Description

I love movies and probably watch them more than I do listen to music even, they're the perfect escape from the horrible world we live in sometimes IMO, so I decided that after selling audio and home theaters for 18 years, it was finally time for me to build a dedicated room for myself. I have a small house so space is limited, but since it's a small room, I figure I can get away with small speakers and still have amazing dynamics and sound-staging. So this will be a single row 4-seat theater. One of my customer's is a carpenter, so I enlisted his help in making the dream happen. So far the old room was demolished down to the block, and we've built it up from scratch. It's been fully insulated, and all the wiring is done. There's over 250ft of romex in the walls, including a dedicated 10 ga run to the equipment on it's own breaker. The lights and chair outlets are on another breaker. Since we'll be sitting pretty close to the screen (About 9'), the system will be based on a new 85" Sony TV.  We've also prewired for a future projector however if I want to go to a larger screen down the road. A lot of time went into figuring out the perfect placement for all the boxes on the wall. There's 26 boxes total, including wiring for 11 speakers, and 4 subwoofers just in case. Next comes trim and door installation, then we're building a floating rack on the wall below the screen to house the equipment with the gear all on drawer sliders to make connections a breeze. My décor concept is like a miniature one-row version of a commercial Dolby Cinema, so I'm going to try and mimic that style with LED lighting and a mostly black/grey room. Being a small space I expect the bass to be challenging in this room, but we'll see!
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Room Details

Dimensions: 12’ × 13’  Small
Ceiling: 7’


Components Toggle details

    • Lexicon RV-9
    A/V Atmos Receiver with Dirac Live and G-Class amplification.
    • Furman Elite 15 PFI
    Power Conditioner
    • Sony UBP-X800M2
    Blu-ray player for 4k movies
    • Totem Acoustic Sky Monitor
    Left and Right main speakers for the system
    • Totem Acoustic Sky Center
    Center channel speaker
    • Totem Acoustic Kin Monitor
    These will be used for the 4 surrounds, and front high-wide channels
    • Totem Acoustic Kin IC-82
    8" In-ceiling speakers used for the Atmos height channels
    • Totem Acoustic Kin Sub 10
    Two 10" subwoofers for bass duties. Bass could be an issue in this small room, but we'll see.
    • Sony KD-X8591J
    4K LED HDR TV. IMAX says the size should be perfect for the short 9' viewing distance while the brightness will be much higher than a projector. That said, I'm an audio guy, so I don't want to spend too much on the video. I did prewire for a projector down the road though if I change my mind.

Comments 16

Can you pls tell me what paint colors you used on walls

a1uc

What a great build, are room treatments in the walls?

kota1

Superb job! Great use of that space. Can imagine it is relaxing and fun to watch and listen with a few friends and family members.

4afsanakhan

I enjoyed looking through the photos as the plan became reality. You are a man with some serious skills!  Congrats on your accomplishment!

bob540

Sweet! Appreciate the time lapsed build out photos. The devil and interest is in those details that you apparently have well covered. Excellent job from design thru install.

Can you say “back to the future”? ;)

sj00884

It is good to see the fat guys getting the job done. Being of stout girth myself and thinking that a system sounds better when you are the driver, I really admire the job your doing.

jmalen123

This is the beauty of our hobby, passion, obsession!! Love seeing the before/after photos as well as the back story to your build. Congrats on making it come to life!

gspinner65

Looks great!

charcoalchuck

Fantastic work. I love seeing builds like this. The room looks fabulous. 
Quality of workmanship is excellent too. 
Really great job. 

paulgreyhead

Owner
Update: We mounted the 85" tv, pulled up the tile floor, and coated the floor on two coats of Behr One-part epoxy. We built and painted the rack, the carpet is installed, and equipment connected with manual calibration. We ran Dirac Live, but it sounds a little off to me, because since the room isn't sound treated yet, I think it's correcting for too much reflected sound, making the sound coming from the speakers distorted. So for now, to me it sounds better with the correction off with only manual tape measure and level adjustments. While trying to install the Totem Kin Monitors in back, I realized that there is no threaded insert in them, so I can't wall mount them. I ordered all Totem Kin Flex speakers instead for the four surrounds and front height channels. Even with just a 5.2.2 setup and no room treatments, it still sounds better than any commercial theater I've been in. It's amazing what SQ and dynamics you can get out of small speakers in a small room. Working this weekend to install surrounds and refine everything.

audiobroke

Please post again when you are finished with all the equipment! Thx

smithtj05

Owner
Thanks! The room is getting trimmed out this weekend, getting the pocket door, and I'll hopefully get some more terminations done. More pics soon!

audiobroke

Great job in building your dream HT room. And thanks for posting pictures, very helpful and inspiring. Looking forward to seeing your room once it’s all completed.

lalitk

Owner
Thank you both! Taping and mudding should happen this week, then sanding, then I get to paint it.

audiobroke

I love seeing the thought, care and building of a dedicated room. Nice equipment choices too, and looking forward to seeing your update.

mjcmt

Hoping to see the finished room soon.

milpai

Showing all 16 posts