Audioholics Showcase Home Overview

[admin]

After two grueling years of plotting, planning, installing and configuring, we’ve finally completed the Audioholics Showcase Home. With over two miles of cable run behind dry wall, more than 40 speakers located around the house, and over 40 channels of amplification, we’ve got enough equipment to make a few IMAX theaters envious. All of the hard work has paid off as we are happy to report this project has gone pretty much according to design. Check out what we use as our reference test bed for conducting reviews and writing technical articles.

Discuss "Audioholics Showcase Home Overview" here. Read the article.

 

[gliz]

those drums are set left handed., I am a left handed drummer and a right handed bass player, but I can eat with BOTH hands!

 

[gene]

those drums are set left handed., I am a left handed drummer and a right handed bass player, but I can eat with BOTH hands!

Same here except I don't play bass.

 

[ned]

It's time for a bluray...........

 

[STRONGBADF1]

PARTY AT GENES HOUSE!!!! ...I'll bring the chips...

I want to hear some Joe Satriani over those RBH's

SBF1

 

[gene]

It's time for a bluray...........

no doubt but I am holding off for a machine that will play all formats including DVD-A and SACD. I am running out of rack space and I've got too many HD DVD's that I like to simply toss my HD player despite I am not a huge fan of it.

 

[Djizasse]

Uau
That rack is amazing.

 

[jamie2112]

Holy smokes that is a sick setup. Congratulations on that great HT setup. I am really behind most of you guys as I don't even have a HD tv yet.....

 

[TICA]

Great System

The Theather Room is our pride and joy. All the endless hours of work and sleep depravation have paid off. We are proud to showcase it on our homepage and hope you all enjoy it as much as we have.

Who knows, one day we might even do a video of it!

TICA

 

[Matt34]

Yup, I'm jealous. I really wish I had that much room to work with.

 

[Reorx]

Very nice. /drool

What do you do to minimize the lights, and the noise from the rack?

Also, from looking at the pic's, you need to work a little on your rack cable management.
Zip ties are the devil. Velcro is much better.

Reorx

 

[Reorx]

Here is a little something that may help. We use these all the time at work (not this specific brand but similar in design).

The rack mounted equipment are all on sliding rails. The non-rackmountable gear are on sliding shelves. The cables travel vertically on 1 side of the rack (velcro'd to the rack), to their specific cable arm. Power cables are on the other side, also velcro'd.

1UCMA-137 1U Horizontal Cable Management Arm
2UCMA-137 2U Horizontal Cable Management Arm

http://www.racksolutions.com/cable-management-arm.shtml

The cleaner the cable management is, the easier it'll be to switch out gear, and air flow will be unobstructed.

 

[gene]

Here is a little something that may help. We use these all the time at work (not this specific brand but similar in design).

The rack mounted equipment are all on sliding rails. The non-rackmountable gear are on sliding shelves. The cables travel vertically on 1 side of the rack (velcro'd to the rack), to their specific cable arm. Power cables are on the other side, also velcro'd.

1UCMA-137 1U Horizontal Cable Management Arm
2UCMA-137 2U Horizontal Cable Management Arm

http://www.racksolutions.com/cable-management-arm.shtml

The cleaner the cable management is, the easier it'll be to switch out gear, and air flow will be unobstructed.

Thanks and very true. I got lazy and used bread ties b/c they were easy and I have a sharp pocket knife if I ever need to take them out. I don't plan on swapping out any major components for awhile but give my obsession with audio and this website, you never know

As for rack noise, I really don't have any. Surprisingly the fan never turns on even during high output. My ceiling lights on the other hand seem to blow out alot, likely b/c of bass shaking the room. I glued all the cans so they don't rattle. The only rattle I seem to have now is my screen which resonants in the upper bass lower mid frequencies and really goes nuts on stuff from Dianna Krall. I need to tighten this up somehow.
__________________

 

[Seth V]

Gene that is an amazing HT setup! Definitely reference all the way! Like you, I am also looking forward to the upcoming Blu-ray universal player. For HD DVD's I'm also hanging on to my HD DVD Player (too many HD titles I don't want to part with).

It's funny you mention bread ties, as my previous setup pretty much used those exclusively. Since then it's been zip ties, and now velcro.

Thanks for sharing that way cool system with us.


Seth

 

[engtaz]

Very nice setup. Well thought out. Congrats on a job well done.

can I visit. LOL

engtaz

 

[gene]

After 5 years, I went back and did some updates to the Audioholics Showcase Home based on recent equipment changes.

Hope you guys dig it.

Audioholics Showcase Home Theater Overview Revamped | Audioholics

 

[jinjuku]

I wonder if switching to Class D amplification would extend your battery run time.

 

[gene]

I wonder if switching to Class D amplification would extend your battery run time.

Possibly, but it's not really a concern of mine. Fidelity first and so far I haven't found a Class D amp that keeps up with the very best in linears for full frequency applications, especially at the power levels I'm using.

 

[jinjuku]

Check out Lab Gruppen. They spec their Class D flat to 45Khz.

 

[agarwalro]

Looks (and I bet, sounds) amazing! Certainly more than I will attain in this life, minus a lottery jackpot or something.

I have a genuine question. Why would you put the equipment rack in the front and spoil the visual and perhaps the audio of the front stage due to L-R imbalance and reflection point? Are all those LEDs and amp lights defeat-able or covered with black off when viewing a movie? On the audio side, I assume you have done ETC measurements to ensure the right speaker does not create strong reflections off the racks...

IMHO, the Kimber cable spoils the clean look of the front. Perhaps you can run them behind the baseboard and only expose the one foot vertical drop from the floor to the wall jacks. That way you can show off in a casual cool manner .

Call me a minimalist, but, with such beautiful floors and walls, the cables should be minimally visually invasive and the equipment rack should have not been there at all. For crying out loud, paint or replace those wall plates with something more color matched to the material on the panels.

On the topic of wire/cable management, BMXTRIX "brought it",