Home theatre install

[airbornflght]

Here are the finished pics of my parents new home theatre I installed for them. It's really nice, I just wish it was mine.

The focal point is the 46" sony bravia z series with a 10 bit panel and 120hz processing. I don't know if any of that makes a significant difference, but I do know the black levels are VERY nice. The built in light sensor is a nice touch as it makes the tv perfect for watching movies in a dim room. Keeps the image from looking blown out.

Other components are a 500 watt rms 1080p up scaling dvd receiver hooked up via hdmi and optical. It's not a large system, but perfect for the room. It is easily twice as loud as the previous hts we had in there which was also a sony.

Other than that there is an ipod dock with 8gb nano, ps3, pioneer turntable, kenwood receiver for turntable. and 12" speakers for turntable receiver.

The tv is mounted on the wall with a tilt mount with all cables hidden inside wall through some retrofit low-voltage gang boxes I installed. The only cable that can be seen is a vga coming from computer, which is temporary. As dvi will run from computer to tv once dual output video card arrives.

The thing I like most is the receiver has an s-air unit which is kind of like a table-top radio but it communicates wirelessly to the receiver and can stream audio from any input (tv, dvd, ipod, etc) which is really cool and functional to me.)

Just thought someone might be interested in the install.:vimp:

[Leonardo]

I'm sure they will enjoy that very much. What video card did you end up with? It was to be AGP, right?

[Kwitko]

Turntable FTW! Looks funny with all that digital gear around it. Nice setup. I'm glad you didn't mount the TV all the way up on the wall. Some people insist it's better having it up in the stratosphere. Dunno why.

Looking at your setup reminds me that I have to mount my center speaker. The wall is brick, so it's a royal PITA.

[airbornflght]

I'd say they are enjoying it. Only problem is I won't be here to use it. :( I think I'm going to leave my ps3 for now since it'll free up some study time at college :D and I don't have an hd display aside from my monitor, which required switching cables all the time which was more trouble than it was worth to be honest.

The brick shouldn't give you too much trouble. Just a 3/8" masonry bit and concrete anchor amirite?

I got lucky since our house is wood studs on 16" centers like most houses are. I had to fight both my parents on the mounting position. My mom wanted it near the ceiling (not really, but might of well had been) and my dad wanted it lower, but I wanted to get the center speaker high enough to project and also allow room for gigantic turntable.

I got them a 6200. It's not great but better than their current card. I tried playing 1080p from the computer on the current vid card and on some files the playback was fluid (wmv) and on others (h.264) it was choppy and constantly tore. Which is understandable as h.264 requires lots of processing. But 720p is def a go.

And I like the turntable but the analogue system is kind of in a state of disrepair. The turntable has some cheapo replacement cartridge on it opposed to the ortofon cartridge that was. We can't find information on what will fit it, so the sound quality is a bit amiss. And the right speaker cab's woofer is down. I think the tinsel lead broke so I may pull it out and try to re solder it on. But I'd rater build another set of tmmw with my dad, which is what we have now. Problem is that'd be expensive. I think tmw or tw is more reasonable. The receiver is still in really good shape as far as I can tell, but I lack a signal/tone generator and scope to verify that.

The thing my dad was most proud of was the entertainment center as it used to be about 5' high. We took it out to our workshop and cut it down to size. The main reason he wanted to recycle it was new entertainment systems don't offer a place to store albums. And he has the bottom of that completely full with at least 200 albums easy. He was also pretty happy about not spending another $300 on a new one.

[Kwitko]

The brick shouldn't give you too much trouble. Just a 3/8" masonry bit and concrete anchor amirite?

The speaker is light, so I'm hoping to get away with regular anchors in the brick. I do have the right masonry bits so that's no issue.

[tmh88]

I'm glad you didn't mount the TV all the way up on the wall. Some people insist it's better having it up in the stratosphere. Dunno why.


I can't stand it when people mount the tv very high, or have it on a high up surface like a fireplace. It's so uncomfortable looking up for a few hours while you're trying to enjoy a movie.

[Clutch]

Nice setup, good job getting it all done for them. And kudos again on the TV placement.

[danball1976]

Turntable FTW! Looks funny with all that digital gear around it. Nice setup. I'm glad you didn't mount the TV all the way up on the wall. Some people insist it's better having it up in the stratosphere. Dunno why.

Looking at your setup reminds me that I have to mount my center speaker. The wall is brick, so it's a royal PITA.

I was going to say something about that. I remember having a radio like that, with a built in turntable way back around 1984. That old tech with the new TV and PS3 looks so out of place, but so cool because it still works.

[airbornflght]

I was going to say something about that. I remember having a radio like that, with a built in turntable way back around 1984. That old tech with the new TV and PS3 looks so out of place, but so cool because it still works.

I really enjoy listening to vinyl but right now it's not too pleasant as a result of the current state of things. But luckily turntables and receivers can be fixed or replaced. What can't be so easily are all the albums, they're the real treasure. My dad has a very good selection and I've been tempted to buy some of my own albums that I would like to have in vinyl.

[danball1976]

I really enjoy listening to vinyl but right now it's not too pleasant as a result of the current state of things. But luckily turntables and receivers can be fixed or replaced. What can't be so easily are all the albums, they're the real treasure. My dad has a very good selection and I've been tempted to buy some of my own albums that I would like to have in vinyl.

My parents had a bunch of LPs, but no turntable to play them... So what do they do? (and they had a bunch of classics). They go and get rid of them, instead of getting a turntable. This was around 1995-97 that they did this.