My Theatre Room

[dolynick]

This theatre room was originally set up some 18 years ago (slightly fuzzy on the exact year). Much of it remains the same but I've put a fair bit of time, money and effort into it over the last 9 months updating and improving it.

The room is 25' x 14' open along the back half of the right wall for a bar and hallway/stairwells. The ceiling is relatively low at around 7' with the dropped ceiling (it was below 8' before and only lost a couple more inches). The half wall along the exterior is foundation cement and creates the ledge. The beam across the middle and the post near the outer wall is structural.

Equipment:
TV: 65" Samsung QN90B
Projector: JVC DLA-NP5
Screen: Elunevision Studio 4k Reference 106" tab tensioned
Processor: Anthem AVM 70
Amps: Anthem Statement A2 (mains) & Statement A5 (center & surrounds), Outlaw 5000x (heights)
Sources: Oppo 203 Universal player, Toshiba HD-A30 HD-DVD player, Apple TV 4k Gen 3, custom HTPC
Fronts: Vienna Acoustic Beethoven Symphony Grand
Center: Vienna Acoustic Mozart Grand
Surrounds: 4x Vienna Acoustic Haydn
Subs: 2x SVS SB1000 at the front, JL Audio Fathom f112 at the rear
Heights: 4x Vienna Acoustic Waltz

New over the last 9 months:
Equipment:
-JVC 4k projector replaced the old used RS45 I picked up a few years back to hold me over from the Panasonic AE2000 origially installed.
-Anthem AVM 70 replaced an AVM50v.
-Picked up 4 Vienna Watlz speakers on the used market for the heights
-The Outlaw 5000x for the heights (sounds pretty close to the Anthems and much cheaper than the overkill MCA 525 if I wanted to stay Anthem).

Room work:
-The white ceiling and walls really didn't play with the new JVC and HDR (I was less critical before). So I replaced the original white ceiling tiles with black tiles.
-The walls are a stippling and I didn't want to go through the hassle and mess of having it stripped, so I opted to DIY myself some wall panels. I planned and made the frames myself according to the spaces. They're inexpensive 1 x 1/2 spruce secured with corner braces. They're covered in Fidelio black velvet (stapled on). They work well but don't look too closely as the spruce wasn't exactly the best in terms of bends and warping, so they're far from perfectly square/flat if you're checking
-The electrical panel box and HVAC box along the front side of the beam are also covered with Fidelio black velvet (with many, many black staples).
-Did some mounting boards and back braces for the heights to attach to. I just used spray paint on them as I wanted them a real matte finish. They work but I think a regular paint probably would have been better in retropect.

Pictures:
A little cluttered at the moment. Pardon the state of the chairs. They were new with the original install but they were inexpensive vynil instead of leather and it has started to come apart over the last year or two. I'm in the process of replacing them now.

From the rear

From the front

From the front, showing the open side at the back.

Fronts, equipment and subs at the front

The JL at the back

From the MLP with the screen down (ignore the wrinkles, they smooth out after a few minutes of it being lowered).

All in all, it has come a long way in the last year picture and sound wise. The AVM 70 in sound quality terms, plus object based Atmos and DTS-X. I wasn't sure the addition of the heights was going to be worth the cost and effort, but they add a pleasing amount immersion to the sound and I am quite happy I did it. The addition of the black surfaces helped maintain more contrast and HDR pop on the projector and also just makes it feel better not having so much white elsewhere in the field of vision.

There's no sound treatment in the room. I expect the velvet panels are more or less acoustically transparent. I've always wondered if the stippling actually does some diffusion naturally or not. I don't have the last set of REW measurements (didn't save them), but the RT60 in the room is a relatively low 150-325 range if memory serves.

Hope you all enjoyed the tour and details of my journey over the last year.
Questions and comments welcome.

 

[William Lemmerhirt]

This theatre room was originally set up some 18 years ago (slightly fuzzy on the exact year). Much of it remains the same but I've put a fair bit of time, money and effort into it over the last 9 months updating and improving it.

The room is 25' x 14' open along the back half of the right wall for a bar and hallway/stairwells. The ceiling is relatively low at around 7' with the dropped ceiling (it was below 8' before and only lost a couple more inches). The half wall along the exterior is foundation cement and creates the ledge. The beam across the middle and the post near the outer wall is structural.

Equipment:
TV: 65" Samsung QN90B
Projector: JVC DLA-NP5
Screen: Elunevision Studio 4k Reference 106" tab tensioned
Processor: Anthem AVM 70
Amps: Anthem Statement A2 (mains) & Statement A5 (center & surrounds), Outlaw 5000x (heights)
Sources: Oppo 203 Universal player, Toshiba HD-A30 HD-DVD player, Apple TV 4k Gen 3, custom HTPC
Fronts: Vienna Acoustic Beethoven Symphony Grand
Center: Vienna Acoustic Mozart Grand
Surrounds: 4x Vienna Acoustic Haydn
Subs: 2x SVS SB1000 at the front, JL Audio Fathom f112 at the rear
Heights: 4x Vienna Acoustic Waltz

New over the last 9 months:
Equipment:
-JVC 4k projector replaced the old used RS45 I picked up a few years back to hold me over from the Panasonic AE2000 origially installed.
-Anthem AVM 70 replaced an AVM50v.
-Picked up 4 Vienna Watlz speakers on the used market for the heights
-The Outlaw 5000x for the heights (sounds pretty close to the Anthems and much cheaper than the overkill MCA 525 if I wanted to stay Anthem).

Room work:
-The white ceiling and walls really didn't play with the new JVC and HDR (I was less critical before). So I replaced the original white ceiling tiles with black tiles.
-The walls are a stippling and I didn't want to go through the hassle and mess of having it stripped, so I opted to DIY myself some wall panels. I planned and made the frames myself according to the spaces. They're inexpensive 1 x 1/2 spruce secured with corner braces. They're covered in Fidelio black velvet (stapled on). They work well but don't look too closely as the spruce wasn't exactly the best in terms of bends and warping, so they're far from perfectly square/flat if you're checking
-The electrical panel box and HVAC box along the front side of the beam are also covered with Fidelio black velvet (with many, many black staples).
-Did some mounting boards and back braces for the heights to attach to. I just used spray paint on them as I wanted them a real matte finish. They work but I think a regular paint probably would have been better in retropect.

Pictures:
A little cluttered at the moment. Pardon the state of the chairs. They were new with the original install but they were inexpensive vynil instead of leather and it has started to come apart over the last year or two. I'm in the process of replacing them now.

From the rear
View attachment 64908

From the front
View attachment 64907

From the front, showing the open side at the back.
View attachment 64909

Fronts, equipment and subs at the front
View attachment 64910

The JL at the back
View attachment 64911

From the MLP with the screen down (ignore the wrinkles, they smooth out after a few minutes of it being lowered).
View attachment 64912

All in all, it has come a long way in the last year picture and sound wise. The AVM 70 in sound quality terms, plus object based Atmos and DTS-X. I wasn't sure the addition of the heights was going to be worth the cost and effort, but they add a pleasing amount immersion to the sound and I am quite happy I did it. The addition of the black surfaces helped maintain more contrast and HDR pop on the projector and also just makes it feel better not having so much white elsewhere in the field of vision.

There's no sound treatment in the room. I expect the velvet panels are more or less acoustically transparent. I've always wondered if the stippling actually does some diffusion naturally or not. I don't have the last set of REW measurements (didn't save them), but the RT60 in the room is a relatively low 150-325 range if memory serves.

Hope you all enjoyed the tour and details of my journey over the last year.
Questions and comments welcome.

Well done! There’s just nothing like dialing in a system.
Per your last sentence…
Is it a trick of my eye, or are the side surrounds in front of the MLP? Have you considered larger ported subwoofers as an upgrade? Just wondering, since the rest of the gear and speakers seem very nice. Nice tour, thanks for pics. They always make it fun!

 

[dolynick]

Thanks!

My surrounds are just slightly ahead of the MLP, and aimed towards the rear. Not the ideal posiion I know, but the shelf wall ends on one side there and the other has the support post to deal with. So making the best of the situation really. I don't really have any complaints related to the sound due to it. The rears are a fair ways back but do fill in pretty well from the back when called upon.

I have not really considered ported subs. Size is an issue as they do tend to be larger (although I do have a bit of extra room at the rear position). Mostly I just enjoy the charateristics of the sealed subs. There is certainly no lack of bass down there currently.

Arc says the SVS are doing ok down to about 20Hz up front

And the Fathom is reaching down to 15Hz reasonably well too:

If anything, I'm toying with doing some sort of line level integrated REL at the front (2x T/7x and probably moving up to ~25Hz or so in room) and letting the JL do the heavy lifting below. The fronts double as my critical listening system as well. I don't really have any major complaints about the sound down there currently so it really is just a thought excercise on whether that might work on a 2 ch listening level or not.

 

[dolynick]

Took the UMIK downstairs today and did a new set of measurements.

Bass 10Hz - 300Hz:
Blue = 2.0, Orange 2.2 profile for music, Green = 7.2.4 profile for movies

Bass 10Hz - 300Hz:
Blue = 2.0, Orange 2.2 profile for music, Green = 7.2.4 profile for movies

Bass 10Hz - 20,000Hz:
Blue = 2.0, Orange 2.2 profile for music, Green = 7.2.4 profile for movies

I'm overshooting my +6db room gain setting as I made mild bumps to sub levels after EQ. It's curious how the movie setting bumped up a little higher ends up being smoother, although it is subjectively too boomy for me for music.

I re-measured today as that set of measurements showed a sharper bass roll-off than expected. I had made a manual phase adjustment on the JL at the rear, so I was curious to see if that was the cause for the lower than expected from target curve numbers. This set was done with phase set to 0 on the sub as it was when ARC Genesis was run. This set is showing about +6db higher at 20Hz. The lesson seeming to be to just trust ARC manage phase better than the manual SPL meter at midpoint method.

2.2 for stereo 10Hz - 300Hz bass:
Blue = last set with manual phase adjust, Orange = ARC default

7.2.4 for movies 10Hz - 300Hz bass:
Green = last set with manual phase adjust, Orange = ARC default

The mic position might account for a bit of the difference but it was within 3-4 inches of the other. I wasn't expect quite as large a difference though.

RT60 80Hz - 5kHz:

165ms to 333ms. Surprisingly good for a more or less untreated room.

 

[William Lemmerhirt]

That LF roll of is surprising to me as well. From 25hz on down, it looks like a ported sub. I know you have three sealed ones, so I would expect it to be a little shallower.(12db vs24db).

 

[dolynick]

That LF roll of is surprising to me as well. From 25hz on down, it looks like a ported sub. I know you have three sealed ones, so I would expect it to be a little shallower.(12db vs24db).

I'm assuming it has to do with them being at opposite ends of the room and some cancellation. The individual measurements show the fathom by itself being smoother down to 15. I should probably turn it 90 degrees, but I'm not sure if it will fit in the current spot then. I might look at trying it in the spring or summer when I'll probably re-run ARC after some furniture changes.

After some listening last night. I ended up knocking the subs back a copule db in the AVR anyways though as it was just too overpowering on the low end with those higher curves. So I probably ended up back closer to the original set, but not running the subs as hard.