Room Size

15x15 feet, but open floor plan to a larger floor making it approx 30x25 feet.

System Overview

The system is actually dual-use, both for Home Theater and Two-channel Audio. This all started when I got the large floorstanders which sounded quite natural and room-filling and decided I wanted to use them for our living room HT setup with dual-use in detailed listening 2-channel audio. The Objections were immediate and forceful! :P Now it's a set of custom large monitors sitting on top of Rythmik F18 audiophile subs. (see the rest of the Saga in the "Other Comments section")

Movie Preferences

All kinds, both from Blu-ray and streaming services.

Room Description

Living room/great room open plan with attached dining room to the left and kitchen to the rear. The speakers easily fill the whole space without feeling shouty when playing music.

Acoustic Treatment

None, but carpet and with enough furniture in it seems to dampen the modes a bit.

Media Storage

Movies: Blu-ray disks in cabinet, more cabinets in another room. Music: Server library shared disk with FLAC format + Tidal subscription for streaming.

Other Comments

This all started when I got the large floorstanders which sounded quite natural and room-filling and decided I wanted to use them for our living room HT setup with dual-use in detailed listening 2-channel audio. The Objections were immediate and forceful! :P Now it's a set of custom large monitors sitting on top of Rythmik F18 audiophile subs. I was told I had to wall-mount the TV and build a setup around them on the walls to make it look like an integrated thing so that the speakers didn't dominate the room, plus put all the A/V equipment into some simple yet acceptable cabinets. Considering I had a Yamaha RX-Z11 HT amp and then for the first version used a Pass Labs X250.8 for detailed music listening, there wasn't really any prebuilt cabinets that fit. I'm really not a woodworker, but I managed to find some prebuilt sections on Ikea from their "BestA" series which I could use. To get enough depth in the cabinet for the components mentioned above, I used both a full-depth and half-depth version of the "BestA" components put together. My wife and I co-designed the look and placement of the components after I showed what the pieces would look like. In particular note that the whole back wall is painted black (actually just-off-block dark charcoal). Her getting involved in the design and coming up with aspects like that are what really sold it in the end. The result was quite a production, enough that we christened it "The Theaterator" (kind of like a monster-truck name... my kid was into those at the time we built it like 3 1/2 years ago).

Components

DVD or LaserDisc Player

Sony X700 blu-ray

Satellite or Cable

Amazon Fire TV stick 4K

Video Display

Sharp Aquos 70 inch 4K

Signal Processors

DEQX HDP-5 controlling the fronts as active 3-way speakers. Custom 2-way monitors with an amp on the tweeter and an amp on the mid/woofers, plus Rythmik F18 subs as the bass modules.

Receiver

Yamaha CX-A5200 11-channel preamp/processor for HT use, using pre-outs for the fronts into the HDP-5 front speaker processor. Surrounds and Zone 2/3 amp: 8-channel Hypex nc252.

Preamp

NAD CI 580 - BluOS multi-zone music streamer for music going directly digital into the HDP-5 front speaker processor.

Power Amp

Fronts: 2 Purifi 1ET400A Stereo amps and a Pass Labs XA30.8. One Purifi amp for the mid/woofers (paralleled so a 4 ohm load) and the other two for the tweeters on a switch (an "accurate mode" and a "sweet mode"). The Rythmik subs have their own servo a

Speakers

Custom 2-way monitors with a RAAL 70-20XR tweeter and 2 Seas W18E001 mid/wooders driven in parallel, with no crossover, just direct connection to the amps then directly driven by the HDP-5.

Surrounds

Polk Audio LSi/FX 80 sides (2) and rears (2) ceiling mounted + Zone 2/3 2 speakers each. They are driven by the Yamaha CX-A5200 + 8-channel nc252 amp combo, and only used in HT mode.

Subwoofer

2 Rythmik F18 (audiophile sealed subs), as the bass modules for the front speakers.

Tuning and Tweaks

The DEQX HDP-5 is extremely programmable, and has multiple custom configurations which can be selected for tweaking specific sound profiles.

Other Components

Niles SAS-1 automatic amp switcher to automate switching the "accurate mode" vs "sweet mode" amplifier setup for the tweeters.