[cip4465]

Hey all, I am a comlete newbie to front projection. I'm having a house built with a dedicated theater room that is 18 feet 10 inches long. I imagine the seating in this room being at 15 feet.


Is 123" screen too much? Looking for real world users out there, if you have something in the 120" range, how far do you sit from it?


When I go to the movies, I generally sit pretty close to the screen, and I'm always a big fan of bigger TVs. I just don't want to go too far!


Thanks!


PS: the projector I have been thinking about is either the Infocus 7205 or the Sharp 12000.

 

[John Kotches]

cip:


If all you are worrying about is "how big a picture can I get", you're missing half the point of having a home theater.


With your seating at 15', this says to me that you are going to be just about against the back wall, which means your sonics aren't going to be much to talk about, even if you utilize in-walls or on-walls. You should reconsider your seating arrangements, moving the sweet row up into the room and go with a smaller screen (IMO).


I'm using a relatively "small" screen because I'm trying to stick with the typical guidelines with respect to screen width vs. seated distance. Small means an 80-inch width with primary seating at 10 feet from the screen.


I opted for this arrangement for a number of reasons, including my desire to have 5 matched speakers for multi-channel music and an acoustically transparent screen.


Cheers,

 

[cip4465]

I appreciate the suggestion, but I though the way I had the sound worked out would be a good setup! Right now, I'm in the worst setup - surrounds are on the back wall- couch is AGAINST the back wall. No good for sure! So, here is what I have planned....


Actually, my measurements were wrong - I have it diagramed out to scale here. If seated in a chair, a persons head would be at 14 feet.


With that said, wired for 7.1, the back surrounds (from the front of a wall mounted speaker) would be about 3 feet 9 inches away (almost 4 feet really). The side surrounds (direcly to the side of the listening spot) would be a greater distance - about 5.5 feet from prime spot. All of the surround speakers are "surround speakers" - in that they are not towers. Wide dispersion speakers for the side surrounds, and who knows what I will get for the back 2, but they will be smaller bookshelf at least.


All of them have been wired to be about 6 feet up the wall. A seated ear would be 3.5 feet from the ground....right? So with a speaker 6 feet up, that might be a little more than the magic "2 feet above head" recommendation, but not by much. I will have the flexibility to change that up or down too.


I figured this positioning would be adequate...no? The diagrams and speaker setup info on the Dolby web page led me to believe this. And I suppose you can turn down the level of the back surrounds if they are over powering.


I don't necessarily want the "biggest screen I can fit in the room" LOL... What I was looking for, was the largest screen - that maintaned NO eye strain or screendoor or anything like that - from the positioning I worked out. I thought the positioning above would be good for sound - and I seemed to get the same idea from Dolby's web page and diagrams, is this not the case?

 

[MMan]

You could surely do a 110" diagonal 14' back.

 

[cip4465]

Thanks MMAN! I was thinking the same. 110 will be what I do, if it is determined that 120 (119, or 123 actually depending on manufacturer) isn't a good idea at 14 feet back.


Concerned about screen door and eye strain and all that. Although I sit fairly close to the screen when going to the movies, this might be a different ball park.


120 inch has the following recommended seating distances:


1.5 x screen width - 13.074 feet

1.75 x screen width - 15.253 feet


So, my 14 is right in the middle of those two numbers. But recommendations are nothing compared against real world use and impressions!

 

[MMan]

I typically sit at 1.5, so you should be fine...

 

[rshephard]

I know the recommended distance is 1.5 but I sit about 1.0. When I go to the movies I always sit in the front 1/4 of the movie theater.

 

[MMan]

Quote:

Originally posted by rshephard I know the recommended distance is 1.5 but I sit about 1.0. When I go to the movies I always sit in the front 1/4 of the movie theater.

I'm with you. I'm actually thinking about breaking the 1.5 rule if I can find a good enough projector.

 

[2Sound]

The question isn't all about how long the room is, but also how wide?


What is the width of the room?


What equipment do you have? If some Martin Logans, then, well you're looking at some serious real estate there! In-walls? Towers? Bookshelfs? You don't want your mains slammed against the walls. It's bad for acoustics! And if you were to follow some of the "golden rules" your mains should be the same distance apart relative to were you are sitting.


HD material you can sit closer to, but things that aren't, say the majority of cable/satellite, then you want to be further back.


Rainbows and screen door effects tend to vary from person to person. Best thing to do is demo the unit if you can to see what's right for you.


John has some good points listed here as well. In my opinion, I'd figure out the sonics first, then fit accordingly.

 

[Ronomy]

120 inch diagonal 16x9 will look great at 14 feet! Closer and the picture will start to get soft and you will start to see screen door or it will be more noticable. Look at it this way, when company comes over just shrink the picture if people are sitting much closer. I've shrunk my picture before and felt I was missing something. Also, with HDTV you can sit much closer than 14 feet with a 120inch screen.

 

[John Kotches]

You said your chairs are at 15' feet in an 18' room. Assuming we're talking about recliners then by the time you recline you're basically against the back wall.


IMO, you're not going to get a good sonic result, but it's your space, and your $$$ and you are free to do as you please.


As far as the height is concerned, All of the speakers in my 5 channel array are ear height (about 40" above the floor) and I'm experimenting with sides for optimal positioning.


My room has a usable length of roughly 18' as well, and my seating is at roughly the 13' mark from the front wall. I'm opting for free standing speakers for best sonics, and an acoustically transparent screen so that when I'm listening to music it's not even down. The Screen Research screen up or down doesn't make a noticable impact either way, but I move speakers in and out too frequently to go with a fixed screen.


Anyway, it's your choice and your room, but IMO you need to do both well for a killer setup


Cheers,

 

[Stew4msu]

Quote:

Originally posted by John Kotches You said your chairs are at 15' feet in an 18' room.

Actually, he said 14 feet and his question was in regards to screen size.



I think you'll be fine with a 120" screen. I'm planning on 126" from 14 feet away with my Sony HS51.





Stew

 

[Dithermaster]

That size at that distance will be great. I shoot widescreen DVD to a 92"x52" screen (106" diagonal) and sit 11' away. It looks fantastic.


The limitation is not projector resolution, but source materal resolution.


While widescreen DVD looks fine at that size, we often shoot satellite TV smaller, otherwise the artifacts and blurryness are too annoying.


I'm using a Sony HS20 with a slight defocus so I don't see any SDE where we sit.


///[email protected]

 

[cip4465]

John Kotches - it actually sounds like your positioning is similar to what I had been thinking then? You have 18 feet of usable space, and sit at the 13 foot mark. What is that mark - the front of the chair or ear level?


Because I'm talking about 18' 10" usable space, and the front of an array of home theater chairs would be at 12 feet 9 inches. Distance from front wall to the ear would be about 14 feet. Reclined all the way back, this gets more tricky - depends on the chairs, and HOW they recline. Lots of chairs offer the space saver feature - and seam to recline more forward than back. Anyhow, seems like you have a very similar setup to what I have been talking about.


So...in an 18 foot room, with your chair at 13 - white size screen do you use?


Also, there was a good question above that asked about room width, and that would actually be another concern. Because your right, I don't want to slam the speakers into the corner. The room is 13 feet 9 inches wide.


120 inch - 2' 5" on each side of the screen

110 inch - 2' 9" on each side of the screen


My fronts are Klipsch reference towers, RF-3 - very skinny towers. From my measurements, with a 120", and 2' 5" to play with, the tower takes up 1 FOOT of width when toe-ed in at the appropriate width. Using a 110 would give me 4 more inches in that 2' 5" to play with. So, is this a bad situation sound wise? having the speaker about a 1 foot from side wall, and about 6" (120) to 10" (110) from the side of the screen?


Oh, and my sub would sit to the right of the left tower - under the screen.


Thanks for the advice guys! I really appreciate it! I don't really want to make any terrible decisions! Also, those that recommended trying it, I will most certainly do that. Buy projector first - project onto a sheet or something see how it looks.

 

[John Kotches]

cip asks:

Quote:

it actually sounds like your positioning is similar to what I had been thinking then? You have 18 feet of usable space, and sit at the 13 foot mark. What is that mark - the front of the chair or ear level?

The back of the chair. Ear position is about 1' closer and the front of the chair another foot closer as well.

Quote:

Because I'm talking about 18' 10" usable space, and the front of an array of home theater chairs would be at 12 feet 9 inches. Distance from front wall to the ear would be about 14 feet. Reclined all the way back, this gets more tricky - depends on the chairs, and HOW they recline. Lots of chairs offer the space saver feature - and seam to recline more forward than back. Anyhow, seems like you have a very similar setup to what I have been talking about.

Yes and no. The key part is the distance from the screen to the seating. See below.

Quote:

So...in an 18 foot room, with your chair at 13 - white size screen do you use?

80" width. The screen isn't mounted on the wall, it's 3' out into the room so that I can properly place a floorstanding loudspeaker behind the acoustically transparent screen and have an optimal distance between the back of the speaker and the wall.


My room offers challenges in 3 dimensions, width (12'), length (18' usable) and height (7').


I also planned so that the primary row of seating is at 1/3 screen height. Technically speaking I'm a little too close to the screen (1.25x screen width) and I do get very slight screen door from my LCD projector. It's ok, I went cheap with the first projector in the room, waiting for 1080p to get to a more affordable price point than $25-30K.


Cheers,

 

[cip4465]

John,


Thanks for the info. I hear you on the 1080p projectors, I would not be surprised if they were the standard in 3 years or so, and cost around 6k or so like the middle end DLPs do now. I have contemplated getting the absolute bare minimum until that point...but then again, it could very well be 5 years until that point.


With your room 12 wide, how far from the side walls are your two front L/R speakers? I just want to make sure I'm not crazy for planning for mine (the closest corner when toed in) to be 1 foot from the side wall.


Thanks again for all info


PS: I realize this thread has gone from a question of distance from screen width to the entire rooms configuration in respect to sound. Sorry for that!

 

[John Kotches]

cip:


So what if the thread digresses. It's civil discourse on a related topic and I suspect it is helpful beyond you


My speakers have a small floorprint, roughly the same as a legal sized sheet of paper (8.5" w x 14" d). That was one of my parameters when I was speaker shopping was a small footprint


I'm at 23" from the left wall, about 22.5" from the right wall (yes, just slightly off center), sorry about that. It's where I got best imaging for stereo, so I'm just living with that hideous flaw.


Seats are at 9'0" to left and right, with 9'6" to the center channel. I have some theater shots in the gallery if you search by my name you should find the pictures. Of course if you're lazy you could just Click Here


Regards,

 

[Maltby]

John:


If I could continue the digression, I have a 11.5 x 19 room, and I am planning to put my fronts and center behind the screen which I plan to be 8ft wide. I have my fronts 38 inches from the side wall, are they too close together, or do you have yours closer to the walls to avoid putting them behind the screen?

 

[WynsWrld98]

cip4465: I also sit fairly close to the front in movie theaters (about 1/4-1/3 back from the front). I have a Sony HS10 projecting on a 119" diagonal screen with a seating distance of 15' and it looks awesome, no defocus needed, no SDE visible. I can move up to about 13' away before I start noticing SDE.


With the DLP projectors you're talking about they have a better fill factor than my HS10 so you should have even less of a problem with SDE.


To me having as large a screen as possible without entering SDE territory is what it's all about to immerse yourself in the viewing experience for maximum impact so I'm on the same page as you.


My advice to you is once you get the house built and buy the projector, project on the white blank wall (if that's what will be opposite the projector) and spend a lot of time showing DVDs and HDTV and adjust the zoom until you get to where you're happy THEN order the screen. That's exactly what I did and I couldn't be happier with the result.

 

[cip4465]

Excellent thought Wayne, and thats exactly what I plan to do.


My only problem is that the room (walls & ceiling) will be painted (by the builder prior to close) a very dark burgandy red. So, I will need to get a sheet or "something" to pin up on the wall for that preliminary size testing.


Speaking of which (and now I am really getting off topic, but here goes), is a sheet enough - my first thought is no. What all could I do CHEAPLY to throw something up on the wall and see what it is like before I buy a screen?