# Dedicated theater progress.



## Chance (Feb 6, 2007)

Well its been five months since I moved into my new house.
And as promised I am going to keep everyone upto date on my progress.
Well at least when I have the energy too. I install/setup theaters for a living. And after a long day in the attic during summer here I rarely come home with the motivation to hop back in one. :sweat:

Now for some details.
I have overhauled my only coat closet into a full blown equipment rack.
Who wears a jacket in Phoenix? :scratchhead:
It has 8 shelves all spaced between 8-10 inches.
Between each shelf are dual outlet recepticals.
I also installed a separate breaker box inside the closet towards the top.
It contains four 15 amp breakers and two 20 amp breakers.
One 20 amp breaker will accomodate a 7 channel amplifier, and the other an IB subwoofer amplifier.
One 15 amp breaker is for the projector, and two plasmas.
The other three are evenly divided for all the other equipment, HD-DVD, Blu-Ray, Couple DTV-HD boxs, LD, Turntable etc.
The breaker box is fed by a 6/3 power wire, which is connected to a 60amp 220v breaker at the houses main breaker box. Yea Yea you maybe thinking that doesnt add up, but I never intend on actually pulling anywhere near 60amps of load.

Ok back to the equipment closet.. 
I cut out a 6' tall by 18" wide hole in the back for easy equipment access and framed it in.
As well I installed a 100cfm fan that vents into the attic, which is on a separate line from the equipment. No ground loops or ac hums here. It will be remotely turned on by the pre/pro via the 12v trigger.
I know I'm not being very good with my descriptions so I'll post some pictures of it when I get the chance. :yikes:

As for the room it is vaulted with the ceiling raising towards the screen.
Rough dimensions are:
Width 18 feet
Length 25 feet
Height back to front
9 feet for the first 6 feet then gradually raising to 13 feet.
Here are a few ****** pictures I'll revise them later.



As you can see the room is/was open to the kitchen/relax/2nd mini theater room. I fixed that. Last picture shows my first hours progress in closing it in. As of now it is insulated drywalled textured and ready for paint.
Here are a couple shots of the room across from it.


That room is my temporary fix. More details on that later.

Couple more pictures of main room:

This shot is immediately after the Optoma HD80 mount with my tan textured screen..


This one with tan textured wall at night


Little bit of prep work


Much more to come! I've left out a ton of details.
But it has already taken me an hour to post this much. :sweat:


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## Chance (Feb 6, 2007)

Color scheme:

I've decided not to compromise picture quality so the room is going to be painted/carpeted in neutral colors. Inside the arch where the screen will be projected is painted flat black minus the screen surface area of course. Outside of the arch (entire front wall) will be a dark grey.
The side walls will be 2 tone divided by 6 feet of thin grey carpet. Above the carpet will be painted the same dark grey as the front wall. And below the carpet will be a lighter grey. I haven't yet decided on specific colors of grey and I am open to comments.

At the top edge of the carpet will be 4" crown molding which will be stained a cherry color. And on the bottom edge will be 2" molding which will be stained cherry as well.
Every six feet there will be a small peice of wood trim that runs top/bottom of the carpet for sake of hiding carpet seams and keeping everything uniform. I will be installing a couple sconces on the carpet area as well as maybe a movie poster or two. Inside the crown molding will be white rope lighting to accent the ceiling and add ambient lighting while the projector isnt running.

The windows are all going to be covered with 9' tall black curtains probably thick crushed velvet.
I will assure no light will get through. The ceiling is going to be painted flat black. The carpet for the meantime will remain a neutral tan as well as the theater seating. I will build a stepped platform and go with darker carpet and new seating as time and money permit.

Pictures to come..


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## Chance (Feb 6, 2007)

Acoustics:

At 23 years of age I am already having hearing problems (self inflicted) and am tone deaf in higher frequencies. More or less I've made some bad desicions in the past and now I have to increase the DB's to make up for it. So for sake of sound quality and less irritation to the neighbors I will be taking every precaution I can to keep the movie in the movie room.
Two of the walls are exterior so they are already insulated.
The other two I went ahead and rented an insulation machine (can't remember the name lol) and alot of blow-in insulation. 
Near the top of the wall frame and between each 16" stud I cut out a 4" round hole and filed them as much as possible without physically blowing out the wall.
As well I doubled up on the insulation in the attic above the room.
I then lined the roof with fiberglass r-13 insulation between the rafters. So basically it goes tile/plywood/fiberglass/attic crawl space/four-15" IB subwoofers :heehee: / 18" blow-in insulation/studs/drywall. If I've lost any of you don't feel bad I don't understand my typing either :duh: That pretty much sums it up for keeping the noise in.

Inside the room along the side and rear walls will be covered with 6' tall carpet. As well I plan on adding any foam treaments if deemed nessesary.


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## Chance (Feb 6, 2007)

Equipment:

All subject to change, but for the time being this is ultimately what is planned for this setup.
Optoma HD80 1080 DLP projector - (purchased and installed) 
It will be fed with a custom 48ft solid copper core rg6 component cable, and a 50ft 22gauge hdmi from monoprice.
DIY S-I-L-V-E-R screen - Thats what it is called on another forum..
It will be 129" diagonal 16x9 and surrouned by a 2 3/8" flat black frame.
Integra DTC-9.8 pre/pro - Possibly the onkyo twin sister whichever I can get cheaper :bigsmile:
Emotiva 200x7 amplifier - Would go with the 120watt/ch version but it lacks balanced outputs.
Dayton standalone rack monoblock - Behringer parametric equalizer tied in.
This will power 4 15" subwoofers line arrayed will be mounted in ceiling in phase with the main and center channel speakers. Undecided on which subwoofers to use possibly dayton series.
Custom HTPC - Equiped with Xbox360 HD-DVD drive, Pioneer BD-Rom, Intel C2D, 2 gig ram, ATI Radeon HD 2600xt, and creative labs X-Fi extrememusic for 7.1 analog out.
Although I currently have a Samsung blu-ray player and am using the Xbox for HD-DVD playback I would rather use the impressive decoding abilities of the new ATI HD2600 series. 
Random Equipment
Directv hr20-100s
Yamaha LD player /w RF Demodulator 
Two Sony 400 Disc DVD changers
Thorens TD295 turntable
JVC D-VHS
Tape deck - :rofl:
Sony 10 disc cd-changer
Not to mention equipment for the other 5.1 room setup.

Speakers:
I have intentions of setting the room up for 7.1.
Eventually I would like to go the DIY route and build cabinets for some of Selah audios designs.
But for the meantime I will be going the poor mans route.
For mains I will be using Polk S10's.
Center channel will be a Mission dual 5 1/4 MTM - Not sure how I aquired it.
I am still contemplating which speakers I will use for surrounds and surround backs.
So far it is a toss up between Pinnacle Black Diamond BD650's and Klipsche Reference 6 1/2 MT's
They of course are going to be wall mounted using LCD pullout mounts. Some of you will be going :rolleyesno: but you will see why soon enough.
And of course already mentioned a line arrayed quad 15" IB setup.
All speakers are fed by 2 pair of 16gauge/4conductor speaker wire for ability to bi-wire in future.

Interconnects:
All will be custom made using belden solid 18gauge copper core rg6. Aside from HDMI/DVI and XLR's.

Thats all I can think of for now. :scratch:


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## bpape (Sep 14, 2006)

You need a break - your fingers must be in knots after typing all that.

Looks like you've got a good handle on what you want to do and progress is happening. At least in a couple of months things will cool down a little.

Good luck.

Bryan


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## Wayne A. Pflughaupt (Apr 13, 2006)

Chance said:


> Two of the walls are exterior so they are already insulated.
> The other two I went ahead and rented an insulation machine (can't remember the name lol) and alot of blow-in insulation.
> Near the top of the wall frame and between each 16" stud I cut out a 4" round hole and filed them as much as possible without physically blowing out the wall.
> As well I doubled up on the insulation in the attic above the room.


If you’re interested in “keeping the movie in the movie room,” thermal insulation isn’t going to cut it. Effective soundproofing requires mass and air tightness. As you can easily see, thermal insulation isn’t terribly dense. 

If room-in-a-room or staggered-stud construction isn’t feasible, then maybe doubling or tripling up the sheetrock of at least the interior rooms and ceiling will go along way. And installing storm windows, to better insure an airtight seal to the outside. Any doors in the room should be the solid-core outdoor type, complete with weather stripping and air-tight threshold. Of course, if the room is air tight, then the AC system will need a dedicated air return installed.

That IB may also be a problem “keeping the movie in the room.” Check this thread. You might want to consider a SLLT instead.

But hey, even if all that added insulation doesn’t get you a lot sound-proofing wise, it will help keep your room cool. Never a bad thing!


Regards,
Wayne


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## Prof. (Oct 20, 2006)

It all sounds very good except for a couple of things...
Carpet on the walls is not very effective for keeping the sound in the room and certainly won't help for any acoustic problems.. You would get better results by doubling up on the wall panels, and using acoustic treatments on the walls in the appropriate positions..
The other is that the 4 15inchers in the roof cavity is not going to make the neighbours very happy..An SLLT in the room, as Wayne suggested would be more practical..
Good luck with the build and keep the pics coming..

Edit...One other thing...If your budget will extend to it, the most effective way of keeping the sound in the room is to double glaze your windows..but I don't know if that's practical in your case..


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## Chance (Feb 6, 2007)

Hmm seems my idea of using carpet to help with echoing and drywall vibration dampening is a no go onder:
But thats why I am here! Fortunately the only neighboring room separated by a wall is mine. But due to poor placement of my front door by the builder I cannot add another layer of drywall to that wall.
Can I however add another layer of drywall to my room?

This is just to keep the neighboring sound from the theater from penetrating my room and making its way across the hall to disturb others. 

So far from priliminary testing my only contributors to some noticable sound outside are through my front door and the small holes that run along the top edge of roof. So now to deside which door I want to get and I can always more densly pack the paper insulation.
As far as which subwoofer setup to use I am definetely going with an IB. 
With my planned seating arangement my only other place would be in the rear of the room. That would be a horrible bass trap waiting to happen. As well I want to keep my subwoofer in phase with my mains.

Funny now that I think of it using an infinite baffle would be great. My house is plopped on a acre of land so my closest neighbors home is about 130 feet away. But hey if I have to listen to there roosters every night/morning not to mention there spanish polka every time they have a bbq. Why not make them suffer from some subsonic bass. :joke:

Thanks for help thus far much appreciated!


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## Chance (Feb 6, 2007)

Prof. said:


> Edit...One other thing...If your budget will extend to it, the most effective way of keeping the sound in the room is to double glaze your windows..but I don't know if that's practical in your case..


Hmm never heard of double glazing. What is that exactly?
Just for reference my windows are double payned. (spell?) 
I am going to be using 3/8" thick overlapped crushed velvet that will be fixed to the entire length of the sides of the windows to prevent any light from entering.

From past experience I have noticed some fairly good sound dampening qualities from this stuff.
But maybe I am just blowing smoke :sad:


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## Prof. (Oct 20, 2006)

Chance said:


> Hmm never heard of double glazing. What is that exactly?
> Just for reference my windows are double payned. (spell?)


I think we're talking about the same thing..Down here we call it double glazing..It's two layers of glass with an air space between them..


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## Chance (Feb 6, 2007)

Couple more pictures.


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## salvasol (Oct 31, 2006)

Chance said:


> Hmm seems my idea of using carpet to help with echoing and drywall vibration dampening is a no go onder:


I was going to ask you What kind of carpet you were thinking on using ... then I saw this.
I have installed carpet on my room (you can see it in this photo) ... this is not a regular carpet, I got it on a website that sell accoustical products ... this helps with echoes and sound ...:yes::yes:



Hopefully this helps ....


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