Home Theater Build-out Begins

When we built our new house, we set aside a room in the basement to be our home theater. The builder finished the room with the standard paint, carpet, and light cans in the ceiling. Now it is time to build the room out as an actual home theater. The room is a little over 13' 2" wide and 16' 6" deep. It has a raised platform in the back that is 73" deep, enough to accomodate one row of seats. It is prewired for 4 surround speakers and a ceiling mount projector. The screen wall has unfinished space behind it so wiring the front three speakers will be easy. The biggest challenge in the room will be the window along the back wall. The framing worked out in such a way that we boxed in the window on either side. Our intent is to cover the window with a full length heavy drape, hoping that will block most or all of the light.

Right now we have a bare room with walls and carpet. Over the next month or two we will transform it in to a dedicated home theater.

Top priority is to talk to a cabinet maker about building cabinets for the screen wall. I want to enclose the front three speakers in nice cabinets that also frame the screen itself. Neext priority is to choose a color scheme and repaint the room. The ceiling is currently white, and it needs to be dark grey or black. We also want a rich color on the walls that is a few shades darker than the current yellow-tan.

My current plan for equipment is as follows:

Panasonic PT-AE3000U projector (already ordered)
Denon AVR-4810 (not available until October)
Paradigm reference studio 60 system speakers
Paradigm reference sub 15 subwoofers
Carada screen (size to be determined, approximately 100 inches diagonally)
Blu-ray player still undecided (looking at Samsung, Pioneer, and Denon)
7 reclining theater chairs: a row of 3 and a row of 4 (looking at Berkline)
Cinemar automation system

Tomorrow we are going to a store in Buckhead (near Atlanta) to look at chairs and to listen to speakers. They also have acoustical treatments which may influence our paint scheme, and they may be able to help us find a cabinetmaker.