Well after picking out the Epson 1080UB Pro Cinema projector as the projector of choice and great for movie afternoons, what do you do about the all important sound system? Well, normally, you normally buy a big honking box that’s called an AVR (audio/video receiver) and then speakers that need big old analog wires. But if everything is digital isn’t there a better way to get 7.1 surround sound without the wires.
Ideally we need a set of wireless speakers that connect via some sort of USB connector to a MacBook to produce great sound and are ideally just use traditional Wifi to get the digital inputs. Each would then have their own amplifier and all you need is the power. So what’s a person to do if you don’t want dedicated A/V components and want to use just a Mac? Well, its a little hard to search for google:”home theater sound system”, but here are some choices that don’t require a wiring closet:
- Yamaha YSP-4000. Well, one solution is a single speaker that uses signal procesing to get simulated surround sound. This is the top of the line $1800 all-in-one that is 40.5″×7.6″×575″ and weighs 34 pounds. It mounts on the wall below your projection screen/flat screen TV. You then get a matching subwoofer YST-FSW150 for $280, run a calibration for your room and you are set! It processes all formats from Dolby Digital, DTS, DTS:Neo 6 and only misses Dolby TrueHD found on Blueray. The inputs are optical/coax digital and two HDMI inputs. So from a computer, you need a DVI/HDMI converter cable (cheap) and then you need some magic box and software that takes USB and makes it coax digital (need to find that one). The main issue is that even with a bigger subwoofer, it lacks punch (maybe a gigantic SVS can 20-39 PC Plus subwoofer for $850 would help get you down to 20Hz!)
- Thiel THIELnet is brand new, but basically each speaker SCS4D has a 250-watt amplifier and the Subwoofer SSD1 area ll IP addressable. There is a magic box, the dB1 that takes traditional signals and convert them to internet protocol. There is just a Thielnet.net website right now, but it is the rigth way to do things. There is a dB1 distributed processor that you put in your wiring closet. It knows where the IP speakers are and there is a Windows application that talks to it. You can have 8 zones for instance.
There are as an aside a host of really good internet only home theater folks I’ve used. You don’t need to buy in a store and the quality is amazingly good cutting out the middle man. Both Axiom and SVS have been great vendors for me.