I thought of the famous phrase in the Crocodile Dundee film when he's confronted by a mugger in New York - “you call that a knife? This was after describing my home theatre to film buff Des Althorp. In reply, he introduced me to his ensemble - nearly one million pounds spent and over two year's in the construction, probably the best non-commercial home theatre in the UK.
Des's background is in IT. Not running around offices fixing computers, but in charge of networking huge commercial installations - typically a whole American skyscraper-full of wire. He must see his home theatre as being on an almost toy-like scale to tinker with compared to his workaday stuff. He reckons that improvements to the system are 'never ending.'
The installation is a cost-no-object affair and includes sources such as a Mark Levinson Media Player at around £10,000. It is controlled by an AMX touch-screen panel which integrates an array of media servers and players, three satellite systems, and one of the highest quality commercial cinema digital projectors on the market. Other automated control items are the Lutron-controlled lighting system, air-conditioning, heating and a 4m Stewart Filmscreen with motorised masking (designed to adjust to frame the picture anywhere from Cinemascope to 4:3 format).
All the equipment is somewhat overshadowed by the construction of the cinema itself. This is a discrete custom-made building on Des's land in the west country. Inside, it's devoid of first-order sound reflections and virtually all other acoustic anomalies have been drastically tamed. This was achieved by acoustician Norman Varney, owner of Ohio-based A/V RoomService Ltd. His long and distinguished CV includes being involved in the set-up and design of the scoring stage of Lucas Film's Skywalker Ranch.
Computer modelling
Norman's work started with a full computer-modelled design incorporating an acoustically-insulated floating floor and ceiling. The walls are manufactured to an accuracy of three millimetres end to end, and are built out-of-square to minimise reflections. This is further aided by diffusion panels. The floor and ceiling are mounted on a battery of coil springs and the ceiling hangs on 56 of them, each bonded with an impact-curing epoxy resin capsule.
Des is enthusiastic about all aspects of the movie industry and because he has the odd bit of cash to spare, has even looked at the idea of producing films himself in cooperation with a professional film industry colleague.
Finally I asked Des about his favourite movies and, unsurprisingly, some of them go nicely with the massive dynamic impact of the system and the towering performance of the Digital Projection IS-15. He mentioned films like Armageddon and Fifth Element. I must admit that I like to play those too, but the impact on my home cinema is not quite the same!
Equipment list
AMX Modero 8.4 inch touch panel
AMX 17 inch touch panel (2)
AMX Netlinx controller
Mark Levinson No.51 Media Player
Sony BDP1 Blu-ray player
Toshiba XE1 HD DVD player
Humax HD satellite receiver
Sky HD satellite receiver
Pioneer HD Laserdisc player
Pioneer AVX-10 DVD/SACD player
MS Windows Media Center PC
JVC DVHS 4000 tape player/recorder
Marshall 17 inch rack-mounted HD monitor
Digital Projection MMS-1000 processor
Mark Levinson No.40 HD Media Console
Mark Levinson No.436 300W Monoblock
Mark Levinson No.436 300W Monoblock
Mark Levinson No.333 stereo amplifier
Mark Levinson No.333 stereo amplifier
Mark Levinson No.333 stereo amplifier
Kaleidescape 10TB server
Extron 8x8 analogue matrix switch
Gefen 6x2 HDMI switch
Sony MSC-4000 Muse decoder
Snell & Wilcox Interpolator
Equi=tech power supplies 100, 110 and 230V
Lutron lighting control system
Digital Projection IS-15 2K (3KW) projector
Faroudja HD projector (spare!)
Stewart Filmscreen 0.9 gain screen
Stewart Filmscreen motorised masking
Wilson MAXX 2 front speakers
Wilson surround speakers (4)
Wilson WATTPuppy (centre)
Wilson subwoofers (2)
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Mick Cox
