June 2005 - page 3
Equipment Racks
Traditional racks used for audiophile systems are a sore topic with many wives, designers and system owners who need to continually make changes to their system. Radical improvements have been made to store-bought home theater racks, including most importantly the ability to install a flat TV on top of your gear.
 Depending on the size of your system, in addition to the extra components you may purchase at some time in the future, you need to consider the size of your rack. Personally, I prefer installed equipment racks like the kind Middle Atlantic sells. You buy the shelves you need for the gear you have and install them neatly in a rack, which saves space. With a pullout style, you have easy access to the back of your rack to make equipment or cable changes with relative ease. You can mount one or two racks like these into a custom piece of furniture or into a closet which you will find can create much more space in your theater. Consider ventilation in any rack system you might install. Overheating is a classic way to get AV equipment to fail on you. Consider ways to get cool air into your rack, as well as sucking hot air from your rack to another place in your home or venting it outside. The parts needed for a pro rack could cost you between $600 to $800, depending on the size and amount of cool custom faceplates that you order. Also be sure to get a rack drawer for about $50, so that you have a place to store all of your remotes in case you ever need them. Also consider installing an AC power strip that rack-mounts with a light. I use mine all the time when changing discs in a dark room during a listening session.
Wife (or Husband) Acceptance Factor
It has been 10 years since I designed home theaters for a living, but back then nothing would derail a good system sale more than a pissed-off wife. A guy who loves gear and spends a ton of money on his rack of components trying to eek the last one-tenth of one percent of performance from his system is a guy who also knows his salesperson at Tiffany’s on a first name basis. If you play your cards right, you shouldn’t need to bribe anyone to get the theater you want.
Sell the idea of changing your theater into a media room that will increase the value of your home and will be a place where the entire family and your friends will want to congregate. Pitch the idea of making your theater look more “finished” by hiding cables, rack-mounting your gear and using smart interior design techniques to make the room be the best-looking space in your home. Your spouse will start to buy into your concept.
The most important part of the process is to involve your wife or girlfriend in the project on a number of levels. Allow her to pick the colors for the room. If she is into it, go shopping for fabric with her. Test seating on a Saturday afternoon at real furniture shops as well as a few top home theater installers or retailers. If you really want to break out the heavy ammo, find an installer and system integrator that has a very trick AMX or Crestron touch panel remote system set-up. Schedule a demo (the salespeople love it when you schedule a demo) and have her run the entire system. You should never really touch the remote. Allow her to believe that, when you are away at work or on the golf course, she can make your pending system do everything she wants it to do. She will quickly see that the system you are designing is more than a tweako collection of esoteric audiophile gear, although we aren’t going to compromise on any of the performance. In fact, by getting your room all dialed in before you install your theater, you have without question guaranteed better performance.
The Next Installment of Building a Basic Badass Theater
Part 2 of this series will deal with system decisions and block diagrams of possible systems, as well as budgetary concerns.
Resources:
How to Rack Mount Your Gear
Home Made Acoustical Treatments
Bob Hoads Sound Tips 1 - Proper Speaker Placement
Bob Hodas Sound Tips 2 - Speaker Placement Continued
Bob Hodas Sound Tips 3 - Placement Without Measurement
Bob Hodas Sound Tips 4 - Don't Let The Speakers Block the View of the Golden Gate Bridge
Bob Hodas Sound Tips 5
Bob Hodas Sound Tips 6
Contact:
Bob Hodas
Rives Audio
RPG
Echo Busters
La-Z-Boy
Pottery Barn
Room and Board
Restoration Hardware
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