As I've mentioned in the past, I'm renting half of this house from my parents. Currently I'm on the ground floor, and they're in the basement. They're using my rent money to make renovations to the house. My dad wants to rent this house later on so he'll have some extra income. I plan on renting the whole thing for a while, but we're making the ground floor and basement entirely separate in anticipation of him renting to other people in the future.

We just made a new stairwell (well, it's still in the process) to the basement so the existing one in the house can be taken out, which will also add floorspace to both levels. However, I don't think any of the renovations have gone as well as I'd like them to, so I thought I should run any more major changes by you guys just so we may avoid some pitfalls. I'll draw up the current layout as well as the basic plan for the new layout (major wall to be knocked out to make most of the basement a big, open area--not the dedicated home theater I want, but my dad won't budge). I look forward to any feedback. In the meantime, my dad's already asking me about flooring, so I'll start with that.

What would you do for flooring? I'm hoping for thin (as the basement is short, and it's going to have a suspended ceiling, making it even shorter), durable, easy to maintain. Of course not so expensive would be nice, since I have other priorities. I don't want to carpet, but rather just use rugs.

So what do you think? Any strong opinions? It would be nice to be able to respond to my father being somewhat informed. Thanks for any advice you may have!

I'll be posting a lot more questions as the endeavor progresses.

All right, I guess I don't need advice on the flooring right away. It sounds like he wants to concentrate on some other stuff first. I would still like to know more than what I can glean through the little online guides to flooring, but at least now there's no time pressure. I'm just scared of everything being done without enough planning. My dad can have a tendency to do that. Me, I'd rather have everything planned out beforehand so it's done right the first time and the end result matches the original vision.

What exactly do you need help with? This is a pretty vast subject.

Just ignore me for now. When I have specific questions, I'll pop back in here. Before I even ask anything specific, I'm hoping to have the layout drawn up as well as list the goals for the space. Thanks!

I now wished I used bamboo. Renewable resource, durable, and looks cool.
Was impossible to get here 2 years ago without paying big premiums, now all the flooring stores carry it.

Yeah, bamboo is awesome. Makes great cutting boards, too.

I used this bamboo when I remodeled our bedroom iFloor
Very durable,inexpensive, great looking and not to difficult to install.

My best friend went with bamboo in his basement. I'll have to look into it.

I'm going to revive this thread, but I don't know how much of what has already been said is going to be relevant. My dad's going to want to do more work again soon, so I wanted to mock up a plan of the layout. Thankfully, one of my former coworker's friends just got her Bachelor of Architecture degree, and, unable to find work in her field so far, she's now working in our department, and she was hungry for a project in which she could employ some of her knowledge. I suggested I may need her services in order to draw up the layout of my basement so I could share with you guys and get your feedback. She came over tonight and made a really fast, not-to-scale drawing of the basic layout with the measurements, then made a model in Google SketchUp Pro with the anticipated layout (which she'll refine after some more time, but I thought I'd jump the gun to give you all an idea of what my space might turn out to look like). I can't give you the current layout at the moment, but I'll post the few pictures of the SketchUp model that she emailed me, and I'll describe what I can of what's different from the current layout.



Currently, there's actually a wall where it shows the beam over the couch, and that beam actually runs full across the basement, supported by probably three beams. There are two in the wall that we're planning on knocking down, and she's going to calculate whether or not the beam that currently exists where we'd like the seating to be can be moved to the extreme right before the ledge around the perimeter. Her estimation is that it should be feasible, which would certainly be nice. Otherwise, I may not be able to get away with two rows of seating, since a beam could interfere with the people in the rear seating.

The bedroom, bathroom, and kitchenette area are not currently divided like that. The bedroom is actually even tinier right now, since there's another stairwell coming down the right side of that space, which the one in the mock-up replaces. The bedroom also does not open directly into the bathroom like that. There's empty space between the two.

She was thinking the heavy curtain idea would be best for blocking the stairwell entrance during movie watching.





Hopefully this gives you enough of an idea of my current plan so you can tear it apart.

Wow, what a great program. Beam supports are a big hassle in basements. Looks like your layout would work but are you planning to isolate the kitchenette from the HT area with a curtain or something else to define the area better?
Don't mind me I wish I could do something in my basement.
Mel N.

Looks good, CV. What are the dimensions of the HT area? Are you going to ceiling mount the QS8 near the kitchen?

Yeah, they're going to be ceiling-mounted, and yeah, I suppose I should have some sort of table to dine at behind the theater seating somewhere, huh?

I didn't have the measurements handy, so I had to remeasure the area for the home theater. Just counting floorspace, it's about 14' wide by 28' long (from ledge to stairwell). Yeah, not good numbers if you're considering a perfectly rectangular room, but does the space above the ledge and opening into the kitchenette make the acoustics complex enough that it might not be a problem?

No, I hadn't considered anything for really sectioning that area off. My major concern was the stairwell.

I would say it's less of a problem with the space opening into the kitchen. Of course, what other anomalies may crop up is another issue!

One of my great regrets in life (so far) is not making myself rich enough to afford a brand new, custom-designed home.

Wow, almost exactly a year since I last posted in this thread. The metal skeleton for the stairwell was just put in today, so I thought I'd share a couple of pictures.

Just leave it like that to keep drunk people out.







Or in.

Yes, you're all invited to be trapped in my basement.

Add steps but make them raise up to form a slide at the touch of a button.

I would make the trip to see that.

That would be completely awesome.

Dang, I knew there was a good reason for having kids...

Another vote for leaving the stair risers as they are, but I think you should add a pond with an alligator under the stairs for motivation.

This is shaping up to be the Best Theater EVER!

I vote for alligator pond, too.

I'm more of a sulphuric acid kind of person. It leaves no evidence.


Uhh, that's what I've been told.

I think I'm going to have a tiny system under the stairs. I could have my nice big system out in the open for me, and then if I invite a friend over for multiplayer gaming, they can be sent to the tiny stair room. But at least it would be a good excuse to get some M0s, right?

Okay, so that would be way down on the list, but I have to use that space for something more fun than just storing my vacuum and stuff, right?

Spikes. Gotta have spikes.

Sharks with ""Laaaaazzzeeerssss"".

In regards to the concrete ledge that runs around the perimeter of the basement, is there a good reason to not put one of the horizontal EP800s on it behind the screen, even though the screen won't be acoustically transparent? Does the fact that it's a subwoofer and not a normal channel make it a non-issue? It would be better if I could put it up and behind so I have more room for center channel and screen. Just curious.

I think it depends on how far the drivers are from the screen material. If they are to close it will probably push that part of the screen in a and out a little which might be noticeable while veiwing. In my apartment when I had my EP500 about 3 feet in front of my seat I could feel it pushing air past my legs though at that distance I doubt it would have been noticeable pushing against a screen. I think even an AT screen might have the same problems up close given the amount of air I imagine the EP800s push. Only way to know for sure is to try it out.

Not sure if it would works but I imagine the drivers could be pointed up if normal positioning is to close.

Good points. What if it's a solid screen and not a fabric? I'm not sure how much distance there would be between the drivers and the screen, but I'm sure I have space to play with.

Really not sure. I imagine with a solid screen as long as it was well anchored you wouldn’t get much movement unless it was very close to the divers but I really don’t know. I’m also not sure how much impact if any a solid screen would have on the higher frequencies your sub would be putting out say around 80Hz. You may loose some mid bass punch with a solid barrier between you and the sub but I don’t think it would have any effect on the deeper bass.

Can you set up a simulation and give it a try to see what happens?

It's a possibility. I'll see.

I'd include the AS-EQ1 in the simulation. That'll give you an objective view of what's actually happening.

This is where it would be handy to have a laptop.

Also, I think the Room EQ Wizard software would work better in this case. I only get the graphs for the AS-EQ1 when I go through the entire calibration process. One of these days, I will invest in a good sound card, microphone, laptop, and learn how to use REW.

Since I don't know, exactly, when I'll be able to set up a simulation, I posed the question to Axiom in case they've already researched the outcome of such positioning. I imagine any performance impact would be minimal. A lot of people don't have their subwoofer drivers facing into the room, including (presumably) all people with downward-firing subs. It's not exactly the same, but then subs are often placed between furniture, so there are usually significant physical barriers in most rooms.

I know, I know. You still want me to do it so I can see what it does in my specific room. Taskmasters, the lot of you!

While your experimenting ever thought of ceiling mounting it above and slightly in front of your seating aimed at you. That might get you some near field midbass punch. The floor would also work but wouldn’t look nearly as cool.

Ha ha. I hadn't considered that, no, but you do have me considering Buttkickers.

Hey, I'll have a party once I'm actually able to move my system into the basement, and you're all invited to help me move my subwoofers around and get them situated just right.

By the way, can you remind me what, precisely, your Buttkicker setup consists of?

I have the Buttkicker LFE Kit.

http://www.thebuttkicker.com/home_theater/products/bk_lfe_kit.htm

However other varieties are available as are other brands. I got a smoking deal on the LFE Kit locally from Fry’s Electronics because the department manager wanted to get rid of it since it wasn’t selling.

I only have the one transducer but up to 4 can be connected to one amp. Also any amp powerful enough can drive it if someone has a spare amp laying around however, other transducers can be easier to drive with an extra amp. The advantage I’ve found with using the dedicated amp are the controls especially the variable high frequency cutoff which allows me to control what frequencies get through to the transducer down to 40Hz. I generally leave it at 40Hz but there are some movies you would think have really low bass but actually don’t so I need to bump it up for those. This filter stops the “voice in butt” syndrome many other brands suffer from because they reproduce a wider range of frequencies. Also minimizes all but the lowest bass in the music from reaching your butt.

IMO one regular transducer is more than enough for several seats if they are connected rigidly in some way. It worked great on my futon in the apartment and now I just have it attached to a 2x4 sitting on the ground with the back legs of my seats sit on top of the 2x4. I was going to build a riser but when I found the seats were high enough not to need one to see over the M80s I figured I’d try out a simple approach and it works great. IMO it actually works better this way than directly attached to the futon. The system is more than powerful enough to shake the 2x4 and attached seats w/o any problems. Plus having it laying along the ground seems to absorb some to the energy so it’s a little less sensitive to changes in power making it easier to get the “volume” right. I also think having it on the 2x4 running along the ground “tightens up” the LFE by dampening any resonating. I have no doubt I could build a riser for two rows of seats and 1 LFE kit would be powerful enough to shake the whole thing as long as it was built rigidly enough.

Some, I imagine most, people turn them up to high especially to demo so people who haven’t had a chance to play with one might thing they are “just to much” or gimmicky, but I can assure you that when calibrated with the system it gives a very “lifelike” feel. Ask Sean how it felt when they were jumping the broken stairs in the Mines of Moria. IMO the Buttkicker enhances scenes like that in a way no subwoofer can w/o over exaggerating the higher bass frequencies.

Stop by and try it out some time. Maybe I can get Sean to do demo and review of it at some point.


Almost forgot. For those who poo poo the extra LFE outputs on some receivers I can say that the extra one makes using a Buttkicker much easier by allowing power adjustments using the receivers remote and separate from the real sub. Before I if I boosted the sub in the receiver it also boosted the Buttkicker which often made it overbearing.

Thanks for the details, Dean. I'll have to get one at some point. It sounds like it adds to the experience quite nicely. What exactly goes into the calibration of it? You mentioned that people turn it up too high, but how do you know the proper level?

I'm glad it comes with its own amplifier.

Good point on the extra LFE output. I'll make sure my next preamp or receiver has at least one extra output.

I thought the Buttkicker enhanced the Mines of Moria scene very nicely. Like Dean said, I believe proper set-up is the key. Set too high and the Buttkicker simply becomes too noticeable. They way Dean had it run was subtle, but effective.

Here's Axiom's response to the subwoofer-behind-the-screen configuration option:

I really liked the idea of movable partition walls to section off the kitchen area and make the theater area of the basement rectangular, but after spending some time actually looking at the layout, there's no way to make that rectangle happen. I still may want a way to section off that area as well as the opening to the stairwell, but I don't know how much it would really improve acoustics. Hmmm....

While it probably won’t change the acoustics much going with a “curtain wall” like I have does a great job creating the illusion of a rectangular room and in turn blocking out all visual distractions so ones focus is primarily on the screen.

So even if you can’t swing a partition wall a curtain wall may help.

Good point. That option is still on the table. I will certainly give Dazian a look when I get to that point.

I'm just going to ramble for a little bit.

My dad has decided to make taking out the walls the next step. We're putting in a new beam, replacing the wood beam which protrudes lower into the room than the rest of the ceiling, and which requires several support posts. The new beam will be a metal I-beam which won't hang lower (or so much lower so as to interfere with the suspended ceiling, anyway) than the floor joists, and it will span a much greater distance without needing a support post, pretty much making the theater area wide open for seating options. The support post that will remain will be out into the room slightly, but I'm glad we get to remove the other two posts which would be more annoying.

He decided to remove all of the walls to tile the floor across the entire basement the same so if he wants to remove or change the position of the walls in the future, there won't be disparities in the floor to deal with. As for the wall I want to go back up, it will allow for slightly more room in the theater/living area and cut into the bedroom a little more, since I really only use my bedroom for sleeping and would rather have more wiggle room for speaker placement options. The final dimensions of the room will be roughly 28'x18'x6.5'. I'm still not a fan of how low the ceiling will be. It won't scrape my own head or that of any of my friends, but I imagine it won't be so great for acoustics. I'll do what I can with some of the ceiling tiles. I'm still pretty dumb about room treatments. It's something I'll be asking for advice on, I'm sure.

Anyway, that's the latest news on that. I'm open to any brainstorms any of you may have.

There are various treatment options which are designed to be installed in T-bar drop ceilings. If you get some designed to diffuse sound, they won't deaden the room (like absorbers will), but the at the same time the ceiling won't act as a reflection point.

Also, if you're installing left and right walls, sacrifice a little width in the back, to make the room taper, like a parallelogram when viewed from above. This will go a long way to preventing standing waves. Oh, duh, I didn't think of the perfect example, like Axiom's speaker cabinets. Also the false walls will make it easy to fish wire for the speakers in the rear of the room.

Stiff walls are a key to allowing the room to be pressurized, and accentuating bass notes. When constructing walls, build the stud frame, place glue (like Liquid Nails) on the studs before screwing the drywall to it. After that sets, screw a second layer of drywall over the first with another layer of glue in between. Offset the seams of the drywall panels so the gaps in the first layer are in the middle of the sheets of the second. Finish the second layer with the usual mud (don't worry about finishing the first).

It would be nice if you could construct the ceiling in the same manner, but as long as the floor above the drop ceiling is solid you should still be able to compress the room's airspace--you'll have the subs to do it.

Oh, forgot about the doors for the room. Find solid core doors (wood, fire doors will usually be good). Have someone run a router around all four edges (stopping just before the latch and hinge mount points) so there is a 1/4" grove in the middle of all edges. Make sure it'll be installed into a frame with four sides (not open on the bottom, but with the little bump). Into the routed grove, glue industrial grade felt. This way the door will provide a bit of a seal when closed, and also be ridged on it's own.

>>Stiff walls are a key to allowing the room to be pressurized, and accentuating bass notes.

This is another of those "totally obvious after someone says it, but not obvious at all until then" things. Thanks !

Thanks for the ideas, Chris. I'll show my dad your posts.

I assume you mean trapezoid, not parallelogram. At most, I could start angling one of the side walls at some point. If you look earlier in the thread, you can see a (former) friend's mock-up of what the basement would look like. Some of our ideas have strayed since then, but the basic layout is pretty close.

The right wall is the basement's concrete perimeter. It already has the 2x4s, insulation, and drywall from a while ago. I'm sure we want something like that on the face of the concrete all of the way around, but I'm not sure if there's a more ideal insulation/drywall combo than what's up. There is already a left wall up in the existing layout, but it will be taken out to do the flooring, then put back up in whatever way we decide to put it back up. As you can see, however, the wall doesn't extend the whole length of the basement, instead opening into the little kitchen area. Even if I angle the wall, it will still have to stop before that kitchen area, and I'm not sure how much benefit it would be versus the space lost.

Yeah, trapezoid. Oh no! Have all the advanced Maths pushed basic Geometry out of my head?

I forgot about the over-all shape of the area. The already irregular shape will help defeat the standing waves, so the angled walls are not as needed.

Although, if you're building walls, it's not that much more expensive to do more at the same time. Does the kitchen area have to be open? In the original sketches what is the big, solid blue area between the bedroom and the theater?

The blue space between the bedroom and theater is the bedroom closet.

The kitchen area does not have to be open, but physically looking at the space, it's hard to imagine wanting it to be walled off since it's so small. I think this is one of those compromises I'm going to have to make.

Cool advice on the doors Chris.

Also CV to add what Chris said on wall construction, if you double up the drywall, it can also help to use a different thickness of drywall for the 2nd layer. Or if you only do one layer use the thicker 5/8ths. They are much stiffer than the standard 1/2 inch.

I know, I know, I have the slowest basement renovation of anyone in the universe. I'm curious if any of you have had experience digging a basement deeper to add height. I know the low ceilings (probably only around 6 1/2 feet high after the suspended ceilings are in) are going to bug me, so I figured I'd better at least look into getting some more height down there.

My dad wants to eventually be able to rent out the basement as a separate living space from the ground floor. I thought he said there wasn't a minimum height requirement, but that's something I should make him double-check, I think. If we need more height to satisfy a local code, then we'd need to dig the whole basement deeper. If the height isn't an issue, then I'd be satisfied only digging deeper for the theater. I'm just wondering how much of an ordeal it would be. We'd have to hire someone with some real knowledge to oversee, but I'd have no problem doing a ton of the hauling out of the dirt and what not. I was hoping someone here might have actually done it at some point and could offer a little guidance up-front.

I'm really going to try to push to have the basement ready for my invasion by Summer. The new Axiom speakers are going to want a bigger, nicer room to play in, I think.

Who is Summer? You haven't told us about her yet.

Are you sure your dad isn't looking to rent it out to someone else now?

That's all I have: Batting "0" in helpful responses to you this morning.

Charles, I'm pretty sure my basement renovation of just one room is taking just as long as yours, if not longer. Seems to me we started at nearly the same time. My weekends always seem busy and It's been such a busy couple of years my evenings are mostly about regenerating what little energy I can through exercise or the total opposite of it, depending on the day.

I have no idea how much trouble that sort of a job would get into but I have only ever seen it done where they raise the house up to add or replace a foundation. Somehow, they have to have room to get heavy equipment under there so I'd say you and your parents would be looking at a major life disruption for the duration and I expect the cost would not be worth the effort unless it was absolutely necessary.

But hey, that's just conjecture on my part. Hopefully, someone can come along to prove that I was a pessimist and it can be done much easier than that.

I would also like to add some useless info
Your sewer line and your basement drain lines. How do they run from the house? If you dig deeper than the piping heading out from your house (especially the basement drains) what do you plan to do with these lines? I agree with Murph that the easiest solution would be to raise the house a couple of feet.

You think "Your" basement project is going slow.....

Thanks for the feedback, guys. I still need to talk to my dad about it, see what he knows that I don't.

I just thought I'd post some pictures now that the basement is mostly gutted.



This first pic shows the view from the bottom of the stairwell entrance. The far wall is where my screen and front speakers will be.



The second pic shows the stairwell entrance.


The third pic shows the left wall that the first pic didn't show, but that wall is actually being moved 32" further to the left, into the bedroom.



The fourth pic is just showing more of where the bedroom is. The bathroom is behind the wall with the TV on it.





The sixth pic shows the window they cut for the bedroom.



Just another shot of the bedroom.



This last shot shows the corner where my kitchen area will be.

Also, does anyone have experience with horizontal water heaters? It seems like they're out there, and having one would help us save space in the bathroom. I'm just curious about any drawbacks.

And of course I'm open to suggestions on anything, since I still have so many directions I could go on most of the details.

Hey! Where's the gator pit?

Behind the secret wall that hides the Regina Shrine.

And/or Regina, once he gets close enough to her.

I thought the shackles were just decorative?

Win.

Woot. Another reno project.
I know nothing of heaters I'm afraid.

We use a wall-hung water heater - is that what you mean? The Baxi Luna, I think it's called. It's really small and hangs . . . uh . . . on the wall, as you may have guessed.

Could be. The first one in my search was actually ceiling-hung, but maybe I'll find more options by searching for wall-hung units. You can see the ledge that runs around most of the perimeter. It would simply be handier to stuff the water heater up into that space than keep it taking up floor space. How do you like your wall-hung?

Charles, it probably doesn't matter if it's ceiling hung or wall hung. As long as it's well hung.

Oh, come on! You were all thinking it.

It's all about the mounting.

Amie, I finally looked up Baxi Luna. I was thinking just of heating water, not heating the house. When I did my brief searching, I was thinking of something like this:

Hubbell Ceiling Hung Horizontal Water Heater

Of course I'm interested in tankless, but I don't think I'd find it satisfactory in the winter. Having a tank like the one I linked to would at least let us put it in a space that otherwise wouldn't really be utilized.

Since we're closer to deciding on flooring, would you guys still recommend bamboo? I like the look, but it sounds like it would be hard for me to choose between engineered and stranded, and I'm not sure what the cost difference is between the bamboo flooring made without much adherence to standards and that made with stricter regulation. My dad is hesitant to install any type of wood flooring in a basement that has flooded a couple of times when the sump has backed up. Not terrible odds in 29 years of living in this house, but still something to perhaps warrant a little paranoia. In any case, I thought I'd ask again since time has passed since the last time I asked. The plan was to floor the whole basement at once with the same flooring, since he wants it easier to move walls later on if he feels the need to change the layout.

CV, not sure how much this will help, but FWIW, I installed engineered bamboo in my basement office and love it. Very durable so far. Actually, this was the last flooring in the house that went down after renovation, but in retrospect I would have used it in other areas as well if I had known how well it worked. It was kind of an experiment that ended well. And it was considered ok for below grade installation as it was an engineered floor.

Cheers,

Dan, I appreciate the feedback. My dad seems set on some kind of tile, not wood, but I'll mention bamboo to him again. I know I like the look of it in my friend's basement.

Does anyone have any links handy for equipment closet builds? Beyond the convenience of having the gear to the side of the seating, as well as improved aesthetics, my goals are to isolate the sound of the gear and provide effective cooling. I'm still foggy on how to accomplish this, so if anyone knows of great references for these questions, I'd be indebted.

I suppose the heat from the gear shouldn't be an issue since I will most likely keep an open back for easy access to the connections. The room behind the equipment closet is my bedroom, and I'm not too concerned with how things look in there. I'll just need a nice-looking glass door for the front that will create a nice seal to keep noise out of the home theater area. Any recommendations there?

I'm thinking I'll have the closet wide enough for two columns of shelving. I plan on having a lot of gear in there, so I'll need the space. Of course, some of the gear I won't need access to from the home theater side, so I guess we'll see.

I'm also concerned about refrigerator noise, since the kitchen area is part of the space, and I won't really be able to isolate it. I suppose I'll just need to read enough reviews to see what the quiet ones are.

A designer is supposed to be coming by on Friday to help us work out our plans a bit more. What are some things I might not be considering that I can bring up?

A few things learned from computer racks more so than audio, but still apply

Rear access to the wiring closet will prove super valuable.

You pay a bit more for proper racks with metal, mesh shelving but it helps a lot with cooling as many items have vents on the bottom.

You can sometimes find used server racks for cheap that might fit in your space. Nice because some have built in cooling and some are filled with AC power access up anbd down. However, they are often still very overpriced for used because they sell fast. Probably overkill unless you stumble upon a bargain.

Getting a rack that allows for rack mounting is nice if you have gear that can utilize it.

If you need extra cooling (and extra never hurts) you can get very quiet fans if you do your research. Quiet PC fans can be a very inexpensive option if $ are tight, if properly located.

As per above, if you are buying additional cooling, plan you airflow accordingly. Having every fan blow inward at your gear will be much weaker than having air blown in and also blown out, making a constantly moving stream of fresh air.

You would need or benefit greatly from some sort of RF to IR Blaster device, but I'm sure you knew that.

Plan your wiring. Keep it as structured as possible. Nothing is worse than a peicemealed, rat's nest of wiring. Keeping all the AC cords running down one side away from the audio cable on the other gives good peace of mind, if nothing else, on the interference/shielding front.

Most importantly, have as many glowing, blue LEDs as possible.

I hear filling your fridge with Beer reduces fridge noise as doesn't have to work as hard cooling the empty space. At least that is what I keep telling my wife.

Excellent advice, Murph!

Just two tidbits- It's probably obvious, but if you want to see up fans for both intake and output, look for a rack with sides. If you're NOT going to power-ventilate, get a rack without sides or with removable sides.

If you can't access the back through a door, you can put the rack on wheels by either building a platform with low-profile, heavy duty casters or by using a workshop tool mobile base. I've used both in two different situations with two different racks.

Well, it's a scientific fact that water has a much higher thermal mass (or, more accurately, specific heat) than air. Since beer is mostly water, it's a perfectly logical conclusion that your fridge will hold a steadier temperature with fewer cooling cycles when filled with beer.

As always, Murph, I appreciate the thoroughness of your replies. On this point, I was wondering if you could post links to any specific examples of the racks or shelving you're thinking of.

As far as airflow, I was thinking of a fan blowing in through a vent at the bottom and out through another vent at the top... on the bedroom side. That way I could have the bedroom side closed up instead of leaving it open like I was originally thinking, and I would simply have a cover to remove or something when I need to access all of the connections.

Good call on wire management. That's one of my major goals, since they've always been kind of a mess in my systems so far. I've never had a media closet before, so I'm excited.

I hadn't done much considering of an RF to IR blaster. I'll look into it when the time comes.

Just talking to talk. I'll never be as detailed as certain other members whose home theaters I'll never come close to.

My dad met with a designer, and they're talking about finishing the whole basement at one go. My dad's going to get the loan to pay for it, and my rent will basically be paying off the loan for the next three years. This will mean a major increase in my rent, at least for those three years, but if it gets me the living space I want, and soon, I'll bite the bullet. But if my rent is going up, I want to fit as much of what I want done into this remodel as possible.

Sooo... since it's not going to be a gradual thing, and I need to map out what I want done with haste, I'm simply trying to pool some of the ideas I've come across for the designer/construction company to look over, and see what can be achieved.

The basement's ceiling is one problem. Since the ground floor will be a separate rental space (after my parents eventually move out), doing nothing for sound isolation probably isn't a great idea. My dad is set on suspended ceiling throughout the basement for the ease of getting to wiring, which I can also see the benefit of, as often as I may want to change gear and cabling for my home theater. However, the basement is already short, and this makes it even shorter, around 79" high with the suspended ceiling in place. It would probably have to be even lower if thicker-than-standard ceiling tiles were used. Is anyone familiar with sound isolation options for suspended ceilings? Since the upstairs is going to go through an overhaul at some point, too, do you think it would be easier to try for soundproofing from above, perhaps with lots of this?: Sound Barriers. We would still want to caulk everything we could from below, right?

For sound treatment, not isolation, do you think bass traps are worth attempting when you see that concrete ledge that runs along the front and right walls of the home theater area? The front two corners could be done, and some material could definitely be stuffed into the right rear corner, but the kitchen area in the rear left obviously wouldn't allow for one. If you still think it would be worthwhile, then what kind of bass traps would you go for? Something premade, like MegaTraps by RealTraps? Or should I have them make me something here? I'm not sure how much further I'd want to go with sound treatment.

They may be designing the media closet, but I'll definitely provide input based on Murph's suggestions.

I'm also hoping to make the custom shelving along the ledge (for music, movies, books) part of the remodel. I just think I'd benefit from having as much as I can made part of the initial design, since they'll probably have a better idea of how to tie it all together visually better than I would by trying to tack it on later. Oh, and the support beam will kind of be out in the middle a bit since the wall that it's close to now is moving further to the left, which I mentioned in the post with the pics.

Final dimensions for the basic rectangle (kitchen area alters that corner) will be very close to 18' by 28.5'. As I said, ceiling height will be 79". From ceiling to top of the concrete ledge (after being topped with something) is around 28".

My dad has been taking my power needs seriously. He installed 20 amp spec grade receptacles all the way around. I may end up with a 30 amp receptacle in the media closet if I get the UPS I want.

As I said, a lot of this is simply me rambling, but of course I welcome any feedback you may have!

Just some links collected in one place for my own benefit, but also to give an idea of what I'm going for. Obviously, not everything will be financially feasible.

For the media closet:

Tripp Lite SmartOnline 3kVA On-Line Doub...V, NEMA outlets

Tripp Lite 24-outlet Vertical Power Stri...ing L5-20P Plug

Build Your Own Rack Cabinet

So Cool (equipment closet ventilation)


For the stairwell:

Panelfold® Acoustical Folding Partitions

Residential climbing walls


Sound isolation/treatment:

ASC Window and Door Soundproofing

Auralex Construction Products


Media shelving:

Rakks

ISS Designs Shelving

Boltz 20 Shelf Modular Steel Bookcase

For the kitchen, does anyone have links to large, affordable sinks and proven faucets with pull-down sprayers?

I would look for a faucet that has magnets to hold the pull-down securely in place when stowed. I didn't spring for that feature when I replaced my kitchen faucet and the pull-out part didn't stow as securely over time. I paid <$150 for the faucet, so better quality non-magnetic faucets might be better.

This one, for example, advertises good retraction. It also has a pause feature on the pull-down, so if you've not right by the sink, you can stop the flow of water easily.

Thanks, Peter! That helps.

Just more brainstorming.... I think instead of a normal dining room table, I'm going to have two long tables made custom that have spaces below them for holding PCs or video game consoles. The tables will face each other, and on the bottoms of the far sides of the table will be power strips. I'll keep the look as simple as possible, but of course I'll want it to match the rest of the basement. Perhaps bench seating, if that can be comfortable for extended LAN gaming sessions. I'll have ethernet jacks on the wall that the tables will be pushed up against. A bookcase may provide some separation between this dining/gaming area and the theater area. The space under the stairs will also be its own computer/gaming desk. I'll have to play with the space to see how I can get this to work. I know it'll work now, with my 60" screen, but once I move to a projector, I'm not sure what size screen I'll end up with, and how far back I'll need the seating. I'm also hoping to somehow mount the rear surrounds to the bookcase instead of ceiling-mounting them like I originally planned.

I've never actually hosted a LAN party, but I've always wanted the capability.

For the media closet, since I was thinking I would want it wide enough to accommodate two shelf spaces, I might want half to be actual rackmount, and the other half just normal open shelving.

I bought "industrial" USB 3.0 hubs to be attached to the theater seating riser, for whatever peripherals I may want running from the gear in the media closet to the seating. One for my PC, one for my Xbox 360. I seem to prefer using the wired Xbox 360 controllers versus the wireless since battery life is not an issue, and I've never really minded the cord.

I've decided not to put subwoofer jacks around the room, as I'm not sure on final placement, and I think I'll be fine with paintable surface-mount raceways (or something along the floor) for the cables after I do find the best locations. I'd also want to wire for both RCA and XLR ends if I did the subwoofer jacks, and that seemed like a lot of hassle.

The Kinect may be an issue, since that should still be at the front of the room. The official extension cable for it extends the length to 20', but that might only get it to the left edge of the front of the room. Obviously, I'd want it closer to the center of the display. It's $50 for the official extension cable, too, and I'm not sure why I wouldn't just try a longer, non-sanctioned USB cable. I'm sure I'd be able to tell pretty quickly whether the increased length was affecting play.

I sure am looking forward to experimenting with placement of the LFR1100s. I'm looking forward to a lot more experimenting in general, now that I'll have more space, and the media closet will make the backs of each piece of equipment easily accessible.

I've been looking forward to this for a long time, so I'm really anxious to see progress on the whole project soon. We still need to meet again with the first designer who stopped by. We're waiting on a quote from a second guy who can at least do the bathroom for us. Hard to be patient.

Instead of home theater seating, I think I'm going to opt for actual movie theater seating for the front row. I've always found them comfortable enough, and they're a better deal. I still need to figure out which brand and model I'm going to get, though. I just emailed the local theater whose seating I like the most, so hopefully they can get back to me with what seating they use. Since they're working on a new location, I also asked if, on the off-chance, I could have my seats added to their order, and I would buy from them. Ha ha. Worth a shot, right?

The seats do have high backs, which I hope won't interfere with the surround at all. I always thought it would be cool if theater seating had removable headrests, like in a car, for the people who want unobstructed audio. I've never found any that has that.

Of course, I could always just by car seats... if I could find any that would look like they fit the decor.

Oh, and I found out from perusing their Facebook page that they do intend to have Dolby Atmos surround, so I'm excited about that.

In case anyone was curious, here is the USB hub I ordered two of:

Mountable 4 Port Rugged Industrial SuperSpeed USB 3.0 Hub

The StarTech name doesn't do a lot for me, but I figured I'd give them a shot, anyway. I expect them to arrive on Monday, so I'll let you know what the build quality is on them, assuming my inexperienced eye can discern.

Wow, they emailed back already and said they had ordered too many chairs for their existing theater, so there are some available. Only $150 per seat!

Awesome!

I WAS going to write that you asking them for help in seating so you could set up your own theater is a little like when customers call me to ask which editing program they should buy instead of hiring me to do their editing!

Ha ha. I had a similar thought when I was composing my my message, but I decided to not have shame.

The pantry and bedroom closet were removed, and the floor joists that weren't there due to the former stairwell were put in. The wall there is still coming down and being moved 32" to the left.





I took a couple of shots of this corner because I'm wondering if I should try to use this narrow empty section as some kind of bass trap, or would it not be worthwhile, since there's still that small room under the stairwell that is acoustically the true corner?





And there are two shots of the stairwell just to show why I'd like a climbing wall. It seems like the best way to make all of that wall space not seem like a waste. Even if it doesn't make it into this renovation, I definitely want to do it at some point.

You should put the alligator pit right below the climbing wall.

You guys won't let it go, will you? You're like one of my alligators with a torso.

I'll have you know it took me an hour to type that post with my little alligator arms.

Plus, I kept hitting my head against the monitor.

The build quality seems just fine. I guess I'll know even more over time, and after I attach them to the riser when the time comes.

Okay, rackmount experts, do you think I'll be okay getting this cabinet and these shelves?:

StarTech.com 36U Adjustable 4 Post Server Equipment Open Frame Rack Cabinet 4POSTRACK36 (Black)

Tripp Lite SRSHELF4PHD Rack Enclosure Cabinet Heavy Duty Fixed Shelf 250 Pound Capacity

Raxxess RAX Unitray Universal Rack Tray UNS1

Yeah, all that looks good.

I don't know personally about StarTech, but all my rack gear at home at work is either from Tripp-Lite or Raxxess (Chief Manufacturing).

Thanks. The reason I'm looking at StarTech and not Tripp Lite is simply because I'm thinking 36U is right for the low ceiling in the basement, and the Tripp Lite options on Amazon.com seem to go from 25U to 45U.

We have the 45U at work. Actually, two of them bolted together. They are a bit large.

If I had the height for it, I'd totally go for a 45U.

Another thing that's probably good about the StarTech, is that it looks less deep than the Tripp-Lite. The ones we have take every bit of most extendable rack rails to reach from the front to rear posts, and then there's two feet of space behind the back of the equipment. It's nice for wiring, but the footprint really dominates a room.

Oh, nice. I still have time to change my mind since I'm still not sure when, exactly, it's all happening, but for now you've given me confidence.

We still haven't heard back from the designer from the first construction place we contacted, which isn't cool. They've been in business for 52 years and have drool-worthy photos of work they've done, so I was excited to see what they could do for us. Plus, they would have been able to do basically everything, so it would go nice and quick.

Another guy came who specializes in bathrooms and works with a guy who does kitchens. I suppose those are the two areas we would need the most help with. The pictures in the catalog for the bathroom stuff look nice, but I guess I'm not too particular about the bathroom. Clean and functional and bright works for me.

The catalogs with the kitchen stuff, on the other hand, have me pretty excited. This is the company the guy uses:

Bellmont Cabinet Company

I'd probably go for the 1600 series to save money, and it would still be nicer than anything I've had before. The optional storage solutions look pretty slick.

I'm still hoping to hear back from the first place, but if we have to do it piecemeal from different contractors, I'm optimistic.

It looks like I can actually fit the 42U StarTech rack cabinet. I read the length under "Technical Details" as 82.00 inches, but in the product dimensions, it's actually at 78 inches. 82 must be how long it is boxed? In any case, StarTech's website also lists it as 78", so I think I'm good. We could still fit it if it was 82" since we don't need the drop ceiling to extend into the media closet, naturally. Up to the joists is 83", and the addition of tile to the floor isn't going to raise it a full inch.

So I think I'm going to plan on two 42U StarTech units side-by-side in the closet. I'm thinking I'll have two doors to access the gear. One door will be opaque and match the wall, and the other glass. I'll have all of the gear I need easy access to behind the glass door, and other cabinet will house the gear I shouldn't need to get to the front of except in rare circumstances. I'll still have full access to the rears of both cabinets from the bedroom.

The Tripp Lite 72" 20-amp 24-outlet power strip I bought for the closet will be mounted in between the two cabinets somehow.

My dad said he did hear back from the designer from the first contractor yesterday, so he'll be coming with his team on Tuesday to talk with us further. I guess I'll have to wake up early that day to provide my input. The sacrifices we make....

Hopefully he can get the proposed layout drawn up in a CAD program that I can then share with all of you. While the basic layout and general shape of everything will be the same as the pictures on the first page of the thread, there will have to be some fine-tuning to where all of the rooms intersect (bedroom, bathroom, HT/kitchen).

As far as sound isolation possibilities, has anyone used this stuff or something like it?: Acoustiblok. Yes, I'm still looking for ways to add at least some level of sound isolation without double-drywalling the ceiling. My dad is set on a suspended ceiling for ease of getting to all of the wiring. This is a major compromise to any sound isolation, but I need to figure something out to better separate the ground floor and basement living spaces.

I suppose the best thing to do would be to have the construction company we hire coordinate with a company that specializes in acoustics. Acoustic Sciences Corporation, which I think Chris first linked to here, is based in Eugene, OR, about 6 hours away. I'm not sure I'd find anyone closer who knows as much, but if they're simply selling their knowledge to our local contractor, then I suppose there's no real need to be any closer.

I'm thinking of perhaps this combo for the kitchen sink and faucet:

Kraus KPF-1602 Single Lever Pull Out Kitchen Faucet, Chrome

Kraus KHF200-36 36-Inch Farmhouse Apron Single Bowl 16 gauge Kitchen Sink, Stainless Steel

Or something along those lines. I just know how convenient it was to clean things in a commercial-grade sink with a commercial-grade sprayer. It would be better to see this stuff in person, of course. Maybe in Seattle when I visit my sister at the end of October.

That would work fine but I feel guilty for sending you down the 'proper rack' road. They are just way too expensive for home use unless you really want to go that way.

A good compromise might be to build a wooden rack sized to allow you to add the metal shelving. This way you gain the benefit of the mesh shelves for cooling and a lower pricetag. Power and additional fans (if required) can still be custom mounted whereever you need it.

After all, in your situation, this will be out of the way and unseen.

Yeah, but he still knows it's there.

While I think wood would work fine, I'm not the handiest person myself, and I think I'd prefer being able to just drop the rack cabinets in. While $400 is a chunk of change for each 42U unit, it would certainly save me some time and frustration trying to get something of my own to work.

I'm probably going to go with a wood frame, but with Raxxess rails screwed to it. You do have to be very accurate with your measurements. Rack equipment only has a few mm of slack with it's mounting holes.

Chris, make the top and bottom mounting holes on those strips elongated, then you,ll have the ability to slide them into perfect alignment, and lock them in place with the rest of the mounting holes.

After looking at the dimensions again for the StarTech 42U unit, I think I'll have to pass on it. It's deeper than I'd like, so I'm going to look at rigging up my own adjustable shelving. Not sure yet if I'll try to frame up something that will take rackmount shelves or not. I'll see what other vented shelving is out there, I suppose. My dad said we could build out the media closet so it sticks into the room a little and can accommodate the StarTech cabinet, but I think I'd like to keep it flush with the rest of the wall.

I still haven't heard back from the local theater on where I can pay for my theater seats and pick them up. I'll message him again at the end of the week if I don't hear anything.

I think the construction company and I may be able to talk my dad into carpeting the HT area instead of tiling it. It would be less work and cheaper, since there would have to be work done to make the floor perfectly level. Carpeting would also mean I wouldn't have to buy a nice area rug. I'd rather put money into sound isolation than floor tiles. Fingers crossed that he'll go for it.

Hmmm... now I'm thinking maybe these:

Middle Atlantic 5-43-26 Slim 5 Series Rack

Middle Atlantic SH-5A-26 Zero Space Shelf

Middle Atlantic UTR1 Half Rack Shelf

I've been shooting out some emails. I emailed Acoustic Sciences Corporation with some preliminary questions about what they might be able to achieve in my basement given some of the obstacles. He has a lot of questions for me, so he wants me to give him a call instead of trying to email back and forth for three weeks. Good idea. As soon as I can get my dad to be available at the same time, I'll call, as I'm sure many of the questions are ones my dad will have to answer.

I also emailed RealTraps to see what they might recommend for my room, either utilizing their ceiling tiles or not. I'm planning on a pair of their MegaTraps for the front corners of the room, at least, and perhaps a couple of MiniTraps for the walls at the reflection points. Of course, I might also just ask Acoustic Sciences Corporation to give a quote on improving the acoustics of the room in addition to their soundproofing expertise. I imagine it will be more than I want to spend, but it can't hurt to ask.

I'm sure I'll have to scale back some of my desires all around. I need more money.

I'm back to thinking I should just make my own shelving for my media closet. I think I'll end up happier that way, and if not, then I can always try again.

I'm thinking I'll use this insulation for the basement ceiling:

ULTRATOUCH™ DENIM INSULATION

Does anyone have any experience with it? It sounds like it's easy to work with, and it seems to have decent sound absorption.

Well, I did it. I ordered a VP180. I HAD to use the coupon code, right? Couldn't let it go to waste. Still wondering what to buy next for the basement, and still waiting to hear what contractor(s) we're going with.

Nicely done, CV. I suppose it was only a matter of time.

I'm (still) envious.

Congrats on the new speaker, CV!!

Thanks, Tom and Sean. Ian himself uses a single VP180 below the screen, so maybe I won't feel the need for another. But you know me.

Cool! Looking forward to the review!

If you REALLY want to show him, buy a jet.


And then park it in your HT room.

No Charles you must buy two VP180s so you can put one above your screen and let us know what sort of “wall of sound” it creates for movies so I’ll know if I should do the same.

Seriously your next step should be to take some pictures so we can visualize what you’re talking about.

I thought "wall of sound" was Catbrat's job.

Ha ha. Good call, Ken. Dean, what do you want pictures of?

In other news, I finally shipped my DSP to Axiom for the code update. Instead of trying to schedule a pickup and hoping I filled the international waybill out correctly, I decided to take it in to the local FedEx Office to be sure. I sent it 2-Day, but the girl at the counter confused me by saying it would go out Monday and be there on Friday if there weren't any customs delays. I didn't ask, but I assume they're tacking on extra days because of the hurricane? Their Service Alerts page says "FedEx is conducting normal operations," though, with no mention of Hurricane Sandy. I suppose I'm not in THAT much of a rush, but with Axiom splitting the shipping cost with me for 2-day service, I feel bad if they're not getting what they're paying for.

I sent my DSP box in on the 29th and they got it on the 31st. Axiom sent the unit back on the 2nd and its not suppose to get here until the 8th and I paid for two day shipping. Something is not right there either,but I will just be glad to get it back before next weekend.

Hopefully you don't have to wait too long CV.

That time frame is a bummer for sure, no matter how one does the math, it simply just doesn't add up. Some people would complain for a reduced fee, or perhaps a credit on the next time they would be using their services again. This may or may not fall on deaf ears, but might be something too consider though.

The good news is that the DSP did make it back to Axiom on Wednesday, so 2-Day shipping did work.

My VP180 should arrive on Tuesday. I adjusted the shelves on what I'm using as my entertainment stand to accommodate. I actually moved the players off that shelf and made it smaller to just fit the VP180. It'll be close, but I think it will fit fine. Still, I can't wait until I can move my system into the basement and have all of my gear in a closet. Then I'll have to work on a new stand for the VP180.

I did end up going with Middle Atlantic. I purchased from showmecables.com instead, though:

Slim 5 Series Equipment Rack Enclosure - 20 In. Depth - 37 RU

SH Series Zero Space Rackshelves - 20 IN Deep

I bought two of these Zero Space shelves for the 20" depth rack, though I'll probably get two more. I'm going to be buying one more of these Middle Atlantic Slim 5 racks, except at the 26" depth, which I'll also get two of the Zero Space shelves for. I'll buy sliding shelves for the printer and scanner, and after that, I think my gear will be sufficiently served by these Raxxess rack trays.

I was impressed with my first order from Show Me Cables. Most of the order took one business day to arrive, and the one straggler package arrived the following day.

Does anyone here have experience installing PC fans into media closets for air circulation? Not knowing much, I'm tempted to go with a couple of these kits:

Coolerguys Cabcool1203 Three 120mm Fan Cooling Kit w/thermal control for Cabinet or Home Theaters

The plan is to have them blowing into the rear of the closet on the bottom and out of the rear (cue Mark) on the top. Does this sound good? Does anyone have any brands they would recommend over Coolerguys?

I'll have new pics for this thread before too long. I'm afraid it's not going to be as pretty as I'd like, so I may need to get a hot woman in the pictures to distract you.

Unless you are restricted in size, why not go for quiet 140 or 150 mm fans

Only because I would need guidance on how to wire it all up and have it work properly, as opposed to getting one of the kits. That's why I'm here crying for help. Ha ha.

One of these would get you half way there in that the fans would simply plug in. You would need to wire a power supply to a moulex connector. You might even be able to find a properly wired power supply.

Thanks, Fred. I appreciate you pointing me in the right direction.

Does that translate to thanks, but I still don't want to electrocute myself?

Here's the pinout.
It tells you that you need a 12 volt supply. I expect you would only need to worry about pin 1 & 2 since the sensing and control functions go between the controller and the fans. Aha! 12v power supply with 4 pin molex connector

Now all you need is a way to mount the fans. This is easier than I thought.

Here's how a guy on AVS mounted the fans. Post 69.

OK, project's done. I'll email you my bill.

It's always forever between these updates. As you can guess, that's because it's going way too slowly.

The latest is that I AM going to use Ikea for my kitchen cabinets. While not at the top for quality, too many people seem happy with what they've gotten for me to ignore their value. I'm going to leave off the doors/fronts and get them from this outfit, though, I think:

Semihandmade

I really like the look of the reclaimed lumber, but since that's in the top tier (most expensive), I will most likely just be asking for an estimate on it, then going with the flat-sawn walnut in their Classic line instead.

I really like the flat, modern look that Ikea offers, but I also like a really nice wood grain if I can get it, and this seems to be the best way to get the best of both worlds.

I've already purchased a design from this company:

Ikea Kitchen Design Online

After messing with Ikea's kitchen planner software and not being satisfied with the results, I decided it would be in my best interests to enlist people who do this for a living, and specifically with Ikea's offerings. While not THAT far off the mark of what I was doing on my own, due to the limitations of the space, they were able to add wall cabinets to the design that were not showing up in Ikea's software, and there were a few other points that made more sense than what I had been planning.

Would any of you be willing to look over the design and offer feedback? They offer two revisions with the initial $145 fee. I already submitted my suggestions for the first revision, but after I get the second draft, I'd love to have some more eyes look it over and perhaps make note of things I haven't considered. If you're interested, just PM me with your email address so I can send you the PDF.

For $145, it seemed like a no-brainer. The first draft already has some fairly comprehensive drawings/renderings, and I think it will come in VERY handy when 1) I submit my plans to Semihandmade, and 2) when I go to Ikea to pick up what I need with a complete shopping list already in hand.

The real villain in the whole kitchen layout is the refrigerator. There's simply not enough space along the two walls for it, so it's going to be in an enclosure that encroaches on the home theater space. I also don't like that it will be so close to the seating, since I was already really concerned about the refrigerator noise when it was going to be across the room. Hopefully insulating the enclosure will give satisfactory results, and hopefully the refrigerator will be quiet. LG seemed to place emphasis on sound levels, so I'm thinking I'll go with this one and cross my fingers: LG LFC25765SB

My dad mounted plywood to the wall between the kitchen and the bathroom, so all wall cabinets on that side will be extremely easy to mount. No needing to find studs.

My kitchen sink was shipped out on the 19th. I'm excited.

I'm wanting stainless steel for my whole kitchen countertop. I was reading someone's blog post about getting a quote of $150/sq. ft. from Home Depot, then finding out a local sheet metal place could make it for $20/sq. ft, albeit with a minimal amount of DIY. Have any of you done this? I wouldn't mind a little of the commercial kitchen look, so I guess I simply need to see if any of the local sheet metal places will do this, and get a quote. I imagine mine may cost a little more than the blogger's because of the undermount sink, and maybe I can make the backsplash part of it as well.

Other work has been progressing, even if it's at a crawl. The bathroom has been getting most of the focus lately, being almost completely framed out, the shower/tub installed, and some of the drywall. A lot of electrical has been done by my dad, with minor help from me. I'll still make sure to get three dedicated 20-amp circuits for the equipment closet. Overkill is my middle name.

We're still not 100% sure on flooring. I think we ARE going to go with ceramic tile in the bathroom, coming out to where it meets the basement's major open space and the bedroom entrance. My dad wanted to use a garage-type flooring (only one design among the samples he brought home looked tolerable to me) due to concerns about flooding, but the inspector suggested he not use that kind of flooring, though my dad didn't pursue an explanation.

As far as look and feel of the floor, I actually like the more affordable vinyl tile. I had a sheet vinyl pattern picked out that I like, but that's when he decided on the garage-type flooring. We'll see if I can get vinyl back in the running. One of my best friends ended up putting vinyl tile over his hardwood floors in the kitchen for better traction and comfort, and he had no problem recommending it.

Does anyone have recommendations on ceiling tiles? My dad already bought some basic ceiling tile, but it looks so boring and... cheap. Even if I don't swank up my ceiling this time around, I'd like to know where to go for something more attractive. Ideally, I'd be able to get superior acoustical performance AND improved looks. Initially, I wanted to purchase at least some of them from RealTraps, but the cost would add up very fast, and I'm still not sure how attractive they are. Better-looking than the tiles my dad purchased, at least. It seems like a whole world of looks opens up when you start browsing commercial ceiling tiles, but I'm not sure how affordable and procurable they are. So yeah, if you have any special insights, I'll be in your debt. Ooh, yeah, I'll give you first pick the next time I'm going to purge my Blu-ray and high-resolution audio collections.

I'll post more pics, too, even though we're still not at a place of beauty.

Okay, that's enough of me boring you for now. I simply wanted to update you now that progress seems to be lurching forward.

Here, you can download the first draft of the kitchen design. I'll post the link to the 2nd draft as soon as I receive it.

And here are the pics.

I love being on your journey.

Vent hood? What's above the sink? I don't understand where the theatre/living space is relative to the kitchen.

Brilliant ideas all around.

Yes, there will be an exhaust hood over the range. It will be a powerful one for the stir-frying I intend to do. It will be ducted directly to the outside on that wall.

Tom, hopefully these pictures will help a little more with the home theater area in relation to the kitchen and bedroom.

Coming down the stairwell, you can see the blue tape around the corner marking where the base cabinets for the kitchen will be.



At the base of the stairwell entrance, showing the edge of the other kitchen wall, the bedroom in the corner straight ahead, and the screen for the home theater area will be on the far wall with the window above the ledge:



Looking straight ahead at where the screen will be, and of course that support post at the left is where I plan to build the enclosure for the refrigerator. As you can see, it intrudes into the home theater area a bit, but hopefully not enough to get under my skin forever. Compromises, I tell you.

Oh, and I had them leave the space above the sink empty simply because I got this faucet/sprayer which is pretty tall. I'll probably put a little shelf or two above and have some hooks for dishwashing stuff.

Where'r the crocs and / or gators?

Isn't it your job to photoshop them in?

Yes, that helps. Thanks.

Where will you eat?

If you look at the sixth image in post #395337, the one with the stairwell entrance in the background, it's the area to the left, where the chair and stack of ceiling tiles are, directly opposite the side where the kitchen will be. That's well behind where the seating in the HT section will be, so I'll have room for a dining set.

Me again. Anyone have experience with putty pads for the backs of electrical outlet boxes? Nick, maybe? I'd like to block as much sound from the bathroom as I can, so I thought of using them since I'll have several electrical boxes on that wall between the kitchen and the bathroom. Those will be the weakest points for sound leakage, I'd imagine.

This stuff is significantly cheaper, however, and I was wondering if anyone knew if it would be as effective. I don't care about fire rating, just sound. It seemed like it could be almost the same product, simply marketed differently.

No dishwasher?

I'm totally paranoid about not having enough space, which colors my perception.

We've got a commercial range hood. My experience makes me hesitant to have open shelves adjacent to the range area. No matter how good your hood is, anything on those shelves is going to get greasy eventually. I'm having a hard time visualizing the hood area, and understanding why the uppers aren't symmetrical.

How about one of those short, wide cabinets up high above the sink? You could mount some lighting on the bottom of it.

I don't know how I feel about the contrasting, white drawer/door fronts on the island and uppers.

I'm really excited for you! What fun!

I appreciate the feedback, Tom!

Yeah, I don't have a specific exhaust hood picked out at this point. And chances are that I won't have those open shelves to the right of where it will be. If it's the upper cabinet above the base cabinet to the left of the range that you're wondering about being asymmetrical, I assume they made it narrower to account for the exhaust hood. Something I was reading online said to have the hood covering 3" to either side of the range. So for a normal 30" range, I'd be going with a 36" hood, which is also why I wouldn't have those open shelves to the right.

That's a good idea for a cabinet above the sink. I'll see if the dimensions work for that.

The colors aren't set in stone yet, and yeah, from that mock-up, it's not really working for me, either. I've liked the two-tone look, but I'm not sure which color to pair with the flat-sawn walnut veneer. I should try to get a sample of that ASAP. I wouldn't mind doing all of the doors/fronts in the same veneer from Semihandmade, but I thought I'd try for the two-tone to save a little bit of money, if I could make it look good.

Oh, and I'm not using a dishwasher initially, but I did mention to them that I'd like the space for a dishwasher in case I decide on one in the future. It's just that it will only be my dishes, and so many things don't want to be washed in a dishwasher, anyway, so I figured I'd do without. I told the design place to remove one of the 30" base cabinets and leave a 24" open space, and expand the other base cabinet to 36". I'll use the open space for a cart on wheels that will hold my garbage and recyclables, assuming I can make that look good.

Brilliant!

A 36" hood is a good idea. Could be comparatively expensive, though.

That semi handmade site was quite a revelation. So many creative people.

Looking at where I plan to put that enclosure for the refrigerator again, I think it really will do a number on the acoustics. For one, the left surround speaker will have to be mounted to that wall of the enclosure, and with the enclosure sticking out into the room like that, it will probably be pretty darn close to the seating. The whole reason I left that bedroom so narrow was to give the speakers more room to breathe. The left LFR1100 will also be affected, with that little pocket that's created with the enclosure sticking out. *beats head against the wall* I mean, I'm sure it will still sound decent, but I was really hoping for a space that would do more justice to my gear. I simply don't know where else to position the refrigerator.

I need to get the entire basement drawn out so you can see exactly what I'm talking about.

Yeah, seriously, how can we work under these conditions?

Aren't you ALWAYS going to have to deal with that support pole, unless you spend money you don't want to on structural upgrades?

Putting the refrigerator somewhere else *might* impact your kitchen design, but given your investment in audio/video gear, I'd be more inclined to have a suboptimal kitchen workflow than to totally screw the pooch on the acoustics.

It just really seems like the fridge is segmenting the whole floor plan into discrete rooms instead of being one, big happy space.

Edit: How wide is the area between the support pole and the opposite wall i.e. the width of the theater if it is inside the footprint of the existing pole position?

Wait, you WERE looking for opinions, or riffing, right?

This is AFTER the structural upgrade. Before, there were three support poles because it was a wood beam that it was supporting. They replaced it with steel beams to reduce it to one, and that's where the beams meet. I guess that's where it had to end up for the amount of distance it could span. One pole was better than three for me.



Yeah, that's what I'm feeling right now, but then I think that even if I do move the refrigerator somewhere else, it's still not going to be an ideal acoustical situation. There are too many weirdnesses to the room. But you're right that this seems like MORE of a compromise to the acoustics.



It would be about 14 1/2 feet across. I'd be losing not quite 4 feet if I pulled that bedroom wall over to match, if that's where you were headed.



Ha ha, of course. I'm glad for ANY feedback, since I'm sure it will only help me come up with more options.

That's where I was headed. And I might still be headed there.

If you're going to have the post there ANYWAY, you're never going to get the aesthetics (or perfect acoustics) that you want if it's just "out there" in the middle of the room. So, my inclination would be to make a more perfect rectangle out of that end of the room. 14.5 feet is still a pretty nice, wide space; you'll still be able to get a 130" 16:9 screen in there with a couple feet on each side.

How far back is the seating compared to the fridge?

While the acoustics still won't be perfect with the post, a slender post as opposed to a wall out into the room seems far superior.

I'd hate to lose the extra width because of the LFR1100s. I want there to be room to play with on either side of the screen so I can do some meaningful tweaking. That being said, I'm not going to have a 130" screen. I was originally wanting around 100", but with other parts of the basement encroaching on what was going to dedicated to the HT portion, and not really seeing how to do a second row of seating on a riser when the ceilings are so low, anyway, I'm liking the idea of one of the 84" 4K TVs with seating closer to the screen whenever those become affordable. And then I won't have to learn about projectors. Ha ha.

I'm not sure exactly where the seating will end up, simply because I don't know a final screen size (looking at a 70" 1080p until bigger 4Ks are common and affordable), or the ultimate positioning of the speakers, which I'll want to experiment with. I'm imagining the seating will end up pretty close to in line with where that proposed refrigerator enclosure will be.

I may be able to compromise and have that wall for the enclosure sticking out only 6" or so into the room by sticking it against the wall where the side of the equipment closet is. The post will still be out into the room, of course, but like I said, I don't think a slender post will affect acoustics nearly as much.

And again, thanks for giving me some stuff to chew on.

Stuff to chew on? So I can expect a FaceBook post about it?

Must include photoshopped gater pit pics!

CV, thanks for sharing your journey on this! Tom has been asking good questions and making good points.

I wish I had feedback for you. Placement of the fridge is a problem. Let me think on this a bit and hope for inspiration.

Have fun, CV!

Thanks for the affirmation, Sean.

Pictures Sean sitting in front of his own fridge, bathed in the glow of the bulb from the open door, wondering if chocolate-chip cheesecake could, indeed, provide inspiration.

CV should definitely get some chocolate-chip cheesecake for his fridge. Then the placement solution is easy:

As close as possible to his listening position.

I really do appreciate all of your input, Tom! I decided to go with the less-than-optimal kitchen layout. I'm going to leave the refrigerator free-standing, not enclosed, and it will be on the other side of the stairwell entrance, across from the kitchen. That means it will slightly block the glass piece that fits into place there, but at least it gets it out of the way of the rest of the room.

I also decided to extend the wall that the equipment closet is on by a couple of feet. As it is now, the equipment closet is the last section of wall, meaning there's no place on that wall to mount the left surround. Adding just two more feet (or maybe I can get away with increasing it to 32") of wall there will give me space to mount without obstructing the bedroom or bathroom entrances. Not a lot of leeway for placement of the surround channel, but hopefully it will work out decently. It also places the surround a little bit forward of the support post, so the interaction should be minimal. If it turns out I want to play with more placement options, I'll utilize ceiling mounts, which I do have laying around because that's how I originally thought I would be mounting all of my surround speakers.

Anyway, I think the refrigerator being by the stairwell and the extended left wall are the best I can do for acoustics.

Ha ha, good call.

Tomorrow, Lundeen Simonson out of Spokane is going to start grinding down the concrete floor in the basement. I decided to go with polished concrete.

I'd forgotten I was interested in polished concrete until I was looking at flooring options again. After being unable to find the same vinyl style I liked before, I suddenly remembered the pictures I'd seen of polished concrete and did some searching. I could only find two places that seemed to do polished concrete in the Tri-Cities, both based in Spokane. I emailed the first place because they had residential projects in their portfolio. I wasn't even going to email Lundeen Simonson, since their website only showed work at companies and schools with vast stretches of concrete. I went ahead and emailed them on the off-chance, simply asking if they could refer me to anyone in the area who would be willing to take on the project. Well, good news. Their project manager responded promptly, and I think it may have even been a weekend. They said they do take on residential projects under the right circumstances, and the owner of the company would be in the Tri-Cities, anyway, since he would be in a meeting at Yoke's, which they had just done.

I couldn't be here to meet him, but my dad did, and he was sold on the idea. The owner suggested we have a small section of the floor done just to show what it would look like before we went any further. I chose four dye colors for them to demo, and their guy, using just hand tools, not the full machine, gave us something to look at, which some of you saw on Facebook. I like what I'm seeing, and I'll say it does look a bit better in person as opposed to in the picture. The full polish should be shinier, too.

They can put designs into the floor using the dyes, so I've been struggling, trying to come up with something. I'm thinking I want some 1' squares at the end of the room where the screen and main speakers will be. They'll be centered so I can use them for accurate positioning of the speakers. Then I want the squares to run into a big circle toward the center of the room. Not just a plain circle, but some sort of design based on a circle. Maybe a cog or something, and then I could have lines going in different directions. I'm not really sure how I want the design to transition into the dining/kitchen end of the main room, or into the bedroom and bathroom. Is anyone here interested in a design job? I have the main room drawn out on paper, but still not the full basement. I'd like to do it in something like SketchUp (which I just learned yesterday is now Trimble SketchUp, not Google SketchUp), but it was taking me too long to do the simplest things. I seem to be an ultra-slow learner with this kind of software. I'd pay if anyone here has the expertise to give me a hand at converting my idea into something in SketchUp. Otherwise, I'll see if the polished concrete guys have someone I should work with to get the design worked out. They didn't say how much time I'd have, but that I have a little because the grinding, patching, and evening out of the floor will take some work.

In any case, I'm excited about soon having some prettier pictures to share with everyone. Once the floor is done, I think it will really start to look like something that can actually be finished. Ha ha. It's only taken millennia.

Charles, I see that you're considering polished concrete 1' squares in various configurations, but is the remaining floor surface to be more acoustically friendly than concrete? The floor is generally the most convenient surface to reduce room liveliness.

I would think it might not be great for the temperature of the room, and boy howdy, don't drop anything!

John, I'm going to be making area rugs out of carpet and Instabind with padding underneath. I'll try to get creative with those for different looks. The main one will cover most of the home theater area, so I'm assuming that will be enough to tame reflections. While the design in the concrete will be mostly covered, I still want it there.

I like the look as well Charles. I'd feel remiss though if I didn't mention that walking on concrete as part of your daily routine can be very hard on your joints. It can lead to long term foot, knee, hip and back issues. Just ask any mechanic why they never shortchange themselves on expensive work boots.

I'm sure the rug will really tie the room together.

Thanks for the heads-up. Peter was saying something similar when I posted about it on Facebook. I'll have to invest in slippers like he suggested.

Duuuuude!

I stand at work (good for my back). Get one of those commercial rubber mat thingies for your kitchen workspace (business Costco in Fife or a restaurant supply house or something).

I was definitely planning on getting a couple of those for the kitchen, but I hadn't figured out what brand. Are the ones you're referring to different from the ones I can get from Amazon.com?

Nah. Just get a good one.

I suppose I only posted pics of my polished concrete floor on Facebook, not here. I decided against a design. I wasn't even going to dye it, but the guy suggested some color so the new concrete and old concrete didn't clash so much.







They're still coming back to put on one more coat of sealer and do one more buff. I'm happy with the look overall, but you can see parts of it look a little cloudier than the rest, so here's hoping that can be improved.

Very nice Charles. I can't wait to see how the finished room will look

Me, either. I'm getting more and more impatient.

Okay, back for a little more advice. Who here is happy with how they're running speaker and data cables around their spaces? I'm finding it a little problematic in a couple of cases. For some of it, it will be easy enough to take advantage of the suspended ceiling for runs. Where it gets tricky is running USB to my seating area (I prefer wired game controllers so I don't have to mess with batteries, and since I use my PC with my home theater, I'd like the ability to plug any USB device in right there), DisplayPort or HDMI to the seating area (should I want to hook up a normal computer monitor for certain types of work), power to the Buttkickers, signal cables to wherever the subwoofers end up, and speaker cables to all surround channels except for the left surround.

Putting most of them behind the baseboards would be perfect, but I'm not finding many elegant solutions. This is the best one I've found:

Access 5000 Large Capacity Raceway by Wiremold

I like that it has two channels, for power and data, and that it's a cover you can pop off whenever you need to switch out cables. But it's a bit spendy, and I think there'd still be a bit of jury-rigging for my intended use.

I'm still not sure how I'm doing the rear surrounds. I have the Axiom stands that I can use, but it does mean running speaker cable out to the center of the room. I have floor cord protectors, which can mostly be covered by whatever area rugs I make. I also have ceiling mounts, but they'll be out in the center of the space, so people would have to watch their heads, and I wouldn't be able to do as much experimenting with positioning without making a lot of work for myself.

No matter what, I'm going to have power and data cables going to the seating area. I suppose I'm simply not sure how best to get them there. Any brainstorms?

Again, thanks for letting me use you as a sounding board. Any feedback is appreciated.

I did a short USB extension from my equipment closet in the basement to my living room right above it with a basic cable <15 ft and it works fine. But for longer distance I wonder how well something like this would work.

http://www.monoprice.com/Product?c_id=10...=1&format=2

I already have an active USB 2.0 extender for the Kinect, as I think that's the longest USB run I need to do. I'm going to try to run the USB 3.0 cables pretty much directly from the equipment closet to the seating area using a floor cord cover. I'll have the cables to the Buttkickers, right surround, and rear surrounds following the baseboard around to the other side of the seating area. Another floor cord cover will get the Buttkicker cables to the Buttkickers. Raceway will get the speaker cable to the right surround. Even more floor cord cover will get the speaker cables to the rear surrounds, which I've decided will be on the FMS-QS stands I already have. I was considering ceiling-mounting them, but I decided I want to be able to move them around with more freedom, for experimentation purposes.

The floor cord covers will most be covered by area rugs, so hopefully it will look okay.

I've ordered one section of this baseboard:

CableMate Baseboard Channel w/2 End Caps, White C800

If it looks like it will work, I'll go ahead and order the rest of what I need.

I'm embarrassed even posting in this thread anymore. Finally pulled the trigger on some lighting for the basement. I couldn't get everything I hoped for, but I think we ended up with a pretty good compromise.

FlatMAX™ Edge Lit LED 2x2 Panel

We got the 5000K panels. I would have liked higher CRI.

At first we took home some can lighting, but with the ceiling being so low, the light didn't have any space in which to spread out, so it ended up being very focused in spots in the floor. Thankfully, it wasn't too late to cancel the order, and a second trip to the store had us looking at these panels. They seemed perfect for evenly distributed output, with the added benefit of being much less labor-intensive (no cutting out for the cans). Also easier to work with than other fixtures we were considering, since they're only 2" deep, where everything else was around 3.5" and more, which is problematic because of how little space there is between the ceiling grid and the floor joists above. 2" meant pain-free slipping in of the panels.

I hadn't kept up on LED lighting, but it seems like they've come a long way, and I'm sure in another 10 years it will be that much better. I'm sure higher CRI at 5000K will be a lot more common by then. In the meantime, I think this will work fine.

In other news, I let the hosting of my website expire, so now none of my photos and other media files I've linked to are available. I'll have to look into image hosting services this weekend and post some new pics, even if there isn't much different than the last batch. I posted a couple of pictures of the lighting on Facebook, for those of you who are my friends on there.

You broke the internet.

You don't care about us at all, do you?

Bikers! They are all the same.

For those who care, one thing I did find out when looking at LED bulbs is that Cree makes theirs in North Carolina. I'll be buying theirs for whatever accent lighting I end up with.

Here are the latest pics I've taken, just so there are some pics in the thread again. You can see the LED panels and the slatwall I'm using as my entryway organizer. As far as the entryway, I just need to add a bulletin board and shoe rack bench to make it completely functional, I think.

The home theater aspect still needs a lot of work. One of my friends is coming over again this coming weekend to help build something for the TV mount. The far wall in the top pic is where the TV will end up, but I'll want to place the mount higher than that wall goes up, which means building something.

We're looking at hiring someone to finish the kitchen, since there are some problems we don't really want to deal with ourselves. Hopefully the bid won't scare us.

Oh, and here's one more, since I've replaced some of the ceiling tiles above the theater area. I only bought one set of 20 because I didn't know how they would look, but I'm happy enough with them that I'll get some more and expand the coverage. They're the 1" thick fiberglass ones on Amazon.com. There are probably better options out there, but in the searching I was doing, I wasn't finding them. Do you think I should get some 2x2 sound diffuser panels as well and mix them in? I probably don't want absorptive panels over the entire area, right?

Ouch. We decided we wanted someone else to come and finish the kitchen for us, so I had a place from just up the road come look at the situation and give us an estimate. Granted, there are a couple of wrinkles that would make it a little difficult, but I wasn't expecting a $10k estimate. The whole reason we went with IKEA cabinets to begin with was to avoid spending $20k on just the kitchen portion of the renovation, but after the custom doors and fronts, another $10k on top of that would put us pretty close to $20k. So we'll have to look at other options. Any of you want to come do all of the work for us?

Nick is your man. But the alligators need to be well fed.

I know it's easy to say when you are far away but if I were close, I'd gladly come help out with anything except seam filling. I shall never do that particular job again. If there is a hell, I expect that's all I will be doing there.

Ha ha, thanks, guys.

One good thing. I decided to finally give up on the apron sink for the kitchen. It would have take some real finagling to make it work, since IKEA doesn't make a cabinet that will work for the sink I bought without modifying it. I also didn't double-check the plans well enough when I had the design done, so they left the cabinet doors too tall for the sink cabinet, and those plans went to Semihandmade, who made my custom doors and fronts. So to make this sink work would have required either cutting the cabinet down and building supports for it, or buying a new base cabinet for it, as well as cutting down the doors. I really like the look and size of the sink, but I'm finally ready to let that slight preference go and get a drop-in to simplify everything.

I was looking at something along the lines of this one: Kohler Vault K-3821. Thoughts? I mean, I'll try to find another brand that isn't so expensive. I still like stainless steel for it, especially with the oven being the only other stainless steel in the kitchen at this point. It seems like it would be odd not to give it a sibling.

We may be going with cultured marble for the countertop. My dad was pleased with the shower and vanity countertop he had done for his bathroom, so I'm willing to hear them out. Here is a page with some photos:

Columbia Cultured Marble - Kitchen Showcase

I'm not sure if I'll go darker or lighter than the floor, but I'm pretty sure I want a good contrast.

For the bathroom, I was considering a wall-mount sink to keep it feeling more open, as well as just a mirror instead of a medicine cabinet, instead just relying on some floating shelves to keep handy what I use. But I'm back and forth on that. I'm at the point where I just want to keep things moving forward.

I bought a waste can for my bathroom, and I was surprised to see it was made in Canada. Umbra Garbino

Since we do a lot of complaining, I like when I get to point out exceptional service to keep it fair.

As an FYI, we purchased a Silgranit kitchen sink from Blanco and while we are happy with the sink, we are even happier with the unusually pleasant service we have received post sale.

Our sink developed a hairline crack along the bottom that we brought to thier attention to see what would happen. It didn't leak but it was noticeable and we wore concerned it would grow. They asked for pictures both from above and below which was fair enough.

I should point out that this was over 6 years after the purchase so we fully expected them to tell us we must have done 'something' wrong and fight us on the warranty. However, in a matter of days, a new sink arrived at our door.

Twice since, we had an issue with the stoppers not being watertight. The new ones just didn't fit perfectly in the new sink. Both times, we had a new stopper in a matter of days. The second time they apologized as they were realizing that the rubber gasket used was defective from thier supplier for a while and assured us they had corrected it and sent us two new stoppers via next-day delivery.

It's rare to see a company stand behind thier products so well these days so I thought it's worth mentioning since you provided the opportunity. If they have a product you like, I recommend them for peace of mind.

Good to know! I was actually looking at one of their sinks since I like the black look, too.

Remind me what brands of home theater seating you've liked the most. Or normal theater seating if it's available for purchase by ordinary consumers. I'm going to check out one store this weekend, but I'm afraid they'll be asking more than I'll want to pay.

Just like food the best is always...free.
We just lucked out, were given a like new love seat and sofa which went into our living room.
This was perfect timing as the love seat (screen room) and recliners (previously in the LR)are no longer commercially available (they are awesome and they match).
I know its not relevant here, just got exited and had to share.
But seriously, looking around for like new seats might save you a pile of cash.

I like the theater seats at one of the local theaters, and I actually messaged them a while back to see if they could add some more to their order for the new theater they're building. They said they actually had plenty of extras from the existing theater, since they decided to give more leg room between rows. He said he could sell them to me at $150 per seat, which seemed like a steal, but the guy of theirs who was supposed to contact me never did, and subsequent messages never got another response. Which I suppose is fine, since they don't really go with the color scheme I have going, but still, that was before I'd decided on colors, so it would have informed my choices.

In any case, every time I look through craigslist for seating in the area, it's never anything I want. I'd better start looking more seriously, though, so I have something to sit on when it gets to the point that I can move my system downstairs.

Hopefully I'll have some new pics to post soon. The interior doors are finally being installed. I need to catch the guy before he puts the trim around the bathroom and bedroom doors, to make sure the gaps are filled with insulation and/or caulk so I can limit sound transmission where possible. I'll also get custom door sweeps and whatever else I can do to make a good seal.

Beanbags, Dude.

Movable bass traps.

As always, slow progress.



Here's a picture of the bathroom wall in its current state. Yes, those are half of the Full Metal Brackets for the Arctic White Algonquins which will flank the mirror. The white boards they're mounted to are pieces of PVC trim we were using to finish something else. To center everything with the outlets, you can see we have the screws offset to the right side of the boards since the outlet boxes are both mounted to studs on the right side. It all feels really solid, so I think they'll work well.

The mudding below is from needing to install some support for the wall-mounting vanity cabinet, since the mounting system for it wasn't made with standard stud spacing in mind. Not that the studs in this wall were standard, but it wouldn't have worked either way. So my dad cut out that section of sheetrock, notched out the studs (with a reciprocating saw and chisel) and placed a 2x6 to horizontally span the distance. He did the same thing in the kitchen area where we needed more support for the cabinets. Hopefully that's the last time it needs to be done.



Here is a photo of the doors to the bathroom (left) and bedroom (right). I'm not particularly happy with the installation of the doors. I'm not sure if you can see it, but the frame doesn't quite reach the floor on the right side of the bathroom door, which bothers me a lot. The doors were also cut down more than I would have liked. I was always going to get door sweeps to close the gap, but the gaps being so big to begin with seemed unnecessary. And yes, the doors are solid-core because I wanted to stop sound where I could. I put weather stripping around the frames and will add the door sweeps when I can.



Just what you wanted, another picture of the stairwell. It wasn't high on my list of priorities, but my dad really wanted another handrail for the right side, so this is what it looks like.



And last image for now. I needed a way to get the power and data cables through the ceiling tiles in the equipment closet, so I got some of these FastCap Dually Grommets. More than I wanted to spend, but they're pretty handy. They would be perfect for cabinets where you want to run wires through.

We're waiting to hear back from a place about the kitchen countertops and carpet for the stairs. In general, there's still touch-up painting that needs to be done, and some more ceiling tiles that need to be cut to fit the perimeter of the bathroom. I'm wanting to switch out most of these white standard ceiling tiles with something a little classier over time, but my dad already had these. I imagine something in the realm of plastic would be better in the bathroom and even kitchen area, something that could be easily wiped down, if I can find anything that looks good.

In any case, that's the latest on this strange odyssey where I'm trying to get home while already physically being at home. It's so close to being habitable, and boy, I can't wait to finally have the space to tinker with my home theater and have people over for movies.

Dude. You gotta rename this thread to: The mostest longestest HT build ever.

Oh, and where exactly is the gator pit? We are disappointed.

Downgraded to a croc pot.

And yeah, this will be the least impressive home theater when you work out time spent versus end result.

Nah...



Nah, too cute...



Hmm, that might work. Pair it with one of these out front and you're all set.

Well played. Just let me know what kind of beer to bring to the Gala Grand Opening.

How about this one?

It would be even better served up by this lovly young thing:

That last one looks like the entrance exhibit at Stumpy McTavish's Alligator Petting Zoo in Boca Raton!

Why didn't you guys remind me not to get banana connectors at the speaker ends of the speaker cable for my bathroom M3s?

Oh, and Fred, you're hilarious.

Probably because nobody wanted to talk about your banana in the bathroom.

Look, my dad mounted the vanity cabinet. I suppose if I had been cooler I would have gotten on-wall or in-wall speakers, but pretend this looks great. I'll have Wiremold cable raceways to take the speaker cables up to the ceiling. Now I just need the mirror and light above the mirror mounted, and the faucet for the sink installed.

Sound wise, boxy speakers win ever time. Looks great also.

Agree with both Catdude.

I like it. Good to see you left a dedicated outlet under each M3 so you can add per-channel subwoofers later.

Thanks, guys.



I wouldn't put it past me!

EP800 inwalls. Ian better get cracking on the design.

Dual dual opposed in-walls please.

Did a little more work today with my dad. He dropped the light fixture for above the mirror on the countertop, though, and chipped the porcelain. Hopefully some porcelain touch-up will make it less noticeable. It seems like no matter what, stuff like this is going to happen every step of the way.

For instance, I just found out today that we're somehow short on pieces that secure the kitchen cabinets to the suspension rails. We had one more base cabinet and one more upper cabinet to mount. We should have had four of a certain part left, but we only seem to have one remaining. But I do weird things in my sleep sometimes, so maybe I went downstairs and threw them away one night. Ha ha. Anyway, according to the FAQ on IKEA's website, I can't order the individual parts, but I can contact my local store and see if they can accommodate me. I don't have a local store, with the nearest ones being several hours away in Seattle or Portland. I don't remember ever seeing it at the Seattle location, but in Portland, right near the entrance is a large wall of the various bits and bobs that people might need spares of, and you can just walk in and take what you need. Convenient if you live nearby. Whatever I do, I should do it soon, since I don't know if they'll have the same pieces come February when they introduce their new cabinet system.

The mirror is up, although we couldn't mount it per the directions, since we didn't have studs where it wanted. My dad decided the best option was to screw directly into the mirror frame where the studs are located. It doesn't look terrible, but he's going to get some black screws to see if they blend better.

The faucet he had an extra of won't work, so I ordered one today from Amazon. More than I wanted to spend, but it's the same one my parents have (Moen S6700 90-Degree One-Handle Low Arc Bathroom Faucet, Chrome). I like it functionally, and it will go along well with the sink. Also, my dad and his friends have had really good experiences with Moen.

The M3s sound really good in there, even with less-than-ideal positioning.

There isn't an insane amount of work left before I can move down there, but it may take me a while to furnish the place. In any case, let's see what we can knock out in the next few weeks.

I love Moen faucets. I'm not sure I'll ever buy anything else again.

Do you want me to go to Ikea in Seattle for you?

When's the party?

When you show up with the case of beer, Gator Girl and the extra parts.

Gator Girl...go on...

Thank you for the offer! My sister found a site that sells all of those IKEA parts, so I went that route. They shipped today USPS Priority, so hopefully they'll be here quickly.

No basement grand opening scheduled yet, but I'll let you know.

I kind of figured she would solve your problem, one way or another. My offer was genuine, though.

Just a few more bathroom pics now that the faucet is in, mirror is up, and light is up.

I'm afraid my A/V receiver may be on the way out. It's suddenly taking a lot longer for it to output audio. I don't think it's anything else in the chain since 1) it happens on both my PC and PS3, and 2) my mains are powered by the ADA-1500, so if it was that or the LFR1100 DSP, the surround speakers would start playing before the mains. I may have to get a new unit sooner than planned. Grr.

The bathroom looks good CV.

Thanks, Fred. I still need to clean it up and add a few more things, of course, but I'm happy enough with how it's shaping up.

I like that vanity a lot. My wife has asked me if we could have speakers in our bathroom, just been too lazy to do anything about it.

I like the vanity cabinet, too, but with the premium price paid for it, we were hoping for a better design. The drawers aren't full extension, we prefer the soft-close function on the IKEA cabinets, the wall-mounting hardware made for extra work, and we had to place spacers under the front of the sink portion so it would effectively drain. You'd think they would have had it slope to the drain to begin with.

Here's an image just to show we did something this weekend:



This is the range hood we spent more on than the stove/oven itself, and that's after it was discounted. Our ducting to the outside unfortunately has three 90-degree bends, and everything you read says to avoid any sharp bends. I guess we'll find out how effective it is. We really didn't have any other options, and that's what the outfit we hired figured out for us.

The bathroom is pretty much done, with just some caulking left to do, and then a couple more ceiling tiles to cut to fit. The washer and dryer may be problematic if we stick with normal ones. Does anyone have experience with the stacked or stackables? If I can get them under 71 inches, that would be great, but a little taller would work, too, if we pull it away from the wall a little more. Otherwise, we'll have a tight fit for opening the doors. It's doable, just tight. My dad had an extra dryer, which I planned on using, so we placed it there to find out how claustrophobic it makes it. In any case, if any of you can shed light on the stackables, I'm all ears.

Cleaned a little bit out, too, so it's slowly starting to resemble a habitable space.

Installed a bike rack in what seemed like the best spot, behind the dining area. You can see I'll be using a picnic table as my dining table. That's actually two separate units. Lifetime brand outdoor benches purchased from Costco with backs that flip down to become tables. They seemed like a good idea for when I want to clear the floor a bit and have more seating. Like I'll ever throw a party after the one I throw for you guys.

Besides the bike rack and some more tidying, we switched out the fixed shower head in the bath for a hand sprayer.

It's looking like tomorrow we'll tackle the shelving for all of my books, Blu-rays, DVDs, video games, etc. I'm going to stay cheap and simply use the standard adjustable shelving which my dad already has a lot of extra hardware for, and we'll just go pick up as many melamine shelf boards as we need. Here's hoping they have enough of whatever color we prefer that are in acceptable condition.

Ooooh, furniture! Does this mean you are down to the short strokes on your reno? It must be a good feeling to finally see something resembling the final form of your reno.

Yes and no. It does get more aggravating because I want stuff to be done, and everything still requires patience.

The place we went to about finishing the kitchen (countertops and sink installation) and carpeting the stairs still hasn't gotten back to us. I'm still debating whether I want to spend so much on the glass door for the home theater equipment closet, and I still need to find someone make the doors for the back side of that closet which faces into the bedroom. I still need to figure out the area rug situation for the home theater area. I still need to figure out seating for the home theater. I still don't know exactly how I'm going to run some of the cabling. My dad's still waiting to hear back from the inspector to have him look under the stairs before we can paint in there and finish that up. Some of the stuff isn't vital and can be fine-tuned over time, but it would be nice to tackle a lot of it before actually living in the space.

Not too productive of a day. After two Home Depots and two Lowe's stores, we came up short on finding everything we needed for the shelving plan. We probably could have had everything we needed if we'd bought some at each place, but we didn't want to buy without knowing if we'd find the rest elsewhere. Really frustrating. It wasn't the ideal shelving plan to begin with, but I can't come up with anything better so far.

I know it's probably not everyone's first choice but I've purchased quite a few shelving and storage systems from Amazon. My QS8's still sit on media towers with 5" holes cut in the top (for the record, they've never fallen).

The convenience is pretty hard to ignore.

I have some sizable shelves that hold a lot, formerly used in a library, but I wanted to go without taking up floor space. See that ledge that goes around the perimeter of the room with the countertop material? I figured I'd put the shelving up in that space, but it's hard to find stuff that's the right fit. I should probably ask someone who makes custom stuff to give me an estimate, see how unrealistic it is. If that's a bust, I'll probably return to the adjustable closet-style shelving with some modifications to the plan.

My Onkyo TX-NR708 bit the dust. No more sound output. I already got my replacement receiver, though. Really didn't want to buy a new receiver yet, but I'm sure my dad or someone else will be interested in this one when I finally upgrade to an Atmos, etc. receiver down the line. I ended up with a previous-generation TX-NR828. It seemed like the best value, since I didn't want to pay for the newer features that are going to be worked out much better in future models.

Setup went very quickly, but I'll do a more exhaustive calibration over the weekend. Or I may even move the system downstairs. I don't have any seating to speak of yet, but I could always take this much-abused sofa down there until I can afford a replacement. I don't have my area rug(s) yet, either, so it would be a very reflective room. It's hard to wait.

I picked up two of the same area rugs from Costco today. I think I chose the wrong color, but other than that, they should work. The basement is the clearest it's been in a while. I hope to have another pic or two to share tomorrow after some more work. I do think I'll move my system downstairs tomorrow, even if some of the setup won't be ideal. I'm thinking I'll just take the chaise longue section of the sofa down since I don't plan on having guests yet. It'll look dumb, but at least I'll have a seat for myself and can start playing with speaker and seating positioning a little. Not that anything I do will be final, since the acoustics of the room will continue to change as it fills out. Here's hoping I can get it done in time to enjoy a movie tomorrow.

Nothing is ever easy. I'm using my system a little bit right now, but it took all day to get to this point, and it's not complete. I don't have the rear surrounds hooked up, only one EP800 (since the amplifier on the other one I hooked up seems to have decided to go kaput after being relocated), no Buttkicker(s), and the cables are not even close to being organized and in their final resting places. Only the surround speakers have the speaker wires run properly. The 100 feet of speaker wire from Blue Jeans went too quickly, so I'll have to order more or just pick up a spool locally.

Oh, and the TV mounting bracket wasn't sufficient. It was rated for more weight than this TV, but there must have been some fudging. It was going to warp the metal if we let it. It wasn't the greatest bracket to begin with. The level that was built into it was crooked on the mount itself, so the helpful feature made things more difficult. In any case, I know better than to skimp and get an off-brand now. Hopefully we can pick up a better one tomorrow.

For the right surround, we built this box out of melamine shelf boards:



We made that to rest on the ledge so it would be closer to the height of the left surround, which is more appropriately mounted to the wall. Even though the QS8 hangs out over the edge to give the bottom-firing driver clearance, it doesn't pull the box over. Still, just to be safe, I put my kettle bell in there for now, until I get something else to weigh it down. I'll take another picture of it actually in use tomorrow.

In other news, my dad was able to make the trim pieces to go between the range vent hood and the ceiling out of the bamboo toe kicks for the kitchen cabinets we decided not to use.



I have to go running with one friend tomorrow, then to dinner with another, but otherwise I'll be doing what I can in the basement again. Hopefully tomorrow will consist of less of me having to do things over because I did them wrong the first time. It happened a lot today and yesterday.

Seems that way some days. Things never go as planed the first time you do something. There is always a learning curve. Its best to go into a new project expecting things to take much longer than they should.

It is also useful to weigh the cost of having something done by a pro vs doing it yourself. Some things are not worth the learning curve.

I'm slowly learning this myself. I have a contractor installing a front door as I type this.

Could I have done it? Probably.

But it's an old house, nothing is square or plumb, and I can't walk away from it halfway through if I run into trouble. More and more, I realize that I have to admit to my limitations and let those with more knowledge and experience just get the job done.

That's right Mark.
Can you imagine what would happen if Joe Blow just picked up a camera and took photos of anything these days putting pro photogs out of business?
What calamity we would have on our hands. Maybe even websites where people could post their own "pro" photos.
Oh the insanity.

That's a very good point, and there have been plenty of instances during this whole odyssey where we've called in the cavalry, but on the other hand, there are always those details even the professionals miss, and it makes you wonder why you went with them to begin with.

Don't get me started.
Good help is seriously hard to find. Integrity seems to be a quality missing from most vocabulary.

On that note, i have a meeting with a general contractor in an hour to get an estimate for a kitchen reno. The second one on the week.

Wow.

You're renovating your kitchen twice in one week?

The good news is that first impressions with the LFR1100s in the new space are positive. I'm already hearing the benefits of having more breathing room around them. I won't try experimenting with different positions until a lot of other stuff in the room is finalized, but I'm optimistic I'll be able to dial them in even more.

I thought you promised Chris and I that the listening area would be square?

Ha

Boredom has set in these days.
What can i say?

If you're really bored, you can come over and paint my screen. Again.

If someone pays the flight ticket, i might just take up the offer.

I should probably buy some partitions to square it up whenever you guys visit so you aren't disoriented.

Nah, leave the extra room and watch them get lost.

Hey Chess. I figured you could drop by and paint on your way to that aniversary celebration this September. I'll even throw in a bottle of nice wine... as long as you promise not to drink most of it until after the painting is done.

The message board isn't liking the generated code, and my brain is too tired to make sense of why, so here is a link to the image of the QS8 mounted to the weighted box.

http://imgur.com/infdY3u

Works

It's going to look weird for a while as I get more speaker wire and figure out the best way to run the subwoofer cables and wire to the rear surrounds, but at least it's functional, and you can see the basic layout:



Yes, I decided to put one of the horizontal EP800s on the ledge behind the screen. It seems to work just fine, so I'm glad it's not just wasted space back there. I'm just going to get blinds to block light from the window.





Besides the bad amp in one EP800, another one was exhibiting a rapid knocking sound whenever there was extremely low bass. I never put in the time to troubleshoot it since it wasn't the most common thing, and it would have been an ordeal to try to figure things out in the smaller space. I was playing the THX "Amazing Life" opener after doing the Audyssey quick calibration, though, and my dad was around, so after the knocking happened again, we both decided to try to get to the bottom of it. The good news is it wasn't the drivers or the amp. The bad news is it was a piece of the enclosure which never got secured properly. There's a board behind the amp when you open it up and look inside, and it was loose in there, so that's what was banging around inside during those times. We put the bad amp in the bad enclosure and the good amp in the good enclosure, so I have three functioning subs. I emailed Axiom about the issues and what we did, so we'll see what they say about getting this one fixed or replaced.

In the meantime, I'm extremely happy with the sound. It's even clearer and more open-sounding than it was before. Now I mainly need more seating to have a movie night. My friends can deal with my mess of cables.

Nice

Thank you. It's not as nice as it should be after so many years, but maybe I'll marry an interior designer, and she'll be all about improving the space.

Good plan. Make sure she's OK with a gator pit though.

I think it's looking great!

And if you end up not liking where one of the speakers is positioned, you can green-screen it out.

Ok, I get the gator pit reference now. Unique choice

Looks great! Gotta love T-Bar ceilings for pulling and hiding cables.

Yeah, my dad really wanted to do that type of ceiling, and I don't blame him.

If you're referring to the green, I picked it because I never seem to see it in home theaters, and hey, I like it. I decided the color scheme would be "haunted forest." Maybe I can get an artist to come paint tree-ish silhouettes on the walls in the future. Ha ha.

Thanks, Mark! After I get to the point where I can call it "done," I'll need to find a photographer as good as you who can make it look that much better in the images I'll share.

It's been a few years, but I can paint hand turkeys on the wall. That way you can have hand turkeys running through your forest. If I work alone all of them will be facing right. They will look like a herd of hand turkeys running from something. Perhaps from the crocodiles?

McGruber going for the "turkey". Throat rips..... No?

Ha ha. You're welcome to leave your mark if you're ever up this way.

All those in favour of hand turkeys on CV's wall say aye.

"Aye."

What animals do feet make?

Aye

I move that the minutes show the original motion having been passed unanimously.

All those who want pics say aye.

Aye.

Aye

Here are a couple of pictures of the shelving I cobbled together today. They're 6' long melamine boards on top of glass blocks from Lowes. The glass blocks were standard at 8"x8"x4", so they work perfectly as supports without being cinder blocks. They work for standard Blu-ray and DVD case heights, but some of the larger deluxe packaging will either have to be laid down or set off to the side.





Oh, and to discourage sliding, I cut pieces of that godforsaken shelf liner material to place between the countertop/glass blocks/shelves. It seems like it will do well enough, as long as people aren't crashing into them. No ragers here.

I am leaving spaces in there for expansion, even though I do plan on doing a purge of my collection soon. That's mostly stuff I want to continue to own, but I can weed out a few. I don't think I'll be able to store all of my books and CDs since I only have space on the ledge for two more 6' sections of shelving. In the main room, that is. I think I'll also do a purge on my book collection, and hopefully that will all fit on the ledge in the bedroom. Maybe then I can fit my CD collection out in the main room. I know it's getting weirder to keep physical media in the age of streaming, but I'll continue to have a hard time letting it go.

Keep it. Don't cave.
Looks good.
Thanks for the pictures.

I really like the shelving solution.

Looks darn near habitable.

"I know it's getting weirder to keep physical media in the age of streaming, but I'll continue to have a hard time letting it go."

I think it is smart to keep it.

1. Somewhere some executive is lowering streaming quality. "The average person can't tell the difference, studies show!"

2. Streaming content could be edited in the future.

Thanks, Tom! I got really excited when I thought of it, so I'm glad it actually worked and looked okay. I don't know if you can tell, but eight of the blocks are the bullnose end pieces. The other glass blocks were around $5 apiece, but those end pieces are usually $17 each. Since the narrow side is facing out on most of the blocks, it would have been nice to have all of those be the end pieces, but not at that price difference. I have eight of them, however, simply because Lowes let me buy them at the $5 price, since they were from the manufacturer in the wrong box and placed with the other $5 blocks. I couldn't resist jumping on that, even if they don't match perfectly with the rest.

Even with the unattractive sides of the non-end blocks facing out, I don't think it looks too bad. I imagine I'll do the same shelving for my CDs, too.

I still have a lot of DVDs of things that haven't been released on Blu-ray, and it's not like I'll have the disposable income to replace them, anyway, but in the meantime, I don't know where I'll store them. I suppose I'll just keep them well-organized in boxes and only crack them open as needed.

I swear I'll only buy the UHD Blu-rays that are must-owns. *straight face*

I too will never let go of physical media.

::raises Hand:: Three!

Doors would look better over the shelving. To me looks too distracting. Other than that is good.

The shelving looks good CV. They give the room a finished look.

What will the lighting look like while viewing?

Do you /will you use the grills or leave them exposed?

I tend to prefer the open shelving look for movies/books/music/games. I'm just imagining a library where all of their books are behind doors.

I think I'll leave them exposed unless younger kids are coming over. The glue on the grills isn't what it used to be, so they've started coming off at the edges. I'll have to try to fix that sometime. The grills from my older speakers are still going strong. It's just the more recent purchases, so I wonder if that's something Axiom will be addressing. In any case, under normal circumstances, I prefer the look with the grills off.

For watching a movie, I'll just turn all of the lights off:



If I want a little light for distracted entertainment, I can do this for now:



My dad wants to put LEDs in the glass blocks, but I'm not that ambitious yet. Some kind of accent lighting is in order at some point, though.

I missed it....how wide is the room?
And....
How far off the back wall are your towers?

Looking at that ep800 lying on the floor, I'd also be concerned about parties and drunk adults, though I don't know how useful a grill would be in that situation.

All in all it looks like things are finally coming together nicely.

Slightly over 18' wide. There are 23" between the wall and the very back corner of the speaker.

Thanks. About what I have now behind mine. Thought I'd ask.
I'd love to have 6' more (50% more) width. Next time.

It's always a pile of compromises, isn't it? I sacrificed space in the bedroom for more space out in this open room. I figure I'm only in the bedroom to sleep, so it seemed like the wise move.

I really need to hurry up with my countertop. Can't wait to cook!

I like the kitchen, CV!! Good choice of wood.

Thanks, Sean! They're just IKEA cabinets, but the doors and fronts I got from Semihandmade, and I'm very happy with the quality. I thought about going with something more exotic, but I liked the look of the bamboo, and I don't regret it. So far. Who knows what I'll think after a while of using the kitchen.

I feel like I always have bad news, and there is more today. Before heading to work this morning, I had my system on like normal. I watched the new Marina and the Diamonds video, then just left the system silent as I did a little browsing online. LOUD POP a few minutes later.

I went over to inspect, smelled burnt something, then quickly tried to play something to see if it was the ADA-1500-4 powering the LFR1100s. Yeah, no sound coming from them. I didn't have time to do any further troubleshooting, so I simply powered off the amp and DSP and unplugged them. Finally checking it out now after getting home, and sure enough, switching the LFR1100 channels to the ADA-1000-4 resulted in restoring my sound. I know they'll take care of me, but I keep wanting my system to be completely up and running the way it's supposed to be so I can have people over. I still need to call them and pay for the return shipping boxes and label for the EP800 that I'm sending in for repair, so I should get everything sorted at once.

Maybe Regina has cast a spell on you for listening to too much Marina?

Does that mean she cares?

Walt and Jesse are ready to help me cook.



I officially have too many CDs. That's only halfway through S, and that's not including soundtracks, classical, comedy, and test CDs. I'll have to weed out some of the ones I know I don't want anymore. Also, a lot of those are singles, so I may store those in boxes behind the shelves, only leaving full albums out for perusal.

I think you need more CDs. When I was going to university we had a music room maybe 16x24 and the entire perimeter of the room was lined with a 2 foot deep wall of LPs. It was basically 5 guys record collections merged and sorted by artist, but there were surprisingly few duplicates other than DSOTM (I think we had maybe 7 copies of DSOTM).

You're not even close.

I'm not trying to say I have even a large collection. I'm only saying I don't have the space for everything I own. Even after I do a purge on my music collection, that's still only my Blu-rays, video games, and my CDs out in the main area. My DVDs still need a home, as well as my books. I don't know how I ever thought this would be enough space.

Whew! Whittled down my CD collection a little bit, boxed up singles and duplicates (as in, normal versions of albums, left deluxe editions on the shelf), and now my main collection fits, with very little breathing room, in that space. I'll still need to keep soundtracks, classical, comedy, and test CDs in storage. I feel like I accomplished very little, and here it is, 3:30 AM.

Yeah, I know that feeling. In theory you establish a "comfort zone" somewhere between the minimum # of <whatever> you feel is sufficient and the maximum number you have room to store.

In practice the second number is usually smaller than the first number

Ha ha, very true!

I've received three of the four Bali cellular shades I've ordered. Maybe counterintuitive, but I went with light filtering (non-blackout) black shades for the stairwell windows, and a white blackout shade for the window behind the TV. They're all inside-mount, so there will still be light around the edges unless I further dress the windows.

I'm tempted to do another Bali shade for the front of the equipment closet, simply because it would be a lot cheaper than a glass door, and maybe blocking the view of the equipment wouldn't be such a bad thing. Of course, this would require an IR extender solution of some kind, which I haven't researched at all. At least, it will require it if I want to control anything other than my PS3 or PC. As long as no one wants me to change the volume during movie nights, then I really don't need to invest in the IR extender stuff right away. In any case, that's just if I decide to go with another shade. I haven't seen it before, but it doesn't seem like it would be unsightly. What do you think? Weird idea?

I'm not sure when the kitchen counter will be installed. I have to have more work done prior to the installation. I had mentioned to the woman at Home Depot when we first went in and ordered the countertop that I still needed the support built for the end where the dishwasher would go, but then I forgot to make a point of ensuring it would be included in the estimate. Sure enough, it wasn't, so now we need to have their cabinet guy come out and measure and give us a bid for doing that part of it, as well as cutting down and attaching the end panel pieces. Then the countertop guys can come do the templating for their portion of the work. Fingers crossed it will happen sooner rather than later.

I'll post new pics after I have the window shades installed, since you've never seen any before in your life.

Here are the shades in the stairwell windows, at least:



They ended up being different colors because I'm not always smart. I had originally ordered both in black, but I didn't double-check my measurements even though they say to be sure. I was sure, but I wasn't right. The top of the window opening is an inch narrower than the bottom in one of them, so there's no way it was fitting. Because they're custom, there are no refunds, of course. I bought them during a 20% off sale at Home Depot. Fortunately, another 20% off sale was going almost immediately after that one ended. Unfortunately, I didn't have the shades until the very end of the second promotion. As in, the last day of it, so when I went to install and found out it wouldn't fit, I felt pressured to order a replacement to save 20%. So at 11:fifty-something PM, I ordered a replacement, but it was "Silver Fox" instead of black, because I couldn't find the black on the website. It turns out I was in the blackout section instead of merely light-filtering, so besides the mis-matched color, the gray one is blackout, and the black one lets some light through. I've basically messed up in every way possible. Plus, there's another 20% off promotion going. I also found out Costco lets you buy Bali shades from them, and they had 10% off, but I don't know how their base price compares.

If I do replace one, I'll probably make the black one "Silver Fox" as well, so I can have the blackout. Most people reacted negatively to the two colors, but the hottest one said I should keep them mis-matched, so we'll see what happens. Ha ha.

And here's the Origami kitchen cart I got so I could have a place to set down groceries when I come down the stairs:



I'm still thinking carpet for the stairs, whatever is supposed to be the most durable. Dragging my feet on that because the stairwell still needs to be repainted, since it's been banged up a fair amount throughout the renovation, and I want the painting done before the carpet is installed just so I don't have to be as careful. Maybe I should get the rest of my furniture before painting, too? I still really like the idea of eventually making that stairwell a climbing wall, but that would be a lot of work redoing the walls with thick plywood to be able to support all of the handholds.

A pic of a triangle shelving unit to utilize a corner between the kitchen and bedroom:



I figure I'll use it for various boxed and canned foodstuffs since I don't have a real pantry.

I finally got my kitchen counter installed:



My backsplash material should come tomorrow, so I'll have a busy weekend. My dad will install the sink, faucet, and garbage disposal. I'll see if I can figure out how to install the lazy susan for the corner cabinet, and I still need to put a handle on that door, too. After all that, I'll need to do some major organization of all of my kitchen stuff and move the island into that area. I also need to fit in food and Age of Ultron with friends!

It's really coming together Charles. Looking good!

Thanks, Murph!

Wow! You've been busy. You're getting great results. Congratulations.
Looks like you're missing some Axiom Aeris in there.

Nothing ever works out perfectly.

They mis-measured slightly on the piece of countertop for the base cabinet to the left of the stove. They measured 26" from the wall to the very edge of the counter (crescent edge included) on the left side, then 26" to where the work surface meets the start of the crescent edge on right side, so it's just a little cock-eyed. It's not very noticeable, except when you're standing over it looking at the handle for the drawer below, or if you're specifically looking at how much the counter sticks out on either side of the stove. I'm thinking I'd rather live with it being a little off rather than go through the hassle of adapting my schedule to them coming out again, since they changed the install time twice on me already, the second time of which was hours after their arrival window--"Oh, by the way, we have to reschedule for tomorrow." I'll just see how much they want to knock off the price.

The other dumb thing is the faucet I got ages ago won't work. Too tall. I don't know where in the planning and re-planning of the layout I messed up, but I thought I still had a couple of inches of clearance. Not so. It wants several more inches to live under that upper cabinet. Rather than remove the cabinet above to accommodate my restaurant-style sprayer, I'm going to cry and gnash my teeth and live with this one from Costco: Hansgrohe Cento Kitchen Faucet

I sure have wasted some money from not knowing what I'm doing. Anyway, even if it's not what I wanted to begin with, I'm happy with how it's turning out. I didn't get as much accomplished as I wanted this weekend, but the sink is installed, the backsplash is installed, the new faucet is half-installed (my Dad ran out of time, so we'll see when we can coordinate again), and I put up an Oxo SteeL Kitchen Tool and Utensil Rack behind the sink to hang the various brushes I'll use to clean dishes.

I'll post pics again when it's all functional and I have a little more time to think of where I'm going to place appliances, etc.

I'd get them to change out their error. It will irk you forever.
They should be scheduling round you, especially if you haven't paid the invoice. It's the only control you'll have.
My two cents...

Unfortunately, with Home Depot, you pay first. With the issues we've had, I won't be making that mistake again.

For the countertop portion, we changed a couple of details during the templating, which he said might add to the cost. At that point, Home Depot was supposed to contact us if we had to pay more, as the contractor is only supposed to do the work after the balance has been paid. We never heard from Home Depot, so we assumed no extra cost. After the job was done, we finally heard from Home Depot, but of course we're not paying because of this mistake. They're supposed to contact Precision Countertops and get back to us. One of the other reasons I'd hesitate to have them out again is because I already put the backsplash up, which would make them pulling that piece and putting the new one (or this one, if they modify it) back in a little trickier. We'll see what happens.

We've done 3 kitchens with Home Depot. Each time getting a second quote (not Lowe's, but a "real" kitchen remodeling company. Each time, HD was cheaper for the cabinets, granite, and install than the "real" kitchen places were for just the cabinets - and, yes, we were comparing apples to apples; in our case all Kraftmaid, all-plywood-construction with solid wood fronts and soft return drawers and doors.

With any construction job you should have the option of refusing the work performed. Haven't had that problem with HD, but several other contractors.

Our experience with Home Depot has been a bit more mixed. Yes they can have some of the lowest prices on materials. They certify buying bulk amounts each year and as such, get price discounts so smaller companies just cannot compete (try going to FloForm directly to get Corian countertops and the same thing through Home Depot is cheaper...even though they also get it from FloForm). However the clincher comes in their installers. How good are they and how expensive compared to someone not with Home Depot?

We once got a quote for painting. The Home Depot contractors wanted something like $3000 to do a main floor hallway and stairwell. We got a local painter to do it for $500 which included the paint. Older little Portugese fellow who barely spoke English. His wife had to interpret most conversations. He was fast and good.
Never seen a painter avoid using tape before and not get a drop anywhere except on the surface. He finished in 2 days, 2 coats (i know, i watched as i was working from home).
The Home Depot painters?
They estimated 3 days work for 2 people.

Hmm, makes you wonder.

That aside, we had HD cabinets in my mother's home reno and we used our own contractor. That worked out well. HD messed up the Corian counter and we got a discount on it.
Our own kitchen reno starts at the end of this month. Not using Home Depot (choices were limited for what we wanted).

This is pretty much the final state of the kitchen. My dad finished the plumbing for the sink. The only things left to do are 1) caulk where the backsplash meets the countertop, and 2) finish installing the lazy susan in the corner cabinet. It won't take long. And of course I'll need to spend time organize all of the kitchen stuff I've accumulated over the years. There are little imperfections throughout, but I'm happy enough with the final product. I'll probably post one more picture of the kitchen after the remainder of the work is done and the kitchen island is in place.



And since there wasn't a good place for the microwave, it ended up on the kitchen cart at the entryway. Not too far out of the way.

Great job. Very inviting. Great place to have a party and layout a bunch of pizza boxes!

Perhaps a microwave combo range hood might have fit?

Perhaps? I didn't seriously consider them because I assumed they would be a compromise on both the microwave and the exhaust.

No, the new models are very good at both.
Something to think about, unless the project has been signed off and moved to operational steady state!

Looking good CV. Wow, I just went back to page one to see when this all started... 2008. It must feel really good for things to finally come together.

Ha ha. Yeah, considering how much effort and money the range hood took, I'm sticking with it. I'm liking my microwave a lot, too. If I get tired of it being on that cart, I can try it on my island, though I'd hate to clutter that up more than I already plan to. I will have a power strip mounted on the back side of it.

Ouch. That's forever ago. Yeah, I'm glad it's finally to this point. Just a few more things to do, as well as furnishings, and I won't be so embarrassed to have people over.

Hey, its as much about the journey as the end goal. I lived through a farmhouse reno that ended up taking 15 years.

I've been really lazy, at a standstill for quite a while. I'm just posting here to say I got a stopgap receiver to last me until maybe the next generation of Anthem is out and, I have money for it. Stopgap again, I should say, since the Onkyo I got prior was supposed to last me until then. I ended up ordering a Marantz SR5010 from Accessories4less. Does it have all of the features I want? Of course not, but it seemed to hit the sweet spot for me right now, and I'll get the more complete package later.

I'll be happy to be able to watch Blu-rays again. Right now the only audio I get is from my PC, since I have the analog outputs from the onboard audio going directly to the amps. I have a Blu-ray drive in my PC, as well as the latest version of PowerDVD, but the audio isn't in sync, and I couldn't figure out where to fix that. I bet the problem goes away once I'm using HDMI for the audio again.

Anyway, hopefully the shipping is speedy!

Someone told me that Anthem releases products every 2 years, so you will be waiting a while...

It'll probably pass faster than I want. Ha ha. I think I was going to prioritize a new display, anyway. I'll get there eventually!

Who will finish first. George RR Martin or CV?

I'm not going to brag about how fast I finish.

It's no wonder you're single .

ETERNALLY.

It's nice to have a receiver again.

But I thought you were single?

Why was this the last word on my thread? At least it's still fresh.

I haven't posted any updates in a while, and yup, that's because I haven't made any great strides. However, I did just pull the trigger on a pair of M5HPs, in anticipation of eventually moving to a full Atmos setup. I'm going to try them out as side surrounds, replacing QS8s. I may also see how a single one performs as a center channel vs. the current VP180.

I saw a 65" LG OLED at Costco last weekend. I want it. Not sure when that's going to happen, but hopefully actually seeing it in person will motivate me to start pinching pennies.

Despite its beautiful image, watch out for image retention/burnin on OLED technology.

A new LG OLED at my local BB has developed severe burnin with only a spectacular LG Demo running without any static images. The reddish LG logo on the demo appears for only 10 seconds at the end of the loop & repeats throughout the day; however, there is a very apparent colourful blob right where the LG logo normally appears. Severe screen damage as far as I can see.

From what I've seen, OLED is not for me...

TAM

Hmmm... certainly something to consider. Probably a dealbreaker for me given my use. I have my computer hooked up to my TV, so there's a lot of time where the icons along the bottom and the tabs at the top remain the same. I guess that means I won't have to spend as much on a TV, but the downside will be that I won't like the image as much.

I got the shipment notification for my M5HPs today, and they're scheduled to arrive next Wednesday, 10/10. Can't wait!

What are you hooking them up to? Is this your first experience with v4?

I believe one of my EP800s may be a v4? When did v4 debut? I ended up getting a replacement in 2015. I think everything else in my system is v3. The M5HPs will be replacing my QS8 side surrounds, and they'll be powered by an ADA1000.

I'm replacing my 80v2 with them. You might want to try the M5s in front to compare them with the LFRs. I'd be curious to know the soundstage size and imaging differences between those two. The v4 came out in June 2014, consisting of albino, aluminum dustcaps and a new tweeter. Since then however there have likely been more refinements to The Family of Curves and hence at least the cross-over. If your 800 has white dust caps and a phase knob, it's v4. I've had my 800 now for almost a year and I still can't say enough about it.

I checked, and yeah, one of mine is a v4. I agree about the EP800. It's been an incredible addition to my HT. I'd recommend it to anyone who can fit it into their budget.

Ya, but you really need a pair of HG Rosewoods...

TAM

Ha ha, I agree. I've always been jealous of the look of those!

Just curious, what grill colour goes well with HG Rosewood ?

(yeah, yeah, we don't need no stinkin' grills)

The closest I could find was "cool grey" - the combination looked interesting but I couldn't see it fitting with my living room decor.

Is Rosewood veneer plus piano finish the nearest thing to HG Rosewood today ?

Oh, wow, the speakers are already in Spokane (maybe a 2.5 hour drive away), so they should be here Monday unless they get held up for no reason.

My older Rosewood 800s are more 'blonde' than the present finish on my M22s & VP160 that have more of a burgundy tone. All of my grills are Black/Charcoal.

Even with the slight mismatch in colour between the subs & the other units, they all look very classy...

TAM

All of mine are boring, standard black because I've never cared about form - only function. However, like other tastes of mine, that too is changing. Ultimately if I'm happy with how my evolved systems sound, I might get Axiom to upgrade me to purple heartwood or cocobolo.

Congrats Charles
It's always nice when you know your package made it across the continent and border safely. I find the anticipation only escalates knowing it's near by. Then on the delivery day sitting like a cat in the window waiting for the bird to come within reach.

Thanks, brendo!

Contemplating. I have spare Full Metal Brackets that I'll probably end up using, but I should probably use stands for now to play with positioning. I want to buy a new TV before most other HT upgrades, and how big could dictate how far back my seating is. Moving to 4K could mean I stay as close or closer, though, even getting a bigger TV, just to be able to resolve the bulk of the detail. This would all be easier if I had the money to buy everything at once.

Unfortunately, signature required means I don't get my speakers until tomorrow.

Looking forward to your impressions.

My friend helped me put up a new shelf for my center channel speaker. It was resting on two monitor stands on top of a bench before this. This wall-mounted shelf gets it up a couple more inches and allows me to place an EP800 below it. I don't think I'll ever have a magazine-worthy setup, but I'll settle for functional.

I got my first email from Axiom re: my LFR1100 Actives and accompanying ADA1500-5 amps. They're at the assembly and electronics stages, respectively.

Like several of you, I wasn't thinking I was quite ready to make the jump, but Ian came to me with a great offer, and I'm doing a lot of trading up to make it happen. I'm reducing from four EP800s to two, as well as removing the VP180 from my setup... along with trading up the original LFR1100s. I've always gotten my speakers in Boston Cherry, but this time I'm going for satin finish Rosewood. Oh, wow, and I didn't realize they went all real wood veneers. I guess it was fate.

I'm also getting four M3 in-ceiling speakers to go full Atmos whenever I get a new AV processor. I keep hoping Anthem will announce a new one.

And you read that right above, I'm trying my setup without a center channel. I've already taken the VP180 out of the chain, and I have to say that so far the phantom center seems to be working fine. I haven't tried sitting off to the side very far, so I'm not sure where it collapses.

If the actives give as large a sweet spot as we've been hearing about then the phantom center is a no brainer. I've traded in a few speakers to covert to walnut for the media room. I didn't convert my VP180 because I suspect/hope I won't need it.

(and you know what that means ... I'll have to trade it in anyway to buy something else)

Charles, I am very glad to hear the phantom center works in your room. In mine, at 12 feet apart and 15 feet MLP, it doesn't work for movies even at the MLP. Music is a different story.

To qualify this, someone who has not heard a center channel would not object to the diffuse center imaging for movies coming from the actives. But when I use the 160, located directly below my screen, there is no mistake the sound comes from the actors' mouths. Otherwise, the sound is strangely detached from the actors.

I won't be able to convert any of my other speakers to a matching finish anytime soon, but I think even just my mains in real wood will make me happy. One bit of sad news is when I was recently re-routing some speaker wires, I knocked over an M5HP, and the very bottom of the rear of the speaker got dinged pretty good. Thankfully it was the back which I only ever see when disconnecting and reconnecting wires, but you can imagine the sinking feeling I had when it happened.

It seems to be better or worse, depending on the material, but I feel like I was getting a similar experience with the center. I figure if I feel it's lacking later on, then it's a good opportunity to get a center that's v4 (or v5 if it takes that long) in matching rosewood.

Charles, I really don't want to introduce doubts for you but I have to get this out. You have a v3 180. Try a v4 160. I think you're missing out.

Not in this round! I have to make my wallet feel like it's at least slightly respected.

I received 10 of the 11 boxes in the shipment, but unfortunately the one I'm waiting on is one of the LFRs. The one LFR that did arrive was missing the top and the bottom of the shipping box, and there is slight cosmetic damage to some of the edges. So that's disappointing. I emailed Axiom and told them I'm not sure I want to go through the hassle of getting it replaced, but I was reporting it now just in case. We'll see how the other one looks when it arrives.

I was also missing a set of cables to go from DSP to amp, I think. It should have been two sets of five cables, right? I got one set, but there are six cables. Red, white, blue, green, yellow, black.

In the meantime, I have stuff pulled out of the boxes and ready to hook up when I get the remaining pieces.

Brutal.
Here's hoping the rest of your shipment comes pristine. Cross continent shipment should be respected more.

Don't worry CV,

Probably customs pulled it to check for drugs ...
After all, somebody was pretty high considering how many binding posts they put on it. Might have to repack the stuffin' though ...

Oh man, sorry to hear that. I thought Axiom had come up with packaging that was for all intents and purposes courier-proof. They're probably hanging onto the second box until they can figure out how to get the end caps off that one as well

If the courier managed to get the end caps off I would not feel bad at all about asking Axiom to submit a claim and replace/rework the speaker. I probably wouldn't have bothered with smaller speakers but these are LFR's !

That said, if the damage was only on the bottom edges I probably wouldn't worry much about it either.

Hope it all gets worked out to your satisfaction, and congrats on the new speakers.

Hmmm...that explains my euphoric highs after snorting what I thought was polyfill.

Not on the bottom, but on the rear of the speaker along the top edge, and then a little further down one side. At least I wouldn't normally see it. You're right, though, with them being LFRs and my first real wood veneer (the Rosewood is gorgeous), it feels wrong to have the slightest imperfection. I'll wait to hear what Debbie says, and also see how the other one fared, before I make up my mind. If they can file a claim and not be out any money, I'll probably do it. I wouldn't want them to be out any money after getting such a good deal on them.

Geez, Charles. I'm sorry to hear about all your troubles.

In the past some of the Axiom boxes I've received came with very loose straps. One came with 3 out of the 4 straps and a hole in the side (VP180). Have a feeling that the shipping guys use the straps to man handle those boxes. Bet the heavier and longer the item the more likely that a strap stretch and come off.

In any case I was lucky ... seems that you were not as fortunate ... and of course, as Murphy would have it, to a very expensive item ...

It continues! The second LFR showed up, and there was more significant damage than the first one, even though the shipping box had both its top and bottom. An edge toward the front on the top was banged up considerably, and one tweeter and one mid on the rear took a beating. So I forwarded those pictures as well.

In the meantime, I'm using one of the new ADA1500s to power the passive LFRs while the ADA1500 that's in my rack has been switched over to supply the M5HPs serving surround duty. The ADA1000 that was previously powering the M5s has nothing to do until I get an AV processor that can do the overhead channels.

Whew, I got a call from Debbie today, and they're going to put the order in for the missing cables, as well as make a new set of LFRs. Looking over the original order now, I see there were 5 interconnect cables for DSP to amp, then 1 for DSP to subwoofer, so that's where the sixth cable that confused me came from. I hadn't looked closely at that field, I suppose. But still, I'm pretty sure I filled out all fields, and I assumed they would know I needed x2 for those DSP-to-amp interconnects, since each speaker has its own DSP, but if I somehow did it wrong beyond the DSP-to-sub cables I didn't need, my apologies to Axiom.

Cool
Axiom is really particular of the finish to my knowledge.
I got my M22\Heartland Maple through B stock took me months to find the blemish. Which turned out to be a little sliver missing on one of the front corners really minor.

Good to hear, although I'm sure that the larger courier companies keep some people on staff to sneak into your house after the damaged goods have been replaced and inflict further damage.

I had visions of some warehouse staffer holding the straps and giving each LFR a helicopter ride (spinning it around) as part of social distancing. The LFR's are just about the right height to keep a 2m safe zone.

Oh my gosh, Mr. Grunt! It's been too long!!!!

Oops, I hit the wrong and very old page. Sure miss you Mr. Grunt.

Ha ha, I need muscles like those.

I'm turning into a real thorn in Axiom's side.

My right passive LFR developed buzz/static in one of the front mids a couple of days ago whenever content is played. It annoyed me enough that I decided to go ahead and switch them out for the Actives with the cosmetic damage, since they're simply sitting here unboxed while I wait for the replacements to arrive. I got them positioned and hooked up, double-checking the connections as I went. I always run Audyssey first, even though I turn it off afterward, simply to set distances. Going through the setup, the EP800 made zero thumps. Having no output happened another time recently, and I ended up turning it off for a while, then turning it back on, and it worked again. My new ADA1500s and DSP are stacked on either side of the front EP800, so when I was starting to reach behind the EP800, I set one hand on the ADA1500's case to steady myself, and there was a very loud zap. Oh, no. After turning the sub back on, the setup was able to send thumps this time, but looking at the results, it gave the fronts a crossover of 200 Hz. I manually set it down to 40 and put on some music. Going around each speaker, I discovered the woofers on the front right speaker weren't doing anything, and neither were any of the drivers on the rear. After testing the different amp channels on different driver sets, it seems those three amp channels are in fact dead. Ouch.

I've already emailed Axiom, so we'll see what they say. In the meantime, I'm going to have some lopsided sound. I've switched to my older ADA1500 to power the right speaker, so I at least have the whole front of the speaker working.

I'm looking forward to when my whole system is at 100% again.

Hi CV,

Have you tried leaving that ADA1500-5 unplugged for a few hours and then seeing if it comes back to life? It's possible you sent a zap of static through the system which could have locked up the protection circuits on those amp channels. That's the only thing I can think might have happened.

Thanks,

Andrew

Charles, do you have carpet in your basement?

Hey, Andrew, thanks for responding. It had been unplugged for a while, so I just tried hooking it back up to those channels, and they're still not doing anything.

Mojo, semi. It's shag-type as area rugs.

It did feel like static discharge when I touched the top of the case. So is it ever extreme enough to do damage beyond pushing the amp into protection?

Fried! If your place is at 40 to 50% relative humidity on shag, you may have built up a difference in potential of 10 kilo Volts...maybe more. You can build up to 40kV although 5 to 10 is more common.

Ouch. That's not what I wanted to hear!

Baked? Does that sound better?

Debbie and Andrew are amazing, and I'm being taken care of. It will be a little while before the new Actives are made, but the process is underway.

A 40,000 Volt static discharge?

I'm picturing a Tesla Coil.

Actually Charles, you are a biological capacitor.

They made them faster than expected, and they arrived faster than expected after being shipped. They showed up today. The right one seems pristine, but the box for the left one came with the straps off, and there was, in fact, cosmetic damage on the front of the speaker this time. So I've left the original left speaker in the chain, since that one's damage (also entirely cosmetic) is on the rear of the speaker. The original right speaker had a midwoofer with performance-affecting damage (pained noise that wouldn't stop), so I was running that without the rear mids hooked up. Slighty lopsidedness to the sound, but I wanted to get the passives boxed up for return.

So now I finally get to hear them in their full glory. I'm listening to Mon Laferte's live album right now, and I'm very happy with the live sound. I don't own a ton of studio albums that I would consider audiophile showcases, but I'm more generally happy with live material being fed through my system. Still, I'll have to revisit a lot of my favorites just to see if I can notice new details.

She sounds good on the Force. My problem is I'm constantly comparing both Airs to my other systems. I can never be happy with the Airs if I keep doing that. The lack of soundstage is killing me.

Charles, play this at reference level. This is what I use to demo the actives. Everyone who has heard this one became convinced the actives were birthed by deities.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=MIKSQT-oXfc

Very nice. Are you maintaining a list of your demo material?

My system is finally running full-tilt again. Besides getting the Actives going, today I got a replacement for the v3 EP800 I had up front that quit working. It's now a v4 in Rosewood to match my Actives. I'll still have to read up on adjusting the phase knob. I also want to do more experimentation with positioning the Actives, but it sounds really good as is. The only other issue is the Actives do have a hum loud enough I can hear it in the listening position when there's no sound playing. I don't think there's anything I can do about that now, but maybe in the future.

Charles, I am through demoing and tweaking. I am finally at the stage where I am enjoying all my systems.

The hum and hiss is something Axiom will have to address. I am patiently waiting.

I'd say you've earned it after all of the work you've put in.

I'm always in a state of enjoying it, but I have no doubt some patient trial and error can get me to another level.

Thank you for acknowledging my effort. It is not something I enjoy.

All evidence to the contrary.
I tweaked for some time with the HT system and then eventually i tired of it. I stopped researching minute and infinitesimal tweaks than broader changes like speaker brand. I would still like to get a laptop someday to run some frequency sweeps in my HT room though. I just cant' be bothered to buy a laptop when i have no other use for it.
Next time you're in town Mojo...

Have an IPad? Use Audiotools by Studio Six Digital.

Its not free but worth every penny. No external mic needed. In fact the internal mic is preferred for measuring phase if you get the transfer function module.

Much easier to use than REW with a laptop.

Not that they look much different than the M3 v3 Algonquins they replaced, but here are the new M3 v4 Wireless in my bathroom.

I upgraded my vision with LASIK. First impressions were that my eyesight was as good as when I was wearing glasses, but a week later, it seems to be better than with glasses. Everything looks so clear, and even the colors are jumping out at me more, which I wasn't expecting. Even my OLED TV looks better than it used to, so I think this counts as a home theater upgrade. I have to say I'm really happy with the results.

I had mine done in 2008. They only promised 20/20 vision, but I ended up with 20/15. My night vision was shot for the first couple of years, but it eventually returned to normal after 4 years.

I was warned that I'd need reading glasses in my mid-40's once my corneas hardened, but I can read just fine in my early 50's. I think it helps having a LCHF diet that prevents eye issues centered around advanced glycation end-products of a modern diet.

What was shot about your night vision? I have a little bit of a halo effect around lights, but it's not terrible. I had a quick appointment with my eye doctor today, and he said my vision is 20/15, too. I told him I keep finding myself looking around and thinking to myself that things have never looked this good.

Everyone has said the same thing to me about reading glasses. So far I'm fine at 44, but I'm sure my days are numbered.

For a while, every point source of light in the dark had a halo: street lights, fairy lights, signal lights, headlights. Night time driving was quite dangerous, as if your eyeglasses were smeared with fingerprint oils at night. It does heal though.

My entire time with eyeglasses, I never managed better than 20/20 vision. It's amazing what modern surgery can do...if you can get past the burning smell of your cornea being cauterized.

Oh no, just found out the front tweeters and mids on both Active LFRs aren't operating. I wonder when they went out. It's both a testament to the speakers that they can still sound so full with just the rear portions working, as well as to my lack of golden ears. It seems like a bizarre coincidence that it's just the tweeters and mids on both. Woofer sections are both working. I'd like to think I would notice if just one side went out at a time, so I'm really not sure what happened. I would still guess it's amp issues as opposed to DSP, but I doubt I'll have the time to troubleshoot until the weekend. I don't look forward to the wait time to get stuff repaired, but at least I can move my M5HPs I'm using as rear surrounds up to the front to get by in the meantime. And I still have an ADA1000 sitting unused until I get a pre-pro or receiver that can do ceiling speakers, so I can do better than the receiver's amplification at least.

I don't think I make enough money to keep staying at Axiom's bleeding edge. When I'm out of warranty and it's going to cost too much to repair them, I may have to switch back to passive speakers with fewer amp channels. They sound so good and look so pretty, but it certainly comes with challenges. I think my last big audio splurge will be the Anthem AVM 70 8K--or whatever I land on--to see how much difference that part of the audio chain makes. I'll ride it as long as possible, and after that I imagine I'll return to more reasonably-price receivers because technology moves too fast.

Damn!

Do you have a meter and know how to use it?

A multimeter? I don't, but I can borrow one from my dad.

Oh, and I don't know how to use it, so I'll take a lesson if you're offering. Otherwise my dad could probably get me through it.

Your dad is a flight of stairs away so he's your best bet. If he incinerates himself, I can help (not him...you).

The safest way for product and humans is to shut the ADAs off, unplug the cables at the speakers and check Ohms at the driver terminals. Mids and tweeters should be 6 to 8 Ohms. It's highly unlikely drivers are the problem.

Then you can play some music and check for AC voltage at the outputs of the DSP. That's low voltage that won't even vaporize a gnat's 'nads.

First thing I'd do though is shut everything down via the rocker switches and see if the problem clears.

I've already done the rocker switches multiple times. I'll let you know what happens with the rest.

Charles, did you and your pop ignite?

I haven't made the time to troubleshoot yet. It's coincided with my place being a total mess from work being done on the house and then finally being motivated to do some rearranging. It's a work in progress.

I don't know how you manage without them. I've never been addicted to anything except v4.

I ended up with a Denon X6700H receiver. It felt like my Marantz was going to die at any second, and I didn't like the thought of having to do without my system for any stretch of time, so I bought a refurbished unit from Accessories4less. It was delivered yesterday. It's not everything I wanted, since I won't be able to try out balanced connections, and it only has one HDMI 2.1 input, but I think I'm a little more confident in Denon's execution vs Anthem at this point in time. Now the pressure is on for me to get my ALFRs in order so I can have my HT firing on all cylinders. I'll finally be able to use the in-ceiling M3s I've just been storing as well. First impression is positive, since there seems to be less noise coming through the speakers when no content is playing.

I've been happy with my 6700 so far. The HDMI inputs can be a little finicky but that's been the only negative so far.

Finicky in what way? The audio seems to take longer than the Marantz did to kick in when I start playing content on my PC. I haven't used other devices enough to know if it's across the board. I also couldn't get 4K 120 Hz from my Xbox Series X, but then I remembered the 25' cable from the AVR to the TV isn't rated for that. Ordered a new one from Amazon, though I won't be heartbroken if it still doesn't work.