theater

Putting the TV on a sound pedestal

A story for your grandchildren: In ancient times, there were these things called armoires--once used for clothing, they evolved into big and bulky cabinets where people hid their big and bulky TVs. But now that plasma, LCD and even OLED sets (the ultimate anorexic model) have completed the television set's swan-like transition, it's understandable if their proud owners no longer want to keep their TVs under wraps.

For these unabashed exhibitionists there's a new Sharp home theater system, a self-contained credenza with built-in speakers, subwoofers and amplifier outfitted with Dolby technology throughout, according to Tech Digest. Sound … Read more

Dolby 3D finds some cinema fans

Dolby has signed up a passel of cinemas to use its Dolby 3D movie technology, the company announced Monday.

At the ShowEast conference Monday, the company offered a list of independent and chain theater companies that will use Dolby 3D: Carousel Cinemas, Cinema City, Cinetopia, Cobb Theatres, Kerasotes Theatres, Malco Theatres, Marcus Theatres, Maya Cinemas, Megaplex Theatres, Starlight Cinemas, Sundance Cinemas, Warren Theatres, Kinepolis Group of Belgium and Supercines of Ecuador.

But Dolby still isn't saying how many screens total are equipped with its technology, a key measurement of how the relative newcomer is faring against incumbent Real D. … Read more

Newsflash: HDTV is too complicated!

In an posting on Crave yesterday, Sony's SVP of Marketing Randy Waynick feels that, as an industry, high definition TV gets a barely passing grade in terms of how it communicates about its products to consumers.

Let's be blunt: HDTV and the next generation home theater it anchors is a trainwreck. What should have been the next great in-home entertainment experience has been marred by an alphabet soup of confusing standards and protocols and dubiously compatible products that consumers should never have been exposed to.

Anyone that has shopped for a TV recently knows how true this is. … Read more

Presenting Goldmund's Media Room, prices start at $300,000

Goldmund, a Swiss-based company, announced the availability of its media room "that exceeds the quality and performance of the nation's top commercial movie theaters and director's screening rooms." They call it "perfection in an imperfect world." Goldmund competes in the ultra-luxury stratosphere of the audiophile universe.

The Goldmund Media Room has up to 128 channels of audio, individual amplifiers for each speaker, and uses proprietary technology to overcome challenging room acoustics. Using their high tech room modeling software, Goldmund's team of professionals determine the number of speakers, and designs all the signal processing … Read more

'Raiders' theater is buried treasure

Its media gear may not be state of the art, but we're just happy to see a home theater that, for once, doesn't have a Star Wars or Star Trek theme. The designers of this Raiders of the Lost Ark theater were commissioned to spend more time on ambience than technical specs, if that's not obvious from the photos. That means special attention was paid to such props as torches, hieroglyphics and Indiana's trademark hat, jacket and whip, as well as the original idol from the movie's opening, according to Electronic House.

The room, which … Read more

Sunfire CRM-2 Cinema Ribbon: The biggest sounding tiny speaker you can buy

Nowadays it seems like everybody wants tiny speakers. Catch is, most small speakers sound small--they squash dynamic range, can't play at all loud, and produce a lot more distortion than large speakers. I've always been frustrated by the sound of really tiny speakers--until I reviewed Sunfire's CRM-2 satellite ($800 each) in the May, 2007 issue of Home Theater magazine .

With its grille removed you notice something unusual: the CRM-2's front baffle is almost completely covered by a 6-inch "ribbon" tweeter (essentially a lightweight aluminum foil, suspended between neodymium magnets). The ribbon's ultra-low moving … Read more

Bringing a faraway galaxy into the home

It's not hard to imagine that Vic Wertz and Lisa Stevens were the former heads of the Official Star Wars Fan Club--all you need to do is take one look at their home theater.

This is no cheap DIY job, to be sure. The couple hired the lead designer on The Phantom Menace to work on the uber-Star Wars theater, which has three levels of seating and measures 22 feet from the back wall to the screen and its custom stage, according to Electronic House. It puts the recently featured Star Trek version to shame.

The theater is adorned … Read more

Logic3 gives 5.1 sound in 15 speakers

Not taken with Yamaha's one-piece 5.1 surround-sound system for $2,000? Still want a cinema sound setup? We've been given an exclusive preview of Logic3's SoundStage speaker system, which incorporates a true 5.1 setup within a single meter-wide enclosure for a more than acceptable $500.

More interesting still is that this 150W beast works its magic with a full 15 speakers--13 mid- and high-range drivers, plus twin subwoofers.

Like Yamaha's YSP-1100, the technology works by bouncing sound around the walls of your living room, eliminating the need for individual speakers that can be problematic … Read more

What do you watch on a 24k TV?

Nearly a year after its first sightings, the $130,000 "Yalos Diamond" TV may finally have some competition--at least in the Department of Gaudy (otherwise known as DOG).

Speaking of abbreviations, we didn't know that LG stood for "Luxury Gold," as it does in the case of this 24-carat monstrosity. True to its moniker, the home theater system includes a 71-inch LCD in full 1080p high definition, as well as receivers, media players and a 500-watt sound all trimmed and plated in real gold, according to Aving. It's truly obscene.

The price of the … Read more

Early details trickle out on new Denon receivers

We're slated to attend a Denon press event on July 24, where we'll almost certainly get the details on its new line of receivers, but it looks like the good guys over at Audioholics got on early look at a couple of the new models--the AVR-3808CI and AVR-4308CI. You can check out the full details at Audioholics, but here's the short story:

The AVR-3808CI comes loaded with four HDMI 1.3 inputs and a single HDMI output. It also features a new graphical user interface (GUI), and we're betting it probably looks like the leaked photos we blogged before. Like the new Onkyo receivers, the 3808 has built-in decoding for both Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio, although prospective buyers should be aware that currently no Blu-ray or HD DVD player is capable of outputting these soundtracks' formats to the receiver in bitstream format. The 3808 can also upconvert analog signals to HDMI, along with scaling them to 1080p. Some enthusiasts have lamented that Denon decided to use Faroudja video processing on these models instead of HQV (seen on Onkyo's receivers, like the TX-SR875 and TX-NR905), but we'll withhold our judgment until we actually get our hands on it. There's also an Ethernet jack, and you'll be able to stream digital music files and Internet radio to the receiver. The Ethernet jack also enables custom installers to log into your receiver and make adjustments offsite.… Read more