Time to spin up a thread of my own...probably a little early as we haven't closed on the house yet, but I'm excited and want to get some early ideas.
So this'll be an over the garage, 2nd floor theater. It'll be in a room that'll be (more or less) dedicated to the task. I say "more or less" because I've been told that it'll double as a location for our daughter to have sleepovers. Since she's not quite 4, I think I've got time to establish my dominance.
Forgive the poor pics, I'm limited by the pics offered on the current 'video tour' of the home:
Northeast view:
Northwest view:
Current thought process:
equipment rack will go into the recessed corner in the Northwest corner. Still making some decisions about what makes sense for screen position. Given the size of the room (19' from door to North wall, 21' from East to West wall), a 120" screen seems about right. I'm initially thinking the east wall makes the most sense, but I'm open to suggestions.
Speakers will remain the B&W set that I currently have. I will likely replace the single Polk with a pair of B&W side surrounds and move the 685s into rear surround duty. Projector will likely be an Epson 5030UB in a ceiling mount arrangement. One of the many questions I have is whether I can mount the projector approximately 1.5' off the ceiling rather than the 4' 6" that Epson is recommending?
Immediate plans for the room include blackout curtains to reduce ambient light, a darker paint scheme, as well as corner bass traps and ceiling and wall panels. When it comes to acoustic room treatments, I'm still learning. From what I've read: bass traps in the corners (do I need to fill the corner from floor to ceiling?) and panels to address reflection points. How does one determine the "right size" for these things?
I look forward to suggestions from those who've "been there, done that!"
Well, like all plans, this one didn't survive first contact with the enemy (aka myself)
It took well over 45 days and switching agents to get our existing home sold. It also required a large discount off of the list price. It's all good, just meant we got a different house and will mean a more measured approach to the theater build.
The up-side is that the new location has been pre-wired for at least 5.1 and, with a little work, will be up for 7.1 soon.
One pic for the new room:
Two immediate problems that will be addressed during the course of the buildout:
1.) space doesn't have a door - I'll likely get something installed into the corner above the stairs.
2.) the room dimensions specified by the seller are 19x19 - from my reading, square rooms make for ugly nodes. We'll see how it all plays out.
If you have the budget get a professional to look into the room acoustics. I see corner bass traps being recommended left and right on the internet. It does sort of work from my own tests but when I had a pro look at the room and I built a 6000 liter bass trap from his design instead it turned out way better. It all depends on where in the bass you have your problems. You need to measure and listen to the room to find that out. Generally I think it sounds better if you let the bass wave pass the listener before trapping the bass. I.e. building a special back wall that's an enormous bass trap. But there are many ways of doing it. My tip though is that you build your own traps with rockwool that someone in the know designs. It's a lot cheaper and way more effective than off the shelf generic designs that don't do anything below 50Hz.
Thanks for the bass trap hints philipbtz! I've been scouring the internet looking for designs on bass traps. At first I thought I'd build my own corner traps but, given the cost and what my workload will look like in the months after moving in, I expect I'll order traps and dispersion from GIK Acoustics. The cost from them is not bad, especially considering that I can get things setup, make a REW capture to see what the room performs like with some furniture in place, and they'll provide a quote to get the right treatments.
Another couple questions for the forum:
1.) I have one window in the room. Because the room will be semi-dedicated rather than a fully dedicated theater, I'd like the window to remain open for additional light when it's not movie time. What have people's experiences been with things like double-blinds and/or blackout curtains?
2.) A couple of years ago we got a sectional from a discount furniture location locally. We have NOT been happy with the quality of the furniture - the padding has degraded pretty quickly. I'm a bit more cautious now and so I'm a little twitchy about ordering a set of seats from a location online, even if they're "famous names". I'm sure I'm not the only one in this spot - what are others doing?
3.) In our current home, we've got a 65" Sony TV. My initial thoughts when we found out we were going to have to come up with more out of pocket for the new house was that I'd delay purchase of the projector. I'm wondering if that truly makes sense. Here's why:
I'd planned on picking up a smaller TV for use in the main living room - something around 50-55", leaving the 65" for the theater. I'd planned on spending around $800 for it. If I can turn that money into an entry-level 1080P projector, isn't that a wiser investment? Something like this would fit the bill and leave a little money towards the screen: http://www.gadgetreview.com/optoma-hd28dse-3d-dlp-projector-review
Looking forward to the input of the more experienced folks,
We're on track to close on the new house within the next month. We're extremely excited!
I've pretty much decided to go with a projector and put the 65" tv downstairs. I've been tossing around the idea of an amp for the B&W 683S2's up front. The more I think about it, though, the more I think it makes sense to put room treatments in, run some REW tests, and go from there.
We've been in the house for nearly a month now and the theater is taking shape. I took the plunge and went for a Sony VPL-HW45ES 1080P Projector and a Elite Screens 120" in Cine-Grey. I knew that it was unlikely that the space would ever be "cavey" enough for a standard white screen and the Cine-Grey's light rejection has been a great solution. It's still a little messy as I'm still trying to figure out exactly how to get cable runs everywhere I want them, but it's been functional enough for several family movie nights. Here's how it looks today:
From the primary viewing/listening position:
Surprisingly, the sound in the room is excellent without any treatments at all....either that or the sound in my old place was so crappy that a more traditional room just sounds fantastic. I'm planning on doing some testing with REW in the next few minutes to see what the testing shows. I've got a neighbor who's a fellow theater enthusiast who's offered to help with room treatments but I'm not getting any ringing from clapping now so....???
It took much longer than anticipated to run some good quality REW tests but it's finally done and it confirmed my suspicions that the theater room already sounds really good without any treatments in place - here's a pic of the waterfall for FR+FL+Sub:
I'm getting pretty good response out of the PSA XS-15SE, but have considered adding a second and/or an Anti-Mode 8033 to allow for further flattening of the Sub response. Any suggestions?
New S1500 and a miniDSP 2x4HD have been ordered. It ought to be fun watching FedEx try and get up my street to deliver the sub - we got another 8-9 inches of snow yesterday. I watched a FedEx driver spinning his wheels in the snow so hard that he threw his chain off the rear wheel yesterday.
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