Description :
Many people these days have that magical room in their house known as the home theatre. Often referred to as a “movie room” or “media centre” the home theatre is now a highly popular place for families and friends to gather.
People inexperienced in the whole home theatre scene are often concerned at how expensive it could be to construct and how much room it may take up. But things have changed. People who have not upgraded their television in quite a while are still assuming the prices of flat screens and speakers are in excess of £3000. It is possible to spend that much, but that is only if you are looking at getting that brand new 50” OLED television that isn’t really worth it.
Make Sure Your System Fits Your Space
The first thing I did when I began looking for the speakers I needed was to size up the room that would become my home theatre. It’s easy to maximize the sound of your room if the space is smaller than average. The smaller the space, the less power needed to amplify the speakers. This means you can get a fairly medium powered receiver/amp and speakers that won’t require a lot of power. A lot of people will pack their room with huge over-sized speakers; you will definitely save a lot more money and have better sounding 5.1 using the correct speakers.
Don’t Let That Salesman In The Shop Fool You
You can always end up spending more when you visit some of the large chain shops. Commission sales are what drives staff members to come rushing up to you as soon as you come through the door. Don’t let them try and sell you every useless item under the sun, they will definitely try. Make sure you find out EXACTLY what you are looking for before you walk into the shop.
Speakers
Equipment can cost a lot of money; it’s in your interest to shop around before making any large decisions, I’ve found that quality is definitely worth investing in. I bought speakers from a local shop that sold speakers as separates. This means that I basically selected different front and rear speakers according to my taste, once I had decided on this I began looking for the ideal centre speaker.
The main problem with buying separate speakers is that they vary in color shape and size; it’s difficult to keep the speakers coordinated. I would however, definitely pick separates over an all in one speaker kit. All in one kits are usually great for the budget but not so great for sound quality, unless you’re spending upwards of £1000 I would not suggest it.
If you are upgrading your home theatre, always look out for shops that will allow you to trade in your previous speakers to then put towards your new ones. You may also want to use an online auction site such as eBay to get rid of your old speakers, or even buy your new ones!
Televisions
The television is one item to be careful of. There are hundreds on the market and they range from 300 to 3000+. You must first decide on what the room is primarily going to be used for, Movies? Gaming?
If gaming is a big factor for your setup and you’re looking at getting the £400 budget Samsung LCD or whichever brand, make sure you check what latency the screen has!
This is usually referred to as “response time” and it can greatly affect how fast your control inputs feel coming through to the television. The smaller the response time the better. The minimum response time for gaming would be around 8ms, any more than that and you’ll be at a disadvantage. LCD televisions can have quite a large response time where as Plasma is known to be a lot smaller but it’s not always the case.
Projectors
Projectors are coming down in price these days so make sure you have a look at those, but don’t forget to include the cost of the pull down screen! Projectors can be a great way to maximize the size of the screen. You can get fairly decent HD projectors now at quite a good price. Projectors can be quite hard to watch in the daytime due to daylight shooting through the window. I had to put up blinds and thick curtains to be able to see the screen. One other thing about projectors is they have a lamp life, the bulb inside the projector can only be used for a certain amount of time before it effectively becomes useless. When I last had a projector its bulb could cost up to £400 for a replacement, so keep that in mind.
Although people assume it to be ridiculously expensive, building a home theatre doesn’t have to be. Just make sure you research what you’re looking for and check the specifics of all items!
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If you like our article then kindly share it with your friends. If you want to support us then subscribe on our RSS feed and Daily Newsletter for future updates. Leave a comment below with your thoughts.
*by andreascy*
