New House, New Media Room, New Questions

Hello all,

I've been lurking here for a few years now and having moved out of my condo into a house recently I finally have a chance to set up a projector. I'm coming Samsung 9 Series, the back-lit one from a few years but I recently picked up a 120" fixed screen from Grandview for $400 BNIB off Kijiji/Craigslist. Things spiraled out of control from there, got some fancy chairs Boxing Day and last night I brought home an Epson 6020. I'm also meeting a guy this weekend about his Denon 3311 so I can have 3D pass-through among other things.

I've kinda sorta got the space sorted out but I want some input on projector placement. According to the online projector calculator 12' is the minimum and 26' is the maximum. 12' would put it directly over my head so I was thinking 16'. That would probably put it over the head of the people sitting in what will eventually be my second row but hey, if your in the second row I obvious don't care about you. I was also thinking flush mounted instead of using the 6" drop that came with the mount in the package but I don't know. I've been playing around with Sketchup all night and think I've done a pretty good job for my first attempt. The speaker placement and dimensions are pretty accurate but the 3D models I download are Klipsch while my setup is the following:

Center - Paradigm CC-190
Fronts - Paradigm Monitor 7
Surround - Paradigm ADP-190
Rears - Paradigm Mini Monitors
Sub - DSP-3100

AV Receiver - Denon AVR-989
Oppo 83
Epson 6020
Grandview 120"

My media rack is in the furnace room through the door, I use a IR blaster to control everything. I ran all the cables through the ceiling, under the carpet, in the walls already except the rears which will go in this weekend. I'm open to input on speaker placement, upgrades, whatever, but the big questions is where is the best place for the projector. Cables aren't an issue, I can run anything anywhere at this point. The empty section to the right of the screen is full of my awful children's stuff and every once in awhile a bouncy castle explodes out of there. It isn't perfect but what are you going to do...






Edited by kingpin748 - 1/30/13 at 11:40am

So I've been told I should lower the surrounds and put the left surround farther away underneath that overhang. I feel like they are better off where they are, symmetrical and that having that left under the over hang is going to cause worse sound. Is dropping them 12" really that important?
Edited by kingpin748 - 2/6/13 at 7:06pm

And then I found a hundred dollars....

Think it will make a difference? I guess you can tell the surrounds are up higher when you try while listening to a movie. The good thing is the dipole surrounds I've got apparently have a dead spot direct in front of them where we sit. At least the reflected surround audio isn't obviously coming from up high. I've put some atom mini monitors on the rear wall now which really seems to fill things in.

Got my sub yesterday and all I can say is wow. I plugged it in, ran Audyssey and this thing is shaking my house. I wonder what it will be like after spending some time placing it and adjusting it a little. I watched the depth charge scene in U571 that I just watched a few days ago and ti was a completely different experience. I'm finding new rattles in my kitchen upstairs that I didn't know about. It's too bad the previous owner didn't insulate the ceiling last year when they finished the basement.

After talking with Sonicboomaudio.com here in Canada they suggested getting the PC12-Plus(cylinder) instead of the PB12-Plus(box). They said it sounds basically the same and the footprint is smaller and shipping is half what it would be for the box as it's half the weight. As it was I was barely able to pack the box downstairs. Once it was out of the box placement was easy. It came packed in a single box with packaging they obviously put some though into. I suppose you could have double boxed it but I don't think it matters. Personally I approve of less packaging as a rule. This might be the only box I ever keep since I might have to ship it someday.







This thing is also huge. I figured maybe I could put it in the corner and the wife wouldn't notice for a bit but upon placing it I realized I need to come clean right away. There was no way should wouldn't immediate notice the gigantic black cylinder in the corner. I think I was in serious denial.

I've decided to move the atom monitor to my computer and try out some SVS SBS-02 for the rears. Since they aren't vented I can flush mount them on the wall. I even grabbed an extra pair for some front highs which are going to sit in the furnace room for a few months. I've decided to get a Denon 4520 to replace my 3311 and at $150 a pair I think these are a steal.
Edited by kingpin748 - 3/1/13 at 10:59am

My center stand showed up last night. It's a VTI DFC19 which can be found here. The flat side of the base is suppose to be facing forward but I decided I wanted it towards the back. I pealed off the VTI logo and cranked the front set of spikes up while the back ones are as low as possible. You can't see it very well but it actually gives me a decent upwards angle on the speaker.







It does the trick if you ask me. It was about $60 but shipping to Canada killed it with another $40 charge. I believe they ship free anywhere in the US though from these guys. I couldn't find anything else that competes locally and I'm really happy with this.

The stand is made out of cast iron and you can fill it with sand if you want. I probably will when it warms up outside. Base came with 2 pairs of spikes to punch through the carpet to the concrete which makes is very stable. They also included 5 double sided foam pads for between the top plate and the speaker. You're also able to run the wires straight up from underneath the base to a grommet just below the top plate.

My Denon 4520 showed up the other day and I've decided to go with Front Height speakers which should be here tomorrow. I ran the wires tonight so I can just drop the speakers in tomorrow afternoon.



Now I need to decide what to do with all the speaker wire coming out of the walls. Front Heights look like this:



So I need to decide weather to go with what I did on the floor standing speakers:



Or I was thinking I should change all 5 fronts to a wall plate and make my own cables just for fun.



I'm going to make the cables look all fancy regardless but I need to decided on which direction to go. At one point I figured the less interruptions in the wire the better. Last week I compared a long piece of wire made up of 3 different sections to a single one and couldn't tell the difference in sound. I kinda feel like the wall plates make it look like I actually paid someone to do this...

The SBS-02s showed up on Friday and I wasted no time putting them up. They came well boxed and were bigger than I expected.





The speaker box isn’t my favorite as it looks a little like plastic in my opinion but the speaker grills are very nice. I wished they matched my Paradigms better but it’s not very noticeable when they are up on the wall.





Unfortunately right out of the box I had to do some surgery. While up on my ladder mounting the front heights the binding post keep turning and I couldn’t figure out what was wrong. Turns out the little nut on the inside was loose so I had to open it up to fix it.



I’ve got them mounted flush right now since my mounts didn’t arrive. I grabbed some Omnimount 20s so that I can aim the surrounds at the listening positions better. Very solid mount and very adjustable with a lot options for ceiling or wall mounted, connecting to the top back or bottom of the speaker. Spec says they can hold up to 20lbs.

I’ve also decided to just sue the grommets instead of a wall plate. I feel like they just blend better with everything else while wall plates catch you eye. Now I just need to patch up the big holes I needed to fish the wire.

Once I got everything mounted I ran Audyssey and listen to some music and watched a few shows. I was very happy with the sound out of the SBS-02s, they seem to blend in nice with everything else I got. I’m pretty sure the Denon 4520 helps with that.

Here is how everything looks now. The wires will be cleaned up later and speakers will be aimed down more.



That should be about it for the AV end of things for me. Next up will be some paint and wainscoting which should make the place much more inviting. Place seems like a basement with a screen on the wall right now.