Official Chase Home Theater Owners Thread

Hi,

Thought I would start a Chase Home Theater Owners Thread since it was pointed out that there was none currently on AVS. I am still a relative beginner so all I can promise is to be more of a burden than a guide.... So all you more experienced owners, feel free to post impressions, tips, graphs etc..etc.

I got 5 SHO-10 speakers and have some preliminary and purely subjective thoughts:

Well the other day I wired up the front stage (3 SHO's) and the 18.T and level matched them with the Rat Shack. No EQ yet. Naturally, I had to listen to them even in this preliminary stage. I used Fantasia 2000 on BD. The sound was HUGE and clean at VERY HIGH levels(I'll get more on this later) I used the tin soldier part with the Shostakovich 2nd piano concerto which is very dynamic. I figured this would be even more demanding for actual SQ than the usual exploding stuff movie scene. It was fantastic, it was a very in your face feeling, not in a bad way, more like you are sitting in the middle of a symphony orchestra while they are playing their ass off.


Well after listening to this for like seven minutes my ears were starting to hurt a little. "My God!!" I was thinking "how can people listen at this level for two hours!!!" It turned out that when I was using the Denon pink noise I adjusted the master volume to read -10db to get to reference level, but when I listened to the movie I forgot and put the volume on 0db so I was actually listening at +10db above reference. No wonder the Rat Shack was measuring over 115db peaks. I am sure there will be plenty more screwups, but as long as I don't electrocute myself its all good!!

Cool!! I am looking forward to those. Especially the SHO-6.


Awesome. 4 18.1's Do you have one in each corner?


Yeah lesson learned. Gotta pay attention to the volume. For a moment my ears felt like they did when I was leaving an AC/DC concert. LOL

Based on 2 18.1's I can only imagine; also seven SHO-10's!!!

Do you have them set up as rear surrounds or are you using front heights. I am setting up a 7.2 with five SHO-10's and 2 WAF-1's for rear surround. The only compromise I have is that I have to put the side surrounds farther back than I want due to a fireplace. So the rear 4 speakers form sort of a "U" shape behind me.

Well the other day I hooked up the SHO-10 side surrounds and re-level matched all speakers and subs. I still need to wire up the WAF-1's for rear surround duty. I am on the slow boat to China with this stuff but I will get there eventually.

I threw in Avatar on BD real quick to get a sense of everything now that the side surrounds were wired up. Listened at reference level. Great, immersive soudstage. Like I mentioned before, these speakers are visceral and clean at high listening levels. Funny story, I listened to the 20th century fox opening part and then noticed that I had not turned the subs' amp back on, the funny part was the sound didn't clue me in right away, once I turned them on during the spaceship part I did feel the low end stuff that was missing but the SHO-10's (at least in the room) had great mid-bass that caused me not to notice the non-subs right away.

That's true. Next up will be WOTW and HTTYD. I'm hoping to melt my face off.

I've watched that Jeff Beck Concert on my bedroom TV, but your review makes me want to pick up the BD and try it out on this system.


That sounds like a sweet setup. Don't forget to come back and share!!

I am planning on putting it on my shortlist.

I finally got all the speakers wired up (5 SHO's and 2 WAF-1's for back surround duty) with the 18.T for 7.2.

I ran HTTYD(the super dragon battle scene) at reference to make sure the Subs were good. No problem there, except for me being scared for my life a couple of times.

Then I wanted to get a good feel for the speakers so I did the Rohirrim charge in LOTR ROTK(also at reference level). It was fantastic as the horses charged and the orcs were shooting arrows at them. The sound-stage was fantastic as the arrows whizzed by my head and it felt like the horses were actually going through the room (so much so I had a urge to look for a makeshift shield and dive behind the couch before I got trampled like the orcs LOL). These speakers do such a good job of "making you there" that you feel the tension building up in you as they come closer and closer to the ork line. (OK, the movie makers designed this but I remember feeling this way in the movie theater watching this scene but not again in the many times I have re-watched this until now)

To mix it up I also played the Lighting of the Beacons scene since it is pure music. The music just builds and builds until it just engulfs you in sound, but not a monolithic wall of sound, I could still hear the individual instruments playing their parts...fantastic. Hearing it like this just draws you into the movie at least as much as the video portion. This is one of those things where until you hear it, you are not aware you are missing it. The only thing about listening at reference with these types of speakers is that it becomes almost a physical and sometimes emotionally draining experience because you are almost pulled into the movie whether you like it or not; it is almost impossible to be a passive listener. I am sure this is coming across as fanboy-ism but I really believe after listening to these types of speakers that the best use for conventional designs in HT should be reserved for chick-flicks only.

I am stuck with the Fred Flintstone method of analogue Rat Shack meter with spreadsheet. The subs are currently in the front corners of the room with one sub forward about 2 feet. I have only done one quick graph from 10-160hz. I was in a hurry and between making sure what track was playing, adjusting the Rat Shack meter knob, and plugging the readout into a spreadsheet I think I misread one of the readouts by 10db. I also forgot to shut a door and had furniture in different places than now due to me still setting up speakers at the time. So all that being said I figured I would wait until the subs have about 100 hours on them before really trying to do anything serious. On the bright side, I do not appear to have any serious nulls excepting that 10db screwup I believe is my fault. Since it is in my Father's system the next town over from me, I do not get to mess with this everyday. He will be coming home next week from Florida so I am sure he will get some hours on it pretty fast, and then I will try to get some good graphs.

LMAO!! Yea, its a safe bet.

My parents got divorced in the 1970's but are still friendly. My mother stopped by at his house one day when I was doing some set-up. I threw in Avatar(at reference of course!!) and the second the 20th century fox opening music came on she almost jumped off the couch. She went to cover her ears but then stopped and just watched the first 10 minutes of the movie. (As I mentioned in an earlier post I had forgot to turn on the sub amp for the first couple minutes, the speakers have great mid-bass slam).

After I shut it off I asked her what she thought and if he would be happy with it. She gave me a look like I was insane and said it sounded better than the movie theater.

Some new picts of the redesigned SHO-10's have been taken. This redesign has also been done for the PRO-10.

The middle three are the new design with slot vent:



Close up:



Close up of horizontal configuration:

No, these picts aren't mine, but from what I gather besides the improved finish and the slot vent which lets the drivers be a little closer together, the box dimensions are the same.