Meridian Unplugged - Powered by MrTechGuy.co.uk Forums Discussion Meridian - Systems Jerrys Theater Pictures

I WANT ONE !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Thanks guys. About a year ago I decided to take my theater to another level and redo the projector, screen and the rats nest of wiring behind the equipment rack. I also needed another rack for more gear. So we embarked on this project. It was a lot of fun. The 518 is kind of being unused as I was using it for converting the optical output of the macintosh music server to coax for the 861 (given the 861s lack of optical inputs and the propensity for computers to introduce noise over coax this seemed like a logical thing to do). But the 518 is such a classic piece of equipment that I am holding on to it and even displaying it but like I said, its going unused currently.

I decided that it was time to really go for it with the projector. Previously I was running a Runco 5000 Ci- but my throw distance was close to 30' and my screen was 96" wide. The visual result of this was that the image was a little too dark- just a little- and 2.35 movies (which is what most "blockbuster" movies are) did not feel cinematic- they felt like I was watching them on a large big screen TV. So I decided I wanted to go for the gusto and go 2.35:1. Its funny because there is the other thread on here about this. Going 2.35:1 is change that is on par with going from VHS straight to HDDVD. It completely changes the viewing experience. I sit about 14' away from the screen and the screen is now 135" wide- so just like being in a good movie theater, the image relative to my field of vision is so expansive that I feel like I have to move my head to see the action on the sides of the screen. My limitation here is my center channel- otherwise I could have squeezed out another 5-10"- and I would have as I am convinced that the key to a pleasing projection image is to make it as big and as bright as possible. Note that on the bright side I don't mean blinding- I just mean punchy.

So that brought me to the Runco cinewide VX-55 projector. I know this ain't the Runco forum and I try to keep the Runco fanboy stuff down here- and believe me they are not always the easiest people to get along with- but the product speaks for itself. The projector is a monster- it requires 220V power! The projector has an automated anamorphic lens and It has an adjustable iris- it can be fully open at setting 0 or fairly closed at setting 9. It comes from the factory at 0- open. When we first fired it up we were stunned that with my room lights on at full brightness- the image was nearly as bright as a plasma in a fully light room! With the lights off- the image was so bright it hurt your eyes! If you can believe it, Im now running it at 9- its most restrictive setting- the benefit of this is increased contrast ratio. Heres the interesting part- the image is still a tiny bit brighter than what most pros would consider optimal. Its not a problem, doesn't hurt the eyes, but if they had a 9.5 setting, Id use it. So thats going through the primary lens, the anamorphic lens and then my optical glass, which is something like 93% efficient (we needed special glass for the room isolation).

The less impressive part of the projector is its video processor. For some reason Runco ships it with a video processor which takes DVD and scales it to 720P and then the projector goes and scales it again to 1080P. The projector supports 24/48hz playback but their video processor does not. On the 720P part, I think this is inexcusable as this introduces scaling artifacts into the image and I can tell you you that its not just in theory- I saw them. On the 24/48 part, I can understand it as its a lot going on already and Runco has a reputation on selling turn key solutions and you have got to make sure it works. With 1080i or P, the signal gets passed straight to the projector and the projector does have a 3:2 pulldown mode. Out of the box the system is an 8/10 because with DVD the image is noisy with scaling artifacts and I think most people would not know better and just accept it.

But I'm a real pain in the you know what. So I grabbed me a CII video processor. What a difference. Forgetting the scan rate for a moment- I am convinced that the CII just has much cleaner everything than the Runco. Add in the better filtering, etc and DVD now looks really great- and if you don't watch a HD image first, the image from DVD looks very convincing. HD is another level. Unfortuately the CII has an Achilles' heal too: cadence lock when using a 2.35:1 screen and/or 24hz output. They have made a lot of improvements with new firmware, but when having friends over I have to leave it in 60hz mode because about once a movie, it will lose the cadence lock and the image will geeettttt vvvveeeeerrryyyy stttuududddeeerrrryyy. Its remedied by pausing for a second and then resuming. I may eventually go to a Radiance but for now Im happy.

The room lights are regular incandescent bulbs. These pictures were taken by a professional photographer my installer uses. I allowed them to submit the pictures to the CEDIA for Theater of the Year which we did not win. The thing I should say is my installer (Innerspace Electronics of Port Chester NY) did a wonderful job on the theater but the basic concept and design was mine and also help from my decorator. The room doesn't light up quite as bright as the picture shows in real life because the photographer used some extra lights to highlight certain things in the room. I think he did a nice job.

The ceiling is actually a bit of a light brown because it goes with the room color scheme and I have seen "media rooms" where the whole room is black, which is great for performance, but I find it depressing. Given how we are shooting the projector, there is rarely any light that hits the ceiling- it only happens when the anamorphic lens is out of the way and its kind of like a very tiny "V" of light on the ceiling. Its not distracting at all, but if I look up, its ever so slightly there. There are no light reflections from the light hitting the screen- the big shadow box around it from Stewart prevents that pretty well.

The room is fairly decoupled from the house using several different techniques so I can go rock out without disturbing anyone- the interesting thing is if you look at the picture of the room showing the back of the room, youll see some white boxes on the ceiling- one of them is a smoke detector and the other is an alarm siren. Because the room is essentially "sound proof", if the alarm would go off, I wouldn't hear it- so we put that in there. The panels are specifically designed for their locations so some reflect sound, some diffuse sound and some absorb (its the higher frequencies- they are not going to absorb the bass!) In general the sound proofing worked out well but the room is under my kitchen and if someone were to walk with hard healed shoes on the floor you might hear the impact from this a little bit and like wise if you are watching a very powerful soundtrack movie in the kitchen they might just feel or hear a little rumble or two. But if someone is having a conversation in the kitchen they will not hear the movie so its pretty good.

I do not know how much power the equipment room draws but Im sure it draws enough. I think the year round ac for the room is probably the biggest power draw, followed by the projector.

Also of note is I have a thermal management system on the projector exhaust- its a fan that sucks air away from the exhaust of the projector when the exhaust hits 85F. It has a little monitor on the fan which tells me the exhaust temp- it quickly gets up to... 122F! The room has its own isolation transformer and industrial surge protector and there are 3 isolated power "supplies": Audio, video (there is some overlap) and "dirty". Dirty is off the house power without any interaction to the isolation transformer and that powers things like lights, the chairs, fans, etc. Each speaker gets its own 20amp dedicated line. I also wired or height speakers at the front and rear should M ever go for that. Also, having the first row of seating elevated from the main speakers is IMHO a mistake. It hurts vertical imaging with music. With movies its not a problem at all. Ive played with the axis control to help with this. But my experience is get the basics right and then do the tweaks. Im not going to complain but Im saying this just in case someone else gets some ideas for their own theater in the future.

Youre right on the chairs- they are very comfortable and I have fallen asleep more times than I can remember- even with a really dynamic soundtrack.

The guy who did the wiring is a true artist and I know he would appreciate everyone's kind words. I think he spent like 3 weeks at my house doing this. You should have seen his face when I told him I wanted to make some new changes.......

Thanks again for the kind words everyone. Its a great room and Im one seriously lucky you know what for having it.

best regards,
Jerry

Wow, very impressive.

Did you find Axis control worked at all? I've never had much luck with it. I wonder if all speakers must be at the same height to work.

Also do you find 8000's for sides and rears overkill?

Also the ultimate question, with all that investment. Do you run your HD player over analog uncompressed or SPDIF compressed (DD/DTS)?

Hey George,
I find Axis works but its subtle. I am using the +3 for the center and +2 for the mains.

I don't find the 8000s for the mains and rears as overkill as I have no subs in the room. The room is actually a trapazoid shape- the front is like 17.5' wide and the rear is like 19' wide. The length is something like 29'. And the height at the top of the platform is like 7.5' and at the bottom is like 9' - so if you do the math its like 4400 cubic feet- its a good amount of air to move. The sides and centers are 7000 and they are all set to large. The 7000s actually move a good amount of air too. They are absolutely overkill for the sides- but at the time I didn't want to do the 33s and I didnt like the idea of doing a wall mounted 5000 series speaker. If I were doing it over today, Id have made the room taller, gone with an 8000 for the center, and done some kind of Meridian in wall speaker (DSP420?) for the sides and 8000s for the rears.

I dont have the multichannel input card so I run HDDVD over compressed SPDIF. The toshiba XA1 will up/down sample things to 1.5mbs DTS and the result is quite a bit of an improvement over the standard DVD soundtracks- so while its not quite the ultimate these new formats can do, its a nice improvement.

best regards,
Jerry

Thanks for the info.

Are your 8000's set to large as well?

P.S. So when is the party again?

Yep- all speakers are set to large. The Mains are set to corner and the center and sides are set to boundary. My room isnt big enough for a real party- but I hear the guys in UK have some new space...

best regards,
Jerry

Wow

Yeah - with our F80's and 26" LCD's we can achieve the same results in a 6'x6' dunny. Bet you don't have a toilet in your cinema - us Brits don't even to have to stop for a loo break as its an integral feature of a typical British home cinema

A real party is not defined by the room space, its how many Hikkers you invite over......

Beautiful. Nice job!

Jerry,

Perhaps time to order a IA45 ?
I found the non compressed sound tracks (PCM) of Bluray a real improvement over the DD 640 kbps track. Perhaps that the 1.5 mbps DTS stream sounds better than a 640 kbps DD track, but the anlogue path might even sound better.

I agree it would likely sound better. I spoke with Meridian on the fact that the 1.5 DTS sounds so noticeably better than even the 640kps DD track and clearly much better than the 480 off of regular DVD and they said it should as it should have a wider dynamic range.

For me this is more about the state of my enthusiasm and my own crazy life than wanting to do it. Sure I want to do it and my enthusiasm is as strong as ever, but I have kids whose lives take a lot of my time- and Im grateful for it- but it means that I have to really think carefully about what I want to do with my free time when I have time away from the family- and everyone needs that. I think the IA45 is a stopgap measure- we know that there is an update to the 861 on the horizon and I am not sure about where everything will go re: HDMI I think over the next year or so we will begin to at least get a sense of direction from Meridian. That's not something they told me, just my own opinion on you can't do these updates without addressing this in some way. It seems the high end, their market, really wants a way to get the best audio possible, which is in their best interest so Im just using common sense here to say I'm going to wait and see. Deploying the IA45 means taking the time to reprogram my 861 and Crestron too- its the "debugging" that takes time and I just don't have it right now. Wish I did but I have other hobbies and interests and of course the family and work to take up the time. I like that I sit down in my theater and it just works- and sounds pretty darn good right now. But I'm not doubting that the IA45 method would result in better results.

best regards,
Jerry