation, it looks like his couch is pretty close to the back wall where he would have is projector mounted, so I don't know if he'd have a lot of foot traffic behind there while watching. My preference is to trade-off the occasional beam block for the increased gain. Others may feel differently.

The only other thing I'd add for the OP is that we use a 92" screen. This 'smaller' screen size also helps with ambient light performance. Since his viewing distance will be about 11', this size seems appropriate. It will also just cover the painting ( assuming at least 12" of black drop on the screen), and provide a picture about the same size as the painting.

Jonathan

Nice setup. Do you have any pictures? Look at the original poster's 5th picture. You can see that there is a walkway between the couch and the shelves. Looks like three to three and a half feet wide wide. That is the only problem that I see with a low mounted projector in that spot. If that walkway is not used then I also would place the projector down low. Also keep in mind with the W5000 or the 1080UB you can try it placed low and if that is a problem you can move it higher. The 92" screen will work, but from his viewing distance I like the 106" screen. The 106" will barely fit. I view a 106" from 11'-6" and I like to sit slightly closer than middle at the theater.

Hi mjg,

No recent photos of the setup. It's going through renovations right now, so isn't too photogenic at the moment. I've uploaded a couple of really old ones from when we were first experimenting ( Greywolf with old Mits HC3 576P ) to show the effectiveness of the retro screen with on-axis viewing.

I too am a fan of 'big'. In our basement theatre we sit 13' back from a 165" screen. For the livingroom 92" was the biggest that would fit. Because of it's smaller size, it's also about 30% brighter than a 106 would be. As you can see from the side view shot of the windows, we need all the brightness we can get in this setup.

Jonathan

I also don't have any recent pictures, but here are 3, showing: (1) my screen retracted (mounted ~4' from the curtains), (2) my screen (106" Da-Lite HP screen) pulled down, and (3) a scene from Coral Reef Adventure, not paused. All of these were taken from my seating position 11' from the screen. On #3 I zoomed the camera to fill the image, the other 2 pictures were with the camera in it's shortest zoom ratio (semi-wide angle, about 35mm equivalent). All were taken with the corner lamp turned on. Photo #3 was taken at night.

PS -- My room is 13' wide. My old 27" TV set, behind the screen, is turned on for photos #1 & #2.

thanks for all the help guys. this will help tremendously when im ready to lay down the cash for my HT.

ive taken the first step..... i ordered skylight shades (with info Rett provided me). they will be in July 7th and supposedly block out 99% of the light and help with energy efficiency. They are Bali skytracks.

We are going to get better shades for the patio door as well as shades for the 2 windows and front door. it should hopefully cut the ambient light down drastically when everything is drawn. as soon as this is all setup, i will post more pics and you guys can give me your advice on if ive adequately cut the ambient light down....

then i can truly decide what screen i should go with. ive also added the w5000 to my potential PJ, but i think im still leaning towards the epson. the onkyo receiver has made the list. ive climbed into my attic... and i think i can get those speaker wires down the wall w/o too many issues.

Hi mjg,

No recent photos of the setup. It's going through renovations right now, so isn't too photogenic at the moment. I've uploaded a couple of really old ones from when we were first experimenting ( Greywolf with old Mits HC3 576P ) to show the effectiveness of the retro screen with on-axis viewing.

I too am a fan of 'big'. In our basement theatre we sit 13' back from a 165" screen. For the livingroom 92" was the biggest that would fit. Because of it's smaller size, it's also about 30% brighter than a 106 would be. As you can see from the side view shot of the windows, we need all the brightness we can get in this setup.

Jonathan

I know that it is an overcast day in that first picture, but your room is dark compared to my room. Using your projector during the day should not be too much of a problem.