Home cinema on a budget
Are you popcorn ready? How to replicate that theatre going experience on a budget.
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irst, a word on the best systems money can buy. If you’re building new, home automation is an ideal solution as it works off a centralised platform for movies, music, radio and anything from lighting controls to security systems. There’s no boxes or cables (a huge benefit!), speakers are often integrated into the building fabric and you can control it all from your phone; in one word: seamless. Considering the amount of work involved and the wiring, it could be a significant outlay. In the case of a retrofit, wireless home automation systems are available too but remember that some amount of cabling is always required. If having a really good cinema experience is high on your ‘wish list’ then you will have the budget to go to a specialist company to see what’s on offer. Even if you don’t, do visit one to test the sound and get a feel for the controls. The live audio and tactile experience will beat any review you can read of it! Bring along music you know well to gauge the quality.
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The budget conscious and environmental option is to use your existing TV. In that case check it’s HD ready (that it has an HDMI port for streaming or for Blu-Ray, see below). If not you can use a simple DVD player and settle for the kind of image quality we’ve lived with over the past decade. You can always invest in a new TV, or projector, at a later time. Buying new, television sets nowadays are High Definition: from simple HD, which is now standard, to 4K Ultra HD, which is four times crisper (four times as many pixels) than HD. Projectors and TVs can be bought at this higher resolution
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but at roughly double the price. The UHD set should be able to upscale your cable satellite or digital TV content to this higher quality but it won’t be able to provide it on streamed content that’s not specifically 4K UHD. Three dimensional viewing (3D) is an option for both television sets and projectors and the extra cost isn’t as high as investing in 4K UHD. You can even buy a TV that converts regular 2D content into 3D and allows you to specify how much depth to give the image. There’s also a model that allows two video game players to use the same screen (instead of split screens), technology which enables two persons to watch different programmes or movies at the same time; it’s all done with the help of special glasses. An important consideration is screen size, the minimum set nowadays in 32’’ but that will be too small for a home theatre. And believe it or not, there is also such a thing as too big (see table above right). Also make sure the seating isn’t too low when compared to the image – home cinema manufacturer THX says that for a pleasurable experience you shouldn’t have to look up any more than 15 degrees. Shape apparently doesn’t matter much; according to television manufacturers curved screens allow you to have the best seat regardless of where you are in the room, however reviews seem SelfBuild & Improve Your Home