FEATURED IN: CE Pro, September 2001
                by: Kurt Scherf, Parks Associates

It's the middle of the summer, and the blockbuster movies are in full swing. In thousands of movie houses across the country, millions of U.S. consumers are flocking to see the latest action thriller, sappy summer romance, or engrossing foreign film. Last year, box office receipts in the U.S. topped $7 billion, and they are likely to hover around this number in 2001. Whether it's summer or any other time of the year, it's clear that Americans have a love-fest with all things celluloid.

As much as going out to the movies appeals to U.S. consumers, however, there has been - particularly in recent years - a move to bring the entire movie-going experience (sans the sticky floors, $3 sodas, annoying coughing, and intermittent cellular phone ringing) home. Home theater systems are becoming increasingly available to the average home owner, and emerging technologies are allowing them to fully recreate the movie theater experience within the home. This, as Parks Associates research indicates, will become increasingly important as the U.S. population ages, and the "baby boomers" and "empty nesters" seek new ways to entertain themselves without leaving the house. As one of our focus group participants put it succinctly, "Our night club days are diminishing, and we want to enjoy time at home."

According to the Arlington, Virginia, based Consumer Electronics Manufacturers Association (CEA), more than 20% of all American households have some sort of home theater setup. A growing segment of these home theater configurations are so-called "home-theater-in-a-box" -packages that retail for as little as $500, and are typically self-installable. The professionally installed home theater system continues to be popular as well, and as larger homes are constructed or retrofit, dedicated home theaters are becoming increasingly popular. For example, in a 2000 survey of nearly 700 U.S. home builders, BUILDER Magazine and Parks Associates found that - in ten years - home builders believe that 57% of homes built in the United States will be pre-wired for dedicated home theater layouts. This is an astonishing 97% growth!

Of course, with a plethora of home theater products and systems from which to choose, consumers have an array of options, including some of the latest display imagery on hand. Now more than ever, consumers have the ability to experience the best that Hollywood has to offer, depending on their budget constraints. And realistically, the vast majority of consumers aren't willing to pay an arm and a leg for their home theater experience. They simply want the best equipment at the best price.

It was with this understanding that the editors of CE Pro issued their marching orders to the Parks Associates' analysts for this month's issue - to find out what equipment is available to consumers who want to dedicate an entire room for a home theater layout. Armed with a floor plan and four different budgets, we were told to find the latest and greatest to meet the needs of everyone from Homer Simpson to George Jetson.

What's New in Display Technologies?
The most common display technologies utilized in the home theater market today are CRT (Cathode Ray Tube), DLP (Digital Light Processing), LCD (Liquid Crystal Display), and the market's newest entrant, plasma. Each technology was designed to replace the others, but in all actuality, no one technology is dominant and each technology has its own strengths and weaknesses.

CRT, the traditional television display technology, has come a long way since its introduction. CRT still provides the most clear and bright picture of all of the technologies, allow for viewing from virtually any angle and still provide the lowest cost solution. However, they are limited in display size.

DLP™ technology, introduced by Texas Instruments over a year ago, has only recently begun making significant inroads in the home theater market. DLP projectors are pricey and can be affected by ambient light in the room, but can closely reproduce the movie theater experience by projecting the image on a large projection screen. Additionally, unlike CRT-based images, DLP™-based images do not degrade over time.

LCD technology allows for televisions that take up much less room than rear-projection solutions. LCD televisions are lighter and provide a smaller footprint than traditional direct view CRT-based televisions. LCD displays have made advances in the past couple of years with regard to color reproduction. While historically lacking in this respect, current LCD televisions provide brilliant reproduction of color. The trade-off, of course, is that these televisions carry a much higher price tag than direct view CRT-based solutions.

Plasma televisions provide an even smaller footprint, allowing the home owner to mount the television directly on a wall. Plasma technology is different from the other display technologies in that red, green and blue lights are created in every pixel, which accounts for the reduction in size of the television. Additionally, while all other display technologies scan the image across the screen, plasma-based displays light all the pixels at once. However, despite these brilliant colors, plasma televisions are still not capable of producing a true black color and carry around a $10,000 price tag.

The Dedicated Home Theater Scenario
To obtain the expert recommendations on designing a home theater, Parks Associates visited three different home theater stores in the Dallas area - Hillcrest High Fidelity, Starpower, and The Home Theater Store. They were all provided with the same dedicated home theater scenario:

• The room is 15-feet wide by 25-feet long with a ceiling height of 10-feet.

• The floor is made of tile and the walls are sheetrock.

• The room has a sofa, recliner, coffee table, two end tables, and 4 x 8 rug it.

• The room has a number of pictures hanging from the wall that are wood framed in glass.

• There is one door in the room and three windows.

Design Results Show Creativity

A Home Theater on a $5,000 Budget
As Andrew Turner, Sales Manager for Hillcrest High Fidelity, quickly noted, "Obviously, the $5,000 budget is a limitation." However, from the average home owner's perspective, the system Andrew devised still affords the home owner a first-rate system, despite not providing movie theater quality. Turner suggested the following components:

A Home Theater on a $10,000 Budget
Next on the list, The Home Theater Store, only a hop, skip, and a jump away from Hillcrest High Fidelity. Which, by the way, I'll admit, I decided to drive rather than walk the two block between the stores, but anyone who has experienced a Texas summer will understand the rationale behind my decision. The Home Theater Store was provided with the exact scenario as Hillcrest High Fidelity, with the exception of a much larger $10,000 budget with which to work. The following is the system that they designed:

System Components	Price
55” Mitsubishi rear projection television	$3500
Definitive Technology five speaker system	$2500
Denon Receiver	$1000
Denon DVD player	$800
HD Receiver	$800
Cables and Speaker Wires	$500
Installation	$800
Grand Total	$9900

The differences are obvious, with a budget twice that offered to Hillcrest High Fidelity, the clear difference in the resulting systems is an upgrade from a 36" to a 55" television and the addition of a HD (high definition) receiver. Additionally, on the whole, better quality components were used for this system.

$50K budget includes CRT projector
The last leg of the quest ended at Starpower, touted as "The ultimate home theater source." At Starpower, Parks Associates sat down with home theater specialist Don Soffar. After laying down the ground rules and providing Don with a $50,000 budget - unfortunately for Don, a fictitious budget - Don constructed the following system:

System Components	Price
Sony CRT Projector (Mounted from the Ceiling)	$15000
Stuart 120” Diagonal Screen	$2700
Atlantic Technology 370 series speaker system (2 front, 2 rear, sub, center)	$4400
Sony receiver	$1300
Sony progressive scan DVD	$1500
Sony S-Video VCR	$700
Sony high definition satellite system	System: $8500, Dish: $200,  Interconnects: $400
Faroudja Line Doubler	$7000
100’ Wire	$50
Installation	$800
Grand Total	$42550

With a lot of home theater knowledge, a little bit of elbow grease, and the flexibility that a $50,000 budget offers, Don was able to design a home theater system that would provide the home owner with a near-movie theater experience. The screen more than doubled in size, switched to a front projection solution, and required the use of a line doubler.

A line doubler attempts to solve the issue of too few lines being projected on such a large screen by overlapping every frame of the movie with a duplicate frame that is slightly off center, essentially filling the gaps between the original lines. While this process makes the image less clear and crisp - especially in lower end models, the higher end line doublers all but correct this problem.

For Those With Money to Burn
As the budget for a dedicated home theater room reaches into the stratosphere ($50,000 and above), the focus tends to broaden. No longer is the focus solely on upgrading and adding new components to the system, it also centers on enhancing and upgrading the viewing and listening environment. In other words, the living room with the home entertainment center transforms into the dedicated home theater room.

In designing the $50,000 dedicated home theater room for this article, Don Soffar asserted that in order for the home theater system to provide the desired level of performance, several changes would have to be made to the room:

1. Rotate the furniture against the 15' wall rather than the 25' wall to provide the proper viewing distance for the 120" screen;

2. Drape the windows with blackout material in order to attain complete darkness and avoid distracting light reflections on the screen; and

3. Carpet the room to avoid unwanted echo.

Moreover, as a consumer's budget allows for increased sophistication for the home theater layout, an installer can begin integrating home controls. For example, integrators might install a Panja or Crestron system for around $7,500 that allows the home owner to control the entire home theater system, lighting, HVAC, and a variety of other home controls via a portable touch panel.

The homeowner can then have the dedicated home theater room programmed to function just like a movie theater, where the lights can be dimmed, the temperature lowered, the movie started, and the volume adjusted all with the touch of a single button.

Another home theater upgrade involves treating the walls of the room for sound. This process involves a company such as Owens Corning mapping out the acoustics of the room and then padding certain walls to absorb sound and making other walls stiff in order to reflect sound. This process provides the audience with the best acoustics available. The cost is not cheap, however. At an estimated cost of $15,000, not many homeowners choose to have their walls treated.

In the home theater market, the available upgrades and enhancements are virtually endless. While installers can and will find a way to build a home theater with virtually any amount of money that a home owner throws their way, Parks Associates' research shows that the average home owner is not chomping at the bit to spend $15,000 on treated walls or some other comparable home theater enhancement. However, it is evident from this research that installation professionals can work around a number of budgets, from low to high-end, and create high-quality systems meet the desires of the consumer.