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As this forum is rarely used anymore, we've locked it. Feel free to browse and read. Questions? Please reach out to us directly. Cheers! |
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Clarence
Joined: 08 Mar 2006
Posts: 3827
Location: Smith Mtn Lake, VA
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2007 4:17 am Post subject: |
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| achase wrote: | | The last units used special ILA panels that were native 16 x 9, had faster response times, superior colorimetry, and much higher contrast ratios. Also important to factor in your calculations is the use of the upcoming HQV line quintuplers. They will take the native 24p H-Def player outputs and convert it to 120P. In doing this the on-screen brightness is increased about 30% over the usual level. The autoranging ability is one of the main reasons I went with the older technology. |
Quintupled (24p x5) blu-ray will be SWEEEEEEEEEEEEET!
I've got some customer data centers in Hartford/Newington... I visit about once a year. I might send you a PM next time I'm in the area. I'd love to see that HT!
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achase
Joined: 03 Sep 2007
Posts: 113
Location: West Hartford
TV/Projector: Christie 4k DCI
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2007 5:24 am Post subject: |
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| AnalogRocks wrote: | | Welcome to the forum achase. 120P refresh? Does that smooth the picture out or does it make things look artificial at all? |
Nice to be here. No, the additional frame rate does not alter your viewing perception. It's the same as being in a theater where the projector actually flashes each frame of film two or three times. A similar technique is used by Faroudga and others with their frame doublers, triplers, and quadruplers for 60i sources.
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rabies_70
Joined: 15 Feb 2007
Posts: 1189
Location: Carlsbad, CA
TV/Projector: Sony G70Q
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2007 6:24 am Post subject: |
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It is REALLY cool to know that someone building something like that is here on the forums, which in MHO makes him real. Welcome to the site, and by the way, VERY nice place you have there 
_________________
Ray
I am an iconoclast
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Tom.W
Joined: 09 Mar 2006
Posts: 6635
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2007 11:34 am Post subject: |
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Welcome to the forum Arnold ! Can you give a little more information on the audio system and cables ?
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cmjohnson
Joined: 03 Apr 2006
Posts: 5180
Location: Buried under G90s
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2007 11:48 am Post subject: |
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Ah, light valves.  I have great respect for that technology.
I remember my AmPros including the 7400 quite well. If it weren't only for their relatively low contrast ratio, they were unquestionably the best very large format display systems going. And even then....all things considered for their day, that was
the best high brightness technology going.
It was quite a bit of fun to fire up the 7400 with the long 7:1 lens and throw movies onto the side of the neighbor's house
across the street. Back in the day when the wall was white and there were no bushes in the path. It made for some
fun neighborhood movie nights.
CRT-like images, (more like film-like, at highest resolutions), loads of light output to spare, no fixed pixel structure....if only the
contrast ratio was CRT-like. But before the contrast ratios had been kicked up into what we CRT enthusiasts would call acceptable,
the ILA/light valve had been outmoded and replaced with the D-ILA, LCD-based variant.
Those CRTs in the ILA machines DO wear, eventually. But they should wear no faster than any normal CRT.
And there's probably a small stock of new replacement CRTs available somewhere. Hughes, maybe. But both IST and Thomas
made ILA/light valve CRTs for AmPro.
I WOULD advise laying in a stock of spare ILA CRTs "just in case". And maybe consider getting them pre-mounted in field-replaceable
cell assemblies.
CJ
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Z-Photo
Joined: 07 Mar 2006
Posts: 2749
Location: Huntsville - Alabama
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2007 11:50 am Post subject: |
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Arnold,
Welcome,
Let me know if you ever need 20-30 swimwear models running around the place.....
_________________
Engineer by Day
Photographer by Night
My Portfolio
The Only GOOD AMPRO - is a Dead AMPRO.
wait - are they not all DEAD already?
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Tom.W
Joined: 09 Mar 2006
Posts: 6635
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achase
Joined: 03 Sep 2007
Posts: 113
Location: West Hartford
TV/Projector: Christie 4k DCI
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2007 4:15 pm Post subject: |
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| Tom.W wrote: | | Welcome to the forum Arnold ! Can you give a little more information on the audio system and cables ? |
Back in 1969, I had a part-time business selling stereo equipment (Sansui, AR, Kenwood, etc.) at a college in the Boston area. I had built what I thought was a really good stereo system until the day I walked into a McIntosh / Klipsch dealer ( The Music Box) in Wellesley, MA. They had a A/B speaker switching system, and started out playing the AR3a’s that I was using at the time, fed by McIntosh amps. They then switched to a pair of Klipschorns. My jaw dropped as I heard a sound unlike anything I had ever experienced before. It was one of those ‘life changing’ moments as I realized that everything I thought I knew about audio before then went out the window. (Of course, my next thought was, “How in the world can I ever afford to buy a system like this??? Years of further stereo sales and a wholesale connection to sell the Klipsch commercial line to bars and hotels solved that problem)
Fast forward about 13 years, and I’m in the broadcasting business enjoying success and a new house with a “state of the art” E.S.P. industrial CRT video projector. I had assembled a ‘Surround Sound’ audio system using Klipschorns for the main Speakers driven by MC-2300 amps, and McIntosh speakers and amps for the other channels. I can’t remember what the ‘state-of-the-art” surround sound processor was, but I do recall the ‘matrix logic’ sounding very impressive for the time, especially if fed from the Laserdisc’s ‘digital’ output! All in all, the system sounded better than anything I had ever heard in the theaters, and I was quite happy with it.
Then…..I go out to Hollywood to a TV programming convention and stay at the Century City complex. Across the way was one of the movie theater chains “flagship' theaters showing “Ghandi in 70mm six-channel magnetic stereo. I decide to see the film, and as I am walking into this HUGE theater (the giant old fashioned type before “twinning”, with hundreds of seats, multiple balconies, etc) I see an easel at the doorway touting the fact that “This theater is equipped with a HPS-4000 Sound System”. I had never heard of “HPS-4000”, and THX was considered THE ultimate thing a theater could equip itself with. As I’m waiting for the movie to begin, I remember thinking smugly to myself how no theater ever came close to duplicating my “Klipschorn/McIntosh" experience.
The movie begins, and within minutes I am experiencing the same kind of audio 'revelation’ I had back at The Music Box years before. The bass, the dialog clarity, and the overall sound experience put my home system to absolute shame. And to do this in such a massive theater was a mind-blowing feat to me. I never forgot that day, and about 10 years ago when I was adding on to my present home, I contacted John Allen, the owner of the company to see if he would build a small version for my (then) new home theater. He agreed to do so, and for the last ten years I’ve been able to experience a bit of what I heard in ’82. My ultimate goal, however, was to recreate the ‘Ghandi’ sound on a larger scale, which brings us to the present question. The speaker cabling used in ALL of the HPS-4000 installations is ordinary non-metallic jacketed 10 gauge, 4 conductor electrical cable, with the wires ‘doubled’ to create one massive ‘pair’. I know at this point many of you are rolling your eyes, but let me share with you another story:
In the early 1970’s, I was friends with the owner of The Stereo Shop in Hartford, CT. Being the science nerd that I am, I questioned the real need for the super-expensive turntable cables that supposedly ‘changed the sound of your records’, or the silver-plated speaker cables. It was the latter that I took the most exception with. I just could not see the benefit of spending the $20 or so a foot for the fancy cable when logic told me conductor size was more important than having a hundred small silver-plated conductors. Every time I visited the Stereo Shop the arguments grew more intense. Finally, the owner agreed to bring to my house a pair of the largest McIntosh speakers made, as well as a MC-2300 amplifier to drive them. An A/B speaker switch was provided, and he hooked up his silver cables to one side, and I hooked up ORDINARY 12 GAUGE SOLID CONDUCTOR ARMOR JACKETED (“BX”) ELECTRICAL CABLE that I had left over after an electrical installation to the other side.
Hours later, after listening to all sorts of source material from the intimately familiar to the Lincoln Mayora ‘Direct to Disk’ series, I could detect ABSOLUTELY NO DIFFERENCE between the two, and frankly neither could he. Thus with this background, I found complete comfort years later with John Allen’s approach: let the end result do the talking.
John uses custom designed BGW amplifiers for all channels.
http://www.hps4000.com/pages/Project440.html
Sorry for such a long winded answer to your question –
Arnold
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Heywood Jablome
Joined: 12 Mar 2006
Posts: 1548
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2007 5:02 pm Post subject: |
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| achase wrote: | The speaker cabling used in ALL of the HPS-4000 installations is ordinary non-metallic jacketed 10 gauge, 4 conductor electrical cable, with the wires ‘doubled’ to create one massive ‘pair’. I know at this point many of you are rolling your eyes,
Arnold |
Few eyes will be rolling hereabouts... few here put much stock in obscenely expensive interconnects and "magic" audio upgrades. In fact, Curt Palme is/was an installer for audio systems (large venue stuff mostly) and we frequently get a healthy chuckle out of $3000 IEC electric cords with Unobtanium terminals hand-assembled by a beautiful virgin only on mid-summeres' eve.
_________________
"Those countries which lag behind in industry, in the application of mechanics and technical chemistry, in the careful selection and utilization of natural products, where the respect for such activities does not permeate all classes of society, will unfailingly decline in prosperity. They will sink faster when neighbor states, with an energetic exchange between science and industry, go forward with renewed vitality."
-- Baron Alexander von Humboldt: 1769-1859
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garyfritz
Joined: 08 Apr 2006
Posts: 12088
Location: Fort Collins, CO
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2007 5:13 pm Post subject: |
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Great stuff, Arnold! Thanks for sharing that. Heywood is right -- you'll find many kindred souls here. Though not many with your HT budget.  Welcome to the asylum, and I hope you'll keep us updated on your HT construction!
Gary
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Heywood Jablome
Joined: 12 Mar 2006
Posts: 1548
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2007 5:16 pm Post subject: |
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Oh... and I'm also a Klipsch fan (horn loaded in general) with a 7.1 all-Herritage system under construction (anchored by a pair of LaScalas for my mains.)
_________________
"Those countries which lag behind in industry, in the application of mechanics and technical chemistry, in the careful selection and utilization of natural products, where the respect for such activities does not permeate all classes of society, will unfailingly decline in prosperity. They will sink faster when neighbor states, with an energetic exchange between science and industry, go forward with renewed vitality."
-- Baron Alexander von Humboldt: 1769-1859
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Tom.W
Joined: 09 Mar 2006
Posts: 6635
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2007 11:40 pm Post subject: |
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Any photos of the HT ? By the way I have been using #10 insulated solid copper wire for my speaker runs for many years with no complaints . 8)
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perisoft
Joined: 29 Aug 2007
Posts: 2920
Location: Ithaca, NY
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| Posted: Tue Sep 04, 2007 2:32 am Post subject: |
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Arnold,
Your post brought a smile to my face. After seeing everything from $450 volume knobs which "change the vibrations" and improve your music to little plastic chips which you place on top of your CD player and which claim to add more information to the CD, seeing someone who invests money in a system *where appropriate* is a real breath of fresh air. The other posters here are right, though - it seems that people in the CRT projector world are fairly rubber-meets-the-road when it comes to real vs. perceived performance. Of course, with video it's a bit easier to do real tests on quality - even a mediocre digital camera can catch the placebo-effect in action. And it's a bit more intuitively obvious when your source quality is the limiting factor (I recently saw a thread full of guys who were horribly upset at their software's habit of downsampling final audio output from 96 to 48khz - despite the fact that, even if they could -hear- 40khz frequencies, no sound engineer in his right mind is going around sticking them in his mixes).
Personally, having yet to attain the level of business success you enjoy (don't feel too bad; I've got time!) I get a charge out of making silk purses from sows' ears, and pulling the absolute best from what I can acquire with ingenuity and patience. Achieving 90% of the performance on 1% of the budget is almost as challenging as running a business... And in that vein it's also cool to see that even though you could hire guys to do the dirty work for you you're still getting in there and yanking on wires. 'Cos hell, that's half the fun anyway!
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achase
Joined: 03 Sep 2007
Posts: 113
Location: West Hartford
TV/Projector: Christie 4k DCI
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| Posted: Tue Sep 04, 2007 4:43 am Post subject: |
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| Tom.W wrote: | | Any photos of the HT ? |
Here you go. These were taken last Spring before the scaffolding went up. It'll still be another year before things will be ready to 'rock and roll'.
For fun is a picture taken a few weeks ago of the main transformer being energized by the power company. The left side of the transformer is the 23,000 volt primary. Note the Nomex flameproof hoods they use when energizing (in case of flashover)!!!
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Main power feed being energized.
(taken 8/07) |
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From projection booth area towards screen.
(taken 4/07) |
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From roughly the screen area looking toward the audience.
(taken 4/07) |
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jask
Joined: 17 Mar 2006
Posts: 10187
Location: kamloops BC
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| Posted: Tue Sep 04, 2007 7:48 am Post subject: |
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I am speechless!!(but grinning from ear to ear!!) that is fantastic and I look forward to your progress photos
Welcome to the forum
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dc_pilgrim
Joined: 31 Oct 2006
Posts: 225
Location: PA
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| Posted: Tue Sep 04, 2007 11:03 am Post subject: |
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I read that article over the weekend while visiting my family. Some of them didn't understand, but I had your back. Too great, welcome to the forum.
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achase
Joined: 03 Sep 2007
Posts: 113
Location: West Hartford
TV/Projector: Christie 4k DCI
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| Posted: Tue Sep 04, 2007 12:42 pm Post subject: |
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| dc_pilgrim wrote: | | I read that article over the weekend while visiting my family. Some of them didn't understand, but I had your back. Too great, welcome to the forum. |
You have no idea what its been like the past two weeks...I used to be in the media myself, and I never would have believed it possible to distort a situation as much as I've just witnessed!
What should have been a non-article or an article about Connecticut's most energy efficient house design came about because of a "perfect storm" of events: First, an A.P. photographer was arrested for breaking through a chain-link fence posted with "private property" and "no-trespassing" signs and shooting photos while walking into the house. All this, of course, was caught on surveillance video. Naturally in print it became, "...a freelance photographer seeking permission to photograph the house for The Associated Press was cited for trespassing." The last time I checked, I believe permission to do something was granted prior to the fact, and without breaking and entering...Second, it was a no-news weekend, and third, it was a holiday when most media operate with only minimal staffs and rely on the wire services for most of their stories.
Even though there aren't things like a ticket booth and soda fountain in the house, that stuff got printed. The most unfortunate part about the article was the spin to make everything seem exaggerated without purpose, when in reality the house was designed to handle major charitable fund raisers, as similar homes in other parts of the country do. Even the HT is designed to bring potential donors in, show them a video of the organization, and then follow it up with a live presentation. There will be a small stage with removable podium (hooked up to the sound system) below the screen to do this. But this is a HT forum , after all, so I'll stick to the technical aspects...
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Tom.W
Joined: 09 Mar 2006
Posts: 6635
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| Posted: Tue Sep 04, 2007 1:20 pm Post subject: |
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Was wondering about the speakers and how many are required . Also will the screen be curved or flat ?
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ecrabb
Forum Moderator
Joined: 13 Mar 2006
Posts: 15909
Location: Utah
TV/Projector: JVC RS40, Epson 5010
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| Posted: Tue Sep 04, 2007 5:10 pm Post subject: |
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My favorite part of the AP "story" was this:
| Quote: | Some question the morality of building a private home that large.
"Do you actually need to have that amount of space to live a good life?" said Susan A. Eisenhandler, a sociology professor at the University of Connecticut. "There are homeless people. There are impoverished people. There are serious social concerns, and we're not addressing that." |
I wonder... According to the PhD, what would be the magic number of square feet we DO NEED to live a good life? If we define "good life" as having our health and being happy, then I'd submit that to live a good life, none of us NEED any more than a roof over our heads, food on the table, and the ability to provide for ourselves and our families. However, the ability to do things - and doing them - for others AND for yourself that make hard work and risk worthwhile. I simply lose more and more respect for the academic community each time I read another comment like this. Then, there's the "journalism" aspect to this. Every time I see a news story and know details from the event or hear details from someone close to the situation, the news story always seems to have the important details completely missing or screwed up. Are contemporary journalists completely incapable of writing good hard news stories without adding editorial or trying to invent a "big picture" where none exists (or ignoring one that does when it doesn't suit your preferences)? Sorry, I get a little wound up sometimes.
Nay-sayers aside, it looks it will be a truly amazing and beautiful property. I know I'll be eagerly awaiting the time when we can see a few pics of the theater as it's getting built and when it's finished. A few details about the equipment specs would be awesome, too.
Best of luck with your project and welcome to the forum, Mr. Chase.
SC
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dc_pilgrim
Joined: 31 Oct 2006
Posts: 225
Location: PA
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| Posted: Tue Sep 04, 2007 6:11 pm Post subject: |
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Yeah my old man thought it was extravagant, but thought much, much less of the PhD who wanted to tell him how to spend his money.
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