Lights, Camera, Action - Building the Perfect Home Theatre System

 Home theater systems have come a long way since the days of putting two huge speakers on either side of the television and listening to records while watching Saturday Night Fever on your VCR and television. Today, there are as many ways to design a home theater system as there are customers to buy them.

“The basics of the home entertainment system haven’t changed much in the last 15 years or so. What has changed is people’s tastes and priorities,” says Adam Bowden of Bose Home Theatre. “Fifteen or 20 years ago, a home entertainment system was synonymous with music. People would spend hours in stores, bring in a variety of music and listen to different speakers before choosing a device to buy. 

Today, a home entertainment system is a visual experience centered around movies, and people make their decisions based on aesthetics, assuming (correctly) that the sound will be exceptional. They will buy a visually appealing home theater system and assume the sound will be visually appealing as well.”

“Prices are coming down on flat screen TVs and quality is going up, so more and more people are incorporating larger flat screens and surround sound into their home theater system design,” says Joe Strang, president of Show Case Home Theatres in Alberta. “The other big news is all-in-one touchpad controls.”

The price of a home theater system depends on how seriously you take your entertainment needs. According to Strang, you can buy a “big box” system for $5,000. But to really get the full experience, he recommends having a custom system installed.

“You have to start by installing the speakers, remote control and flat screen, and that costs about $9,000,” he says.

But if money is no object, there’s plenty of fun to be had. “We’ve done multimedia rooms that cost $500,000 for a single room. For that price, you get projectors that are better than a movie theater, with sound so good that when someone whispers on the screen, it sounds like they’re whispering in your ear.”

Some owners opt for the total theater experience and have custom theater seating installed in their media room, with one-touch remotes in the arm of each chair, massage units and heated seats.

“We even put motion in the seats so that when there’s motion in the movie, you feel it in your seat,” he says. “And I don’t mean it just vibrates-it actually moves.”

Other options for your home theater system include custom curtains, acoustic paint and soundproofing. It may seem like overkill, but Strang says most homes over $700,000 now have a dedicated media room or home theater room.

Sound Systems in Businesses

The quality of a best sound systems should not be taken lightly by anyone…ministry staff, sound technicians or the congregation. The church is a place to listen to God’s word, chat with friends and relax from all the stresses of the outside world. The sound system is a point of contact that intersects with all of the above groups. Whether directly or indirectly, sound systems impact all aspects of a ministry.

While the congregation can sit back and enjoy the benefits of a well-designed audio-visual system that brings music ministry performances and worship messages to life, there is one group that doesn’t get a chance to relax…and it’s not the pastoral staff. 

It’s the people sitting in the back of the sanctuary in a small cubicle filled with dials, knobs, meters, cords, computer screens and the pressure to make the music and sermon sound “right.” The quality of the sound is solely dependent on the staff manning the sound booth. Whether a church has a multi-million dollar system or a few guitars plugged into a $120 amp makes no difference. An inexperienced sound technician can make Third Day sound like a high school garage band.

While the members of the congregation watch and hear the musicians, the musicians watch and depend on the sound technicians. The “sound technician” is certainly the unsung hero of any well-organized church service. 

No one sees the person in the back tuning and turning the little knobs, but everyone, without a doubt, is directly affected by that person’s performance. Any musician will tell you how important it is to have both an expert sound technician and a top-notch sound system.

Loudspeaker Enclosure

A loudspeaker enclosure is an enclosure designed to transmit sound to the listener through mounted drivers. The primary role of the speaker enclosure is to prevent out-of-phase sound waves from the back of the speaker from combining with in-phase sound waves from the front of the speaker. 

This results in interface patterns and cancellation, which reduces speaker efficiency, especially at low frequencies where the wavelengths are so long that the interference affects the entire listening area.

Most loudspeaker enclosures use some sort of structure, more like a box to contain the out-of-phase sound energy. The box is typically made of wood or, more recently, plastic, both for ease of construction and appearance. Speaker enclosures are sometimes sealed and sometimes vented. 

Vented enclosures allow some of the sound energy to be released inside the enclosure and, if properly designed with phase relationships in mind, increase bass response and reduce speaker excursion.