gunark's lounge project - pj/tv, rented accom

[gunark]

Ok so I'm moving into a new place, a new new place in fact as I will be the first tenant. I've had some decent AV - not stupid £££ but not tat - for a while and decided as I'm moving I'll sell a load of gear off. This way I don't have to move it and I get new kit too.

The room is about 14' square with door at one side and outside patio doors at the opposite. I'm gonna talk about the furniture when I have some pics but the list of gear going into the project so far is:

LG 42PG6000 Plasma TV
Sharp XV-Z3000 DLP Projector
Vista HTPC with Nvidia 9300 IGP, Blu Ray and HDDVD
Nintendo NTSC Gamecube with Nintendo Component Cable
Yamaha DSPAX861SE AV Amplifier
Q Acoustics 1030i Front L & R Speakers
Q Acoustics 1000c Centre Speakers
Q Acoustics 1010i Rear L & R Speakers*
Yamaha Subwoofer
IXOS XHS233 Speaker Wire*
Allcam Projector Mount*
Allcam PCW92ME Motorised Projector Screen*

*forthcoming

I'm gonna knock up a design of it in Visio or a room design program to demonstrate how it'll work together.

I hope it'll go together ok - I'm not a muppet but I'm also not a pro! Luckily I have a mate who does AV installs to help so fingers crossed. I wanted to write it up for two reasons - one, to show it off I guess! but two, not so many of these installs deal with rented places, where the scope for fixing and fitting is somewhat reduced. With this I can show what I did, and get advice from others too so when people want to do a rental install, they can also look at mine. I hope.

[gunark]

Not sure who actually will give a toss about this update but here it is.

I'm still going to do this but I am currently 'between houses' as my new place is now nearly 2 months overdue and I'm in temp accommodation with all my AV goodies in storage. Coupled with a Macbook with a broken DVD drive Apple refuse to fix, it's not good.

In AV terms however, changes will be made. The room seems to be a converted garage with it's own roof/loft so I aim to do the wiring for rears/screen power/PJ HDMI and power in the loft. With that in mind my rears may well change to the Q-Acoustics QAV wall mount 'wedges'. Score one for discreet AV!

I am moving the HTPC to become a hackintosh (I was going to sell the Macbook and get a new imac but f- Apple). So I will now go for a combo setup. A hacked WDTV streaming MKVs, etc from a basic server, the server also running iTunes and both will stream to a (second hand) airport express N, feeding sound to the amp and data to the WDTV. This way I can control the itunes from my iphone too. Also I may get Sky HD on the £49 box/£120 quidco cash back offer and then pay the remaining £250 odd for the year subs upfront.

Why the change? Well, two main points.

One, Apple have put me off spending any money on them so I need to build a hackintosh for my music gear. As it happens my HTPC is pretty close to the imac spec (C2D, Nvidia 9x00 integrated GPU) and it only needs to run Logic/Reason and control the (XP) server via Remote Desktop for OSX.

Two, the HTPC became too much. Codec issues, switching on at random times, HDMI not working for a while, the sound not staying locked to either optical or HDMI and even then not being 5.1, FFDShow not integrating with VMC, HD-DVD just stopped running, the music player just slow and not too friendly (and no smart playlists as flexible as itunes). Basically I spent to much time wrestling with the box and not enough watching/listening. Pointless then. So I'm going to the WDTV for ease of use, SKY HD for PVR and airport express for music. That'll save me money on Grecian 2000, broken window panes and new PCs in the long run too.

I also like the server idea so I can setup longer downloads remotely and leave a box doing the work in another room, not a production machine. I can also set up airport expresses in other rooms too, sharing the itunes library on the server and controlled from my iphone. Tres cool, n'est pas?

Believe me, I will move house and actually have something of substance to put in here. Honest.

[Marky P]

It's pics we want.



Pics get people interested, even if it's just a pic of your cat or something.

And good luck, BTW.

[gunark]

Originally Posted by Marky P

It's pics we want.



Pics get people interested, even if it's just a pic of your cat or something.

And good luck, BTW.

Mate, I'd post pics if I could get in the damn place. It's a bone of contention, let's just call it that.