[Martycool007]

Hey guys, I am looking to convert a rather large room in my house from one large room into two smaller rooms, with one room being a dedicated theater room, and the other room being a dedicated dining room. I am on a tight budget, and could use some advise.


First off, I have some options as to the size of the theater room and was wondering if there are any "ideal" dimensions, or, "rules of thumb" for a dedicated theater room? Just so you know, I would like to build this room a bit smaller than what might be common in these types of threads as I do not want to have to buy more subwoofers and upgrade my speakers in order to fill a large room. I will post some measurements of the length and width of the total volume of this large room that I will be sectioning off into two rooms. I believe that the total length is 34' and the width is 14' with the hight being 8'. I will measure in just a bit with the exact actual hight-width-depth in just a bit. Any suggestions on the best possible room dimensions, or "ideal" dimensions would be much appreciated.


I will have seating on one row only, and would like to build a riser anyway because the floor is slab concrete, and the walls of the house are all cinder block. So I am assuming that if I build a riser for my seats then I would get a better tactical sensation from my subs. I will be using a 4 person seating arrangement, but, now that I think about this the more I am starting to consider doing two rows with two seats in the front and two seats behind with both on a riser platform. My question here is: how should the riser platform be constructed, and how tall should I make it? Would it be best to frame it with 2 by 4's making it 4" tall with some basic plywood or OSB on the top?


I am not planning on doing a baffle wall or projector setup at this time, but, I do so in the future. For right now I will be using my Mitsubishi 70" DLP TV for the video side of this. Yes, it is cheap and of somewhat poor quality, but, right now things are tight financially, so I will have to wait on buying a projector. Any other suggestions on how I can make the front LCR and TV look nice would be appreciated as well!

 

[Cksqurd]

I would say you can make riser any height you want if you only have one row. I just finished our theater and have two rows. The room is 16x17 with 8' ceiling. The riser is 2x8 for the back row. I

 

[AirBenji]

You should take a look at the forum's riser height calculator: http://www.avsforum.com/t/505237/riser-height-calculator .

 

[Martycool007]

Thanks for the responses CKSqued & AirBenji!


As far as the optimal room dimensions for my setup, being that I can make it any size I want, and consider that my LCR's are smaller with the RAAL tweeter, what would be a good way to figure out the optimal room dimensions?


Are there any rules of thumb or should I just go with any size I want? I was thinking 15' long, & 12' wide. Does that sound ok?

 

[Martycool007]

Any help with regards to the optimal room dimensions would be greatly appreciated!!!


Also, any pointers wrt building a stage with an AT screen? I want to make this room look really nice. I have any size I can pick from wrt the room dimensions, just looking for the best HxWxD of the room and how to go about building a front stage & possible baffle wall??

 

[helmsman]

Martycool007 - for what it's worth, my opinion is don't be too dismissive of going with one row of seats. That's exactly what I did in my theater which is roughly 14 feet by 21 feet. I have double doors coming into my theater midpoint on one of the shorter walls, and I have my screen placed on one of the longer walls. While this may seem a little non-conventional I really like the setup. I have 5 seats (a 3 section parallel to the screen wall and one single on each side that is slightly toed in) and I have a 2.4:1 aspect ratio screen that is 10 feet wide. The reason I went with this setup is that I rarely use more than 3 seats and with 2 rows you always have one row that is not optimal as far as screen distance goes. Even my singles on the sides don't feel like they're way off center and the screen distance is still optimal, although the sound is best balanced in the middle. But my setup doens't feel cramped and I have plenty of room for a nice wide coffee table for those drinks and snacks that won't fit in a cupholder! That's my 2 cents worth.

 

[helmsman]

Oh, and I built a stage and walled in the front left and right speakers, and it was nice having plenty of room on the sides of the screen to do this. This ended up crating a recessed screen area that is 21 inches in from what is effectively my new screen wall, and I added a stage with a curved first step that ended into the room another 16 inches, so it's like I have a 3 foot stage. I will post some pix if but I'm waiting for carpet - can take some in the meantime showing you the work in progress if you like. By the way, all this wall work I was describing I pretty much made up as I went along (at the framing stage). Even the curved front stage was something I just eyeballed as opposed to going through detailed measurements (and I'm a Stanford trained mechanical engineer - I just believe in the law of diminishing returns when it comes to certain effort and expense!)

 

[Mfusick]



Quote:
Originally Posted by Martycool007  /t/1523109/building-a-dedicated-theater-room-my-questions/0_100#post_24503574


Thanks for the responses CKSqued & AirBenji!


As far as the optimal room dimensions for my setup, being that I can make it any size I want, and consider that my LCR's are smaller with the RAAL tweeter, what would be a good way to figure out the optimal room dimensions?


Are there any rules of thumb or should I just go with any size I want? I was thinking 15' long, & 12' wide. Does that sound ok?

You don't want a square. That's really the only rule of thumb. You don't want dimensions of a rectangle that are related or divisible by each other, or like double one direction than the other exactly. That will create trouble in the bass regions.


Ideally- if you could slope a wall or ceiling or floor that's the best- but that can get technical and unless you do it right it's not worth the trouble. Avoid a square is really all you need to do. Stuff like risers and stages and corner traps usually help anyways.


Also you can play with sub placements to avoid some troubles too. Ideally you'd want 4 subs, two in front and two in the back. One near the ceiling and one near the floor. Hard to do, but that's going to deliver you a smoother response in the middle of the room.


Once you learn the ideals, then you modify to get as close as possible and avoid the trouble areas as much as you can. You want to make the room as big as you can IMO. Bigger is better.

 

[Martycool007]

Ok, so I measured the length and width of the large room that I will be dividing into two rooms via a complete wall which will completely separate the two rooms.


The total room length is 27ft and it is 14ft deep. So what do you guys think about the theater room being 12ft by 14ft, or possibly 16ft by 14ft? I am stuck with the 14 foot side, but the other dimension can be anything I so choose.


If I go with the 12 foot by 14 foot size I would likely place the front screen & LCR's along the 12 foot wall as that would give me 14 foot of depth. If I go with the 16 foot by 14 foot direction then the screen & LCR 'a would be on the 14 foot wall?? Does that sound ok? What is the best solution to this situation?

 

[BIGmouthinDC]

depends on door location Got a sketch?

 

[Mfusick]

Bigger is better

 

[cw5billwade]

What size dining room do you want? 14x12 or 14x11 would be the smallest formal I would do for the dining room leaving you 14x15 or 14x16 not ideal but there are a lot of small builds on here.