[mobious]

The Kodi (formerly known as xbmc) community has never steered me wrong. So I come to you my fellow Kodi users to help me build my new home theater room. I will most likely be hiring a professional for any installations, wiring, and any sort of construction related to the project, what I need your help with is choosing the tools that will make this the best home theater ever (I know a little over exaggerated but can you blame me I am excited!). Where should we start? Probably room dimensions right? I will give you an update on that as soon as I take them tomorrow. So lets see what we can cover now.

I have a pretty good background in HDTV's however I have zero/nada when it comes to projectors, this will obviously be the backbone of the room so give me your recommendations. I want something that will be future proof so 4K isn't out of the question even though there isn't much content out there for it right now I don't plan on buying something now only to need to upgrade it 2 years later. I would like it to provide the crispiest (if that even a word?) and most vibrant picture possible (price is not a problem my budget is flexible so I don't mind going into the high end sector, just nothing overboard like an imax projector lol jk).

Also since we are discussing picture, I do occasionally game so 60hz (if that applies to projectors) is a must, do 4k 60hz projectors even exist yet? Or would you guys recommend a sort of hybrid setup where I would have an HDTV for things such as gaming and then have the projector screen come down in front of it for movies? Let me know your thoughts!

Second would be sound system, I already have a pretty decent onkyo receiver (I think) that supports 7.1 surround, what I need help choosing is the proper speakers, although I would think that might relate to the room dimensions so if that's not something you guys can recommend now we can keep that for once I have the proper dimensions.

I think this sums up quite well what I would like as a first post in this topic, I plan to document every step of this and update you guys throughout the entire journey (if you guys show interest of course!) so I hope this is going to be the start of something beautiful! And yes I'm rambling now lol. Really excited to see where this goes!

[Stereodude]

Depending on how serious you are about this planned theater room you may want to at least browse the Theater Design & Construction subform on AVSforum. You can learn a lot and get a lot of ideas by looking at what other people have done.

[bossanova808]

Good 4K cinema projectors are *very* expensive right now, so a lot will depend on how serious you are with the $s. I had a a look at the $13000 Sony 4K model. It's very sharp, for sure, but I did not feel it added a great deal on a 135" or so screen over a 1080p model - certainly not worth the extra $10K or so I felt at this stage. in 4 years, say, when I will probably be looking for prjector round 2, then I suspect I will jump at 4K models.

Anyway, I have been doing something similar, although definitely NOT the 'ultimate' home theatre. I have been setting up a lounge that can be converted into a theatre as well, so drop down screen etc. It has certainly been more complex than anticipated.

There's a few basic questions to answer before any sensible conversation can be had:
Room size
Screen Size, fixed to wall (best, easiest) - or drop down etc.
Always dark or some day time use?
Wall type/window locations etc?
How high are your ceiling, are you happy to have the projector always on show?
Is this going to be projector only or TV + projector?

Basically, you have to pay a fair bit of attention to the throw, zoom, and shift capabilities ad they're surprisingly fussy about placement (if you want to avoid software correction of keystoning anyway, and you do!). High ceiling - our issue - is the real killer here. We have 3m (so 12ft?) ceilings - so we either need to accept a pole with a projector hanging down 1m+ from that, or use an expensive lift (very expensive, fiddly, and in our case impossible due some roof truss/fireplace flu issues!). Otherwise, you will need to project off a table, in nutshell, or using some sort of coffee table between your seats. It gets complex to get right pretty quickly, unless you have a truly dedicated room with relatively low ceilings. The projectors are larger than you might imagine, and some are relatively noisy/pump out a reasonable amount of heat.

I went with a Sony HW40 projector. It appears to be the most well reviewed of the more modest home theatre projector options (versus the very popular Epson, Panasonic and BenQ options). I looked at all of those in some detail and found the Sony to be a very nice model - it just has the right combination of detail and colour accuracy, with sensible easy controls. Unlike a TV where you can usually settle on one set of settings for everything, with a projector I am finding it is worth doing a bit more tweaking. E.g. Sony have a system called 'reality creation' which seeks to sharpen things subtly by adding texture - hard to describe but it can be very effective. I have found it works well with things that have been shot digitally or post processed to have no film grain - it can really crispen these up and looks very natural. But if you use it on something with quite a grainy look already (e.g. Super 8 or something older like Star Wars) - it is not beneficial. but the Sony has very quick controls for this sort of things and looks to have an extensive presets system too, although I am not yet using that.

I am heading towards a relatively smaller screen of 95" due to room constraints (it's still 230% larger than my TV by area!). I have tested this against a white wall while I wait for our renovation to finish (Americans call that a re-model I think!) - but even on a less than ideal wall the projector's performance is pretty fantastic. With a properly white screen it should be even better. And I have seen some in very good environments for demos, and the performance is superb. There are projectors with deeper blacks (the JVCs) - but I still did not find them bettter overall. The blacks on the Sony are good, but the detail within the shadows is quite excellent and better than anything else I saw. But all of the current models were pretty impressive (my benchmark being projectors from about 5 years agao, which were far less impressive!). I dismissed the BenQ as the rainbow effect might bother some viewers.

AVS is indeed the place to go (and post a build log too) - lots of experienced advice on there although it can be a little 'purist' at times - but more generally XBMC on 2.5 metres of screen works well - really well. I was surprised in a way, expected it to somehow feel too big for the fonts or whatever, but it just felt right - even more so than on my 50" plasma actually. Although you do want to make sure your artwork is very much up to scratch!

There's just no matching a projector for a cinematic feel (although even at 24P the motion of LCD projectors is noticeably smoother than real film (because there's no frame change flciker basically) -, so that takes a bit of getting used to) - but the sounds side is at least as important. You don't necessarily need massive stacks though, some people really go nuts on that, and they can be pretty ugly. Concentrate on the center speaker as it carries up to 70% of the sound including pretty much all dialogue and is absolutely key to a nice experience I reckon - it's not all about chair shaking explosions really!

Anyway, that's my own ramble just to get things started....

[mobious]

Thanks for the amazing reply bossanova, and thanks for the recommendation stereodude.

So far I would have to agree 14k on a projector is a bit much, I'm not into up scaling and by the time 4k content is mainstream they would probably cost a fraction of that. So as promised here are the room dimensions. I actually have a choice between two rooms one is more squarish but bigger overall while the other is more rectangular which I would think is better for a home theatre setup even if it's slugjtly smaller? (Correct me if I am wrong of course).

The dimensions are as follows.

Room A is 19.7 feet by 14.5 feet with a height (ground to ceiling) of 11.5 feet
Room B is 21.2 feet by 17 feet with the same height of 11.5

Both rooms have cement walls and both have windows with automatic shutters so light isn't an issue.

As far as projectors are concerned I'm torn between Sony (because you brought up sony) and JVC, specifically between the sony hw55es and the JVC x500r, I'd like to hear your opinions on these two guys (from those who are familiar with projectors)

As far as sound systems go I'm still uncertain as I have zero background in the field so any input on this guys would be great. As you guys have recommend I will basically mirror this post on avs and see what the gurus there have to say about it but I will be coming here first for the Kodi communities input!

[Stereodude]

How many people are you planning to seat? How big of a screen are you after? Do you want to go with an AT screen hiding all the speakers?

[Raitsa]

Sony VPL-HW55ES is an amazing projector and i can recommend it 100%.

[bossanova808]

I couldn't see much difference (via my eyeballs) between the Sony 55 and 40 to be honest, but for me it's all about movies in darker rooms, I imagine the dynamic iris (primary difference) might be more noticeable in the context of lighter room watching. I don't have any first hand experience with the JVC, couldn't find one to test easily here. My concern with dynamic irises is you can normally hear them so if you're going to be sitting quite near the projector's location, be aware of that. The Sony's are noticeably much quieter in general (fan is 21db I believe) - than the competition from Epson and Pana (both 30+), again no idea on JVC. I'm no expert but I can say I am very impressed with the Sony so far and the folks I bought it from were also fulsome in their praise for it, most of their demo setups were now running Sonys.

I'd go the rectangle myself, yep. Your higher ceiling mean you will prob want to mount the projector on the back wall about 2/3rds up I guess? You should then consider what size screens work from the range (different projectors have different zooms / throw ratios, so there are firm physical limits you have to play with!).

My major point is be very careful to pre-calculate the projector and screen placement and size stuff before buying, as it's not as obvious as you might think that it will all work!

[mobious]

Thank you for all the help guys, especially Bossanova for such informative posts.

Here is a little update and of course let me know your thoughts. For the sound system we decided to go 11.1 because were using the bigger room. Speakers will be provided by Paradigm Studio 20's combined with a 590 center and a hexagon 3 way Sub 1. Projector wise the Epson 6030 seems to be the winning choice but that could change as the last thing we will be getting is the projector and the project will take a couple of months to complete since not everything is available now.

Everything else from AVR to other electronics will be selected by my new friend who I met recently and is an extreme hobbyist in this field. To control and power this entire setup he recommends we get a Marantz 8801 in combination with an MM8077.

Finally I didn't realize how important the screen is that you will be projecting on and from comparisons and reviews we will be going for a 113 inch black diamond.

Let me know your thoughts!

[bossanova808]

Make sure you demo the Epson against as many others as you can. They're certainly good, but definitely noisier than I'd like. Although with 12 speakers you probably won't notice it much!!

Enjoy and good luck with it all!

[mobious]

Here are some pics of what we got so far.

The room (in the process of being completely emptied, ceiling will be repainted and padded walls will be installed) going for a maroon/navy blue color scheme hopefully it ends up looking nice!

http://imgur.com/RyDmSzO
http://imgur.com/1t9ax1v

Received some of my speakers as well, still missing the studio 20s which will act as rear, side, and front top for the 11.1 setup, they are in order and hopefully don't take too long. Originally the plan was to just go box speakers for the entire setup but I got a good deal on the studio 60s and 100s that I couldn't pass up stepping it up a notch lol.

http://imgur.com/8INGz2a

Edit: a note to the moderators of this forum if you guys want to move this thread to the showcase section I don't mind as I just plan to update every now and then showing off the progress of the build.

[Stereodude]

What are you doing for room treatments to minimize reflections?

[mobious]

What are you doing for room treatments to minimize reflections?

Could you elaborate on that question? I'll try to answer based on what my understanding of the question is.

Basically the entire room will be boarded up with soft padding like you generally see in high end joke theaters and that includes the windows so the room will be unified and absolutely no light will come in. Carpet will be added to minimize sound echo. Is that what you wanted to know?

[Stereodude]

Could you elaborate on that question? I'll try to answer based on what my understanding of the question is.

Basically the entire room will be boarded up with soft padding like you generally see in high end joke theaters and that includes the windows so the room will be unified and absolutely no light will come in. Carpet will be added to minimize sound echo. Is that what you wanted to know?

Yes, sound reflections. Typically people put bass traps in the front corners and floor to ceiling panels on the front stage with an inch or two of compressed fiberglass product to prevent acoustic reflections from the speakers. The first reflection point on the ceiling is often treated with a panel as well.

[mobious]

Could you elaborate on that question? I'll try to answer based on what my understanding of the question is.

Basically the entire room will be boarded up with soft padding like you generally see in high end joke theaters and that includes the windows so the room will be unified and absolutely no light will come in. Carpet will be added to minimize sound echo. Is that what you wanted to know?

Yes, sound reflections. Typically people put bass traps in the front corners and floor to ceiling panels on the front stage with an inch or two of compressed fiberglass product to prevent acoustic reflections from the speakers. The first reflection point on the ceiling is often treated with a panel as well.

I'm not quite sure what the plans for the ceiling are as I have a contractor doing the boarding and he's specialized in home theaters, he said that he will deal with any and all possible echo points. Thanks for the heads up I'll be sure to bring it up with him next time we meet.

[mobious]

Hey guys I know it's been a while but I thought I'd update you on what's been done so far. Right now the painting is done and were on the final stages of boarding up the walls.

http://imgur.com/8ZrPNeu

http://imgur.com/JB9JFxO