Moved into this house about 6 years ago now, and since moving in I've been keen to get a cinema room again.
I used to have a multi-purpose room in my old flat (computer desk/sofa bed/electric ceiling mounted screen to keep it out of the way) and loved it, so it's been a missing part of this new home for a long time!
We're renovating the whole house, and it's taking me a bit of time to do each one as I'm stripping out all the lathe and plaster before adding insulation and plaster-boarding the rooms and doing my best to keep old features where they're still there - such as the cornice. Obviously a dedicated cinema room isn't high on the priorities when we had leaking showers and roof
Anyway, got past the worst of that now and on to the fun stuff!
AV gear wise my set up is based around ~3/4 year old tech. I could have easily convinced myself that I "needed" a £10k HDMI 2.1 compliant projector, with matching processor and dedicated amps, but I've saved myself a bit of money by basically matching everything to the gear that I was looking at when I started thinking about this 3 years ago and buying second hand. So while I couldn't afford a Sony VPL-VW550ES projector when it launched, I'm happy that I picked one up for a rock bottom price today.
Originally I had planned on having my desk in front of the alcove in the back right of the room but, as you can see from the pic below, I've not left myself much room
I didn't originally plan on having two rows of seats, but we got this entire corner set free, so kinda felt obligated. The back riser, that the three seats are sitting on, was a complete afterthought put together in an afternoon then wrapped in leftover strips of carpet I had from the install
I'll probably remove it in around 6 months when the novelty wears off from showing friends and family.
On to the setup...
Video
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- Sony VPL-VW550ES 4k Projector
- Fixed 120inch 1.0 gain screen
- Nvidia Shield Pro
- Apple TV 4k
- Sony PS5 for blurays
Audio (7.2.4 Channels)
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- 7 x KEF T301 surround speakers
- 1 x BK Electric XXLS400 - Down Firing Subwoofer
- 1 x BK Electric Monolith Plus - Front Firing Subwoofer
- 4 x Wharfedale DFS ceiling mounted speakers
- Anthem MRX 720 AVR
- Arcam FMJ P7 - 7 Channel Amplifier
- miniDSP 2x4 HD
Random Other info
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- Fully addressable (using WLED), totally hidden, 600 LED strip that lights the cornice
- Electric roller blackout blind
- Harmony Companion Remote controlling AV gear
- 7 individual seats that sit 10 comfortably/cosily
- Wall mounted tablet showing Home Assistant cinema control screen
- One button press on tablet that "Gets ready for a movie" by doing the following steps...
- Turn on all the AV equipment
- Start closing the blinds
- Turn off the main lights
- Turn on the LED lights
- Start the Perl and Dean music through the SONOS in time to finish with the blinds closing (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3WQrLuaMBMw)
- Start Plex
- Start the "Amaze" Dolby demo (handy to run to tune volume based on audience preference)
- Turn off the LED lights in time with the Dolby demo finishing
- Shows a "royPLEX" logo
To say that I'm happy with it is an understatement... In my flat I just had 7 channel surround setup without a sub (trying to be neighbour friendly) but man... these subs are to die for in a full 7.2.4 setup I've got now! My KEF T301 speakers replaced some B&W and Wharfedale towers that I had mixed and matched previously. I wanted something that took up less room as you can see the subs/cabinet and chairs take up a lot of space. Side by side (when I bought just two KEFs to test) I did prefer my older towers, but with everything in place I'd be hard pushed to identify any deficiencies with my setup when paired with good subwoofers. Saying that... I do have some planned upgrades
- I'm still using Wharfedale DFS speakers on the ceiling that are designed for 5.1 systems surround speakers and "throw" the sound around a little. I was just using what I had so not massively fussed, but over time I'll probably put some matching KEF T301s on the ceiling
- I need to run the rear speakers from my AVR rather than the dedicated amp. There's some noise coming from the amps for these channels on the AVR so keen to add a dedicated second 4 channel amp to avoid this
- Get a matching BK Electric XXLS400 and sell BK Electric Monolith Plus
- I thought I'd only be able to fit a 120inch screen (using the various projector throw calcs) but I managed to push the projector back further than I thought so think I can get a 130inch screen. Would also like to make it acoustically transparent and get the LRC speakers behind it as sometimes the centre speaker can sound a bit "low".
- Add some acoustic treatment. It sounds totally fine at the moment but haven't even run the calibration yet so interesting to see what difference that might make!)
So, here goes... the reveal!
What I brought the room back to...
Where I've ended up...
Home Assistant Screen for the tablet:
