Home Theatre

Roger

Roger

1,000+ Posts
I'm about to undergo some work on a new house and I know many of you guys are big time experts on creating the best possible theatre/TV watching atmosphere as possible. So the first thing to mention is that this is not a going to be a theatre it will be far from perfect. I'm moving into an older house that has potential.

I'm going to mount the HD LCD TV above the fireplace.

I think in order to do this I need between a 20-30 ft HDMI cable to run from a HDMI Receiver to the TV which I'll have an electrician run through the walls for the best possible look. The receivers I've looked at are Onkyo (reasonably priced) and are 7.1 Dolby Digital.

If I can run 7 speakers then I might as well do it. Thus I'm thinking of mounting the center speaker directly below or above the TV. The middle and back speakers I'm thinking of getting 6" or 7" in wall speakers and mounting in the ceiling.

The Front speakers can either be mounted in the bookshelves on the sides or in the ceiling, is there a reason one would be better than the other? I was thinking that potentially I could have both and have the ones in the book case be set as B speakers if I get a receiver that has A&B. However I would potentially like B to be for speakers I could have them drop wires for outdoor speakers on the patio.

The subwoofer, is it best to have in front or back of the room? If in back is there somewhere to buy the wiring needed or will the electrician have it?

Someone gave me a link to monoprice.com which appears to have a bunch of stuff for very good prices, is there any reason not to buy anything and everything I can from them? the 30ft gold plated hdmi cords for less than $40 seems too good to be true.

Suggestions and comments? Keep in mind while I want to get it right, I'd like to keep this reasonably priced.
 
I would definitely not mount your front left & right speakers in the ceiling. Ideally you want your mid-range speaker cones at close to ear level when you'll be using your HT system to watch movies & especially when you're listening to stereo recordings. The side & rear effects speakers can certainly be mounted as in-wall or in-ceiling, but your front left, right, & center speakers need to be firing directly towards you.

And monoprice has been plugged & given a solid
hookem.gif
from pretty much everyone that's used them (myself included).
 
Ideally, in addition to keeping ALL speakers as close to ear level as possible (save your sub), its best to maintain at least 6" clearance between the back of the speaker to the nearest wall. This helps to eliminate/minimize first order reflections. I see you want to do in wall speakers but if your room and SO can afford the looks, I would suggest not. Thats not to say in wall speakers are all crap, but a free standing speaker with proper clearance will probably work best.

Ideal sub placement is largely dependent on room acoustics. Placement in the room will dictate phase and room gain. If your sub has phase control and gain control (which it should, phase control might be iffy), then it doesn't really matter where you place it as the sub's controls can adjust accordingly.

The only wiring you need for a powered sub are RCA cables and power. Personally, I likeThe Link for RCA cables that are long lengths. For short lengths and HDMI, monoprice is hard to beat.
 
First, I wouldn't mount your display above the fireplace.
brickwall.gif


Ditto on front L C R speakers.

I use monoprice for my connections and bluejeans for my sub cable. Both are excellent!!

I know an extra room is difficult to come by but if you have it, here is one of my favorite home theater build threads. Home Theater in a small space
 
Without question, monoprice is the best (or at least a great) place to get cables...

WIthout question, mounting your bad-*** TV over a fireplace is a tragically bad idea...seriously, don't ******* do it, no matter how she thinks 'it looks'...your TV should be mounted within a few inches of eye level, unless you're Manut Bol or your couches sit on risers, above the fireplace is a horrible, horrible decision....

...and don't get me wrong, plenty of people do it and say "it's fine", but they're full of ****. If it's a 'home theatre', it isn't above a ******* fireplace...

I mean seriously, don't wallmount your TV above the fireplace. It will suck *** and everyone will laugh at you (well, maybe not, but they should)...

...I mean, really, don't do it...

...no ****...

Even a Samaritan tosser wouldn't do that...
 
That is an awesome link DC.

I've had an extra bedroom for awhile but was missing the inspiration - now I've got it.

I think my wife may be sorry you posted that link.
 
The bad thing is, I think the $6,000,000 HT looks like ****...

Some of the much "cheaper" HT's in the other link look a hell of a lot better.
 
Well sometimes over the fireplace maybe the only place you can put your TV, having to deal with the wife factor. In your case if that is the only place that you can put it, then placing the center directly under the TV and either going with a slender speaker on the left and right mounted works very well, or placing the left and right on the bookshelf. Remember for home theater the wider you get the front speakers the better sound stage that you get, for 2 channel music it more depends on your distance back. Stay away from going into the ceiling with the fronts as you will not get the desired sound stage. I wouldn't do the a&b thing as most receivers won't let you run a&b together when running 5.1 or 7.1. If you are going to upgrade your receiver I would do a 2 zone receiver that would allow you to run something different on the patio then what is inside. I also probably wouldn't run 7.1 in a living room area. A good idea for a subwoofer cable is to run a piece of RG6 coax cable and use rf to rca adaptors on them. Hope this has helped some.
 
thanks for all of the input, much of it confirming some of my thoughts. I agree that over the fire place sucks, but this is an old house that really leaves me no other options.

I believe what I'm going to do is to have the TV and center speaker mounted into the brick, the 2 front speakers can go into the space built into the book shelves for speakers that will be facing right at you. The 2 middle and 2 back speakers will either be mounted from the beams on the vaulted ceiling or mounted in the roof or walls, not sure yet.

My question is if I am going to buy a sub-woofer later donw the road should I wire it for front or back? Are most of the new ones able to be either? if so I'd prefer front for ease of wiring and aesthics.
 
Yeah, that 6M setup looks like ****. I'd rather have a clean setup that than pile of ****. I am sure it sounds and looks great, but my first reaction to that set up is what the **** is going on here. I'd rather have a clean setup with a couple rows of movie chairs and less visual distraction.
 
not to derail my own thread, but that $6 million setup looks like it should be a tapioca tea shop with a bunch of 18-35 year olds running around playing board games while watching the movie.

One day when I build a house from scratch, I will have a true home theatre and I figure less is more...it will have 2 rows of theatre chairs with walls designed for acoustics, speakers are meant to be heard not seen and big *** projection wall.
 
DC, I'd like that setup but possibly add a black curtain that can be open or closed to separate the bar from the theatre room as desired
 
The Link


Check out the basement home theater/bar/wine room floorplan setup in this modest 14,000 sq.ft. shack in Phoenix.

The $2,995,000 is for the lot...and does not include the house:
 
I really can't understand why those movie theater type seats are all the rage. Isn't a high quality couch much more comfortable? Is everyone becoming touch-a-phobic? I'd rather see a movie curled up with a wife or girlfriend. Are the owners of these seats so sick of their wives that they don't want to be anywhere near them?

Bernard
 
Bernard, they sell some that are more of a love-seat (double withouth the arm in the middle).
 
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