By: Steve

Steve — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 23:13:26 +0000

Ovation,

Thanks for your comments. We all have to do what we can in the houses we have. It sounds like you have done pretty well. From my experience so far, getting the room right is as, if not more, important than the choice of components. In my next blog I’ll try to describe what it was that made the the HT in the house I just sold so successful in my eyes (and ears), even though it was not a dedicated room.

Steve

By: ovation

ovation — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 13:55:35 +0000

Well, while my setup is not an “elite” setup, it is a lot costlier than most of the people I know–including a number who have far more means than I have–(a 1100$ 720p projector, a 5.1 speaker system that retailed for about 3000$, a 1000$ receiver (though you can buy one with more features and equivalent performance for half that much now, I suppose), a 150$ HD DVD player, a 350$ region-free PAL/NTSC SD DVD player, an 800$ hi-res audio player, and assorted other gear worth about another 1000$ at retail). I did choose to place it in a ‘dedicated room”, though it is not a fancy one (the furniture is secondary basement furniture and the shelving for gear and media was free from my wife’s office throwaways). I do know that if I did NOT have a dedicated room, there would be no projector in the system. The other rooms (save the other basement room–kids’ playroom that may, one day, become a bigger HT room) are simply not large enough to accommodate a projector system. Even my dedicated room is currently host to a 64 inch 16 x 9 screen and could not (if I rearranged everything to go for max screen size rather than the current audio first arrangement) really accommodate more than 80 inches at the very most (more like 72 to be comfortable with a 720p projector). In the living room, 50 inches would be as big as it could go (and then only at 1080p), not to mention that proper speaker placement would be next to impossible. In fact, I plan to put in a 2 channel system in the living room in a couple of years (when my youngest kid is less likely to scrap it ). In the playroom, with proper speaker placement, 90 or so inches would be the max (perhaps smaller–I haven’t measured it exactly). So while I agree that one does not have to have a dedicated room (it would work, with some effort, in the kids’ playroom without making it a dedicated room), SPACE is a critical factor. For everything else in our lives, our house is more than sufficiently large to meet our needs. But given its size, the only practical option for me to have an “HT’ in the house worthy of the designation is a dedicated room. In any event, good luck with your new house and HT. As a contributor to this site, I’m sure you’ll succeed in creating a great environment for your HT.

Comments on: Daily Blog – Steve Smallcombe – March 31, 2008: WHAT EXACTLY IS A HOME THEATER?

By: Steve

By: ovation