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Underground Theater Movement - January 2004 - page 3  System designer Hansen says that one of his best tricks for keeping theaters working flawlessly over years is to not just rack-mount the equipment, but also to keep the airflow to the gear high so that the equipment never runs at too hot a temperature. While most AV gear will not completely fail if asked to run in a boiler room-like rack environment, the heat does take life off of the equipment. Cooling fans, built deep into the depths of the rack, draw cool air from a nearby HVAC vent directly into the equipment rack. At the top of the rack, Hansen draws the hot air (predictably, heat rises) away from the equipment and out of the theater room. Thanks to a little foresight, this system has run with very little maintenance over the past 10 years. The projector needs minor calibrations from time to time and their control system needs additional sources added, but this is about the extent of the work needed to keep this system running for an entire decade.Hanson's trick for heat dispersion is also important for video, especially now, with the advent of modern, ultra-bright digital projectors. The Sony VPH70 video projector used for this system was placed inside a hush box and has a system to draw heat away from the internal components. At the time of the system was photographed, the projector was calibrated for standard 4:3 NTSC video for TV and DVDs. A Faroudja VP200 video processor is still in use to “line double” the video signal going to the projector. The system control is completed by an AMX control system.  The scope of the project was grand and the client says without a doubt it was worth the effort and the investment. The entire lower level of the home has provided a place to experience great times with family and friends. Now, as AV technology has progressed, it is time to upgrade much of the theater so that the client can enjoy HDTV, DVD-Audio and SACD, as well as access homemade video footage via camcorders, DVD-RW and other sources.Simply Home Entertainment is in the process of modernizing the client’s theater with a number of notable upgrades. First and most significant is the use of a JVC D-ILA video projector, which has a 4:3 chip that matches the preexisting screen. The Faroudja VP200 video processor used in the system is without question a classic, but it will be replaced with a Faroudja NRS native rate DVI output video processor, which will allow for the more complicated video switching in the system, as well as a directly digital output from the video processor to the projector. Hansen reports he has retrofitted a number of his more modern D-ILA theaters with DVI performance and his clients, more entertainment industry power players than videophiles, have been flipping out over the video performance improvement. Removing an entire layer of analog to digital and digital back to analog conversion means a significance improvement in video performance. Other upgrades coming to the client’s system include a Mark Levinson No. 40 AV preamp to control the vast video inputs that the client is now using. The No. 40 also will allow 7.1 surround sound for films and 5.1 analog inputs for both DVD-Audio and SACD. One great feature of the No. 40 is that it provides the client with the ability to add or delete an input via the menus that come up on the unit’s LCD screen. While the core settings for the No. 40 are stored in the unit in “non-volatile” memory inside the component, the unit does allow the client and his family to plug in a friend’s camcorder without ordering a service call to Beverly Hills. HDTV will be added for both DirecTV and terrestrial use, tuned via a Sony HD300 tuner. A DVD-Audio/SACD player will be added, along with a TiVo2 personal video recorder and a DVD-RW deck, which will all become new sources for the system. A more modern AMX system has been proposed to the client for an additional upgrade, which will allow for more sophisticated control of the system via a larger, lighter, color remote that also has more useful hard buttons that allow increased control of the overall system. In the end, the fact the client feels his $100,000 investment (exclusive of the interior design costs) was a good one proves that a well-designed theater doesn’t need to break the bank and can stand the test of time in terms of both style and technology. At some point, new AV goodies will come calling, but if your system is designed for the long haul, all you have to do is plug them in and start enjoying them. See complete equipment list below...
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