Help for dedicated HT room....

[jbichsel]

First, this is an awesome forum with some fantastically knowledgeable folks. Thanks for all the info I've gathered just by the hours of reading I've done. I hope someone can help with our situation.

We are building a new home, living in it while we finish the interior ourselves. We have dedicated a room in the basement for our HT. So here is what I have to work with:

Room dimensions - 23' X 13'8" x 9' ceiling (joists exposed now). Three walls are poured concrete. The 23' dimension runs North-South. The south wall contains some plumbing from bathrooms above, A/C units outside and cable from satellite. I am planning on building a screen/component wall 2' away from this so the length of the room will be 21' afterwards.

The wall for entry to the HT is frames (2x4 studs), partially insulated and has drywall up to 8' on the theater side. Not my choice of order but the WAF had to be satisfied.

I plan on building a 1' x 45 degree chase around the perimeter ceiling to hold conduit/ducting for the cabling/speaker wires.

Our goal is to have two rows of theater lounger seating; first row on floor level viewing distance about 13' from the screen, second row on a raised platform (10-12") with 'zero' clearance recliners.

We plan on having dark blue indoor/outdoor carpet on the floor and about 4' up the walls. Above that, I want to build some sort of padded panels, but keep the budget under control.

Since my wife and I are anxious to get this monster going, I am going to begin working on it tomorrow, a bit each day as a break from all the other tasks I have with the house.

We do have a limited budget and are using a InFocus LitePro 580 for now. We hope to upgrade next year if the tax man is kind.

Here are some questions:

1. Is 120", 16:9 screen going to be too large for a 13' viewing distance of the first row?

2. I don't have a need to spend a lot on sound insulation of the concrete walls. What about using carpet padding under the carpet on the walls, then polyester batting on thin wood panels with upholstery fabric above? Same on the ceiling?

3. The screen/component wall I want to have everything hidden. My idea is to have it all padded around the screen with padded doors that open for access to the components. Component cabinet will have a roll-out cabinet for access with its own ventilation system. Good idea?

4. The center channel speaker and sub-woofer I would like to build into the screen wall below the screen so everything is flush. I plan on making the niche' for these able to fit different speakers than I have now for upgrading in the future. Good or bad?

Again, the budget is tight on this, but we want it to be a great HT. We are looking at projectors like the Optoma H78DC3, Dwin TV4 (high end of the line).

While nothing is totally set in stone, I do want to get started and not have to rework things or feel like I've wasted money.

Thanks for any input.

Jerry

 

[jaxvon]

Hi, and welcome!

For starters, I wish we were all lucky enough to start with a dedicated room! Okay, lets start in on the questions. If you carpet everything, you're going to have a VERY dead room. But it will not fix bass issues. Ethan Winer posts here frequently, and he has a lot of knowledge on acoustics and bass traps and such.

Question: What is your overall budget at this point, and what equipment are you starting with?

As for the component and screen wall, I think you're going to want more than 2' in. Since I assume you're going to put all your components in a rack, then that's 19" by itself. If you ever plan on making an access to the area behind this wall, then you're going to want more room back there.

I assume that at one point you're going to want inwall speakers, perhaps something sexy like this at some point. Since your current speakers are NOT designed to be in-wall, you might want to leave them out for right now. If they are a sealed or front ported design, then you might have some luck recessing them. Otherwise, you're going to have issues. Also, they can't be flush to the wall without having high frequency diffraction issues (read: highs will sound like crap). As far as subwoofers go, most in-wall subwoofers I know of have a limited response and won't provide you with couch shaking subsonic bass. You might want to look at getting a velodyne subwoofer (or two!) and mounting them into the wall with some isolation. Since they are a sealed design, they won't have any port issues. If you had the cash, two DD-15 subs would be amazing (though expensive).

Random tip for wiring: conduit is your friend.

Onto the other questions:

1. Use this handy calculator to figure that stuff out.
2. I honestly don't know what would be best. I'll defer to the acoustics experts.
3. Not sure about the padding, but otherwise a great idea. Do you plan on having a smoked glass door for the components, or will that be completely hidden and have a separate access? If you're going for a door, then something like this or this. Obviously you might want to install some quiet fan panels to help keep everything cool and happy.
4. See what I said above.

This sounds like a great project, I hope this helps!

 

[jbichsel]

Thanks

jaxvon,
Thanks for the feedback and ideas.
First the budget. Minimal. Can't really put a price on it as we've not discussed a dollar amount. We do need to be frugal as this is a luxury not a need for getting past the construction loan and into a mortgage.
I have enough lumber to frame up whatever I need so that much is covered. All labor will be done by me so that is also covered.

As to the 'dead room' issue; we are looking at what movie theaters do with carpeting up the walls and the heavy fabrics above. Is that not good for HT's?

Existing gear:
InFocus LitePro 580 (for $5, you can't beat it)
Yamaha RX-V800 receiver (in a few years I'll upgrade to something like the 2600)
Dish Network 811 HD satellite receiver
Samsung HD850 DVD player (upscaling and HDMI)
Toshiba VHS
RCA Beta player/recorder (21 years old and still works)
Playstation 2
Sony SS-MB350H (front)
Yamaha 5.1 surround w/sub (model for set escapes me)
I can substitute my Bose 301's and Pioneer S-DF3-K's for the Yamaha setup.

I do NOT want in-wall speakers. What we have is make-do for now and will eventually be moved elsewhere in the house. I want some towers for the front, 1 or 2 sub's, complimenting a full 7.1 system.

My idea of placing the speakers in the screen wall is only for the center and sub to have them below the screen. While I would love to have one of the acoustically invisible screens to have the center behind the screen, my better half would shoot me if I spent that kind of money on a screen. As it is, we are looking at something like Screen Goo. So getting the center right below the screen but not having it protrude into the room was my hope.

The racks your links showed are spot on. While I'm sure they are not in our budget right now, I have no doubt I can find something similar that is or fabricate something.

I am hoping to NOT have a smoked glass door. We really don't want to see any components while we're watching movies. I do have one other possible location for components going in a side wall, recessed into the laundry room. The back of this would be right next the the air handler for the basement so I could run a 4" duct from the plenum into the cabinet for cooling. Hmmm...

That would possibly allow for building storage around the screen for DVD's, VHS, Beta and PS/2 games. Hmm...

I will try to get a floor plan and maybe some photos to help show the layout.

Thanks again.