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Home Theater Done Right: Millercarbon's System

Dual use, should probably be the title. Oh well. Finally posted my system. Someone’s always asking about how to do a dual use system. Well, here’s how its done.
Cinephile or audiophile, movies and music are the two things I have loved for as long as I can remember. I want my music to sound as good as possible, and I want my movies to look and sound as good as possible. Everything is a compromise and yet when it comes to these two the compromises are remarkably few. If any. At least that is what my system shows. Because it is a first-rate audiophile sound system, AND a top level home theater.
Whether music or movies an immersive experience is the goal. To lose yourself in the experience. To be carried away.
Studies show viewers consistently rate video quality higher when sound quality is high. Unfortunately the Home Theater industry has chosen to pursue quantity over quality. Which cannot ever work. No amount of surround speakers will ever make up for poor quality. Everyone knows this perfectly well. Being able to convince anyone otherwise is a testament to marketing.
But that’s not my main point here. Rather it is that everything matters. Seemingly minor little things like cryogenic treatment, HFT, ECT, Total Contact, fuses, cable elevators, etc when added together actually make so much difference it is almost impossible to build a truly good system without them.

Removing those tweaks from my system would lower it down to merely average.

Anyway, the system is posted. Enjoy the pics. I am not that good a photographer but Steve Clarke was busy. Tried to get the tubes go glow- how’d I do?

The system evolves. Here for reference are some pics from 16 years ago. https://www.theanalogdept.com/c_miller.htm
Comments welcome. Enjoy!


128x128millercarbon

Showing 11 responses by mijostyn

mijostyn's avatar
mijostyn
8,248 posts
 
Millercarbon, I find any lights near or around my screen very annoying but they do not seem to bother you. Did you have something done to your eyes?
mijostyn's avatar
mijostyn
8,248 posts
 
I sort of did mc. Your amp is right under your screen. Hard to hide when a movie is on. I don't even want a dim pilot light near the screen as any extraneous light affects the picture. Of course my old JVC DLP projector only throws 1000 lumens. I might not be as sensitive with one of the new laser projectors (3000 lumens) But still I would not put any equipment other than speakers near the screen. A lot of equipment now has a "lights off" feature. A bit hard to do with tubes. 
I suppose I am lucky having had a chance to build my own house. I only use balanced amps now and they are on a shelf up against the ceiling in the work shop right under the speakers and subs. There is conduit running from the equipment rack which is to the left of the listening sofa down to the amps. The amps are class A so I constructed a cooling system (fans) that blows over the tops of the amps. The common 12 volt power supply also triggers the amps. It is operated by a switch next to the equipment cabinet. Initially I could hear the fans (no good) so I put a potentiometer on each fan to slow them down which worked. I did make one mistake. There are two Lenox heat pumps just outside that wall. They are pretty quiet but you can still hear them on quiet passages. Every once in a while I'll get annoyed and turn them off for a spell. 
Anyway if you have a basement you could do the same thing but then none of your stuff would be on display.
mijostyn's avatar
mijostyn
8,248 posts
 
No argument mc. I have black out drapes in the room but because it is an open concept house and the room was designed to maximize bass performance there is no keeping ambient light out during the day time. No problem at night and there are no pilot lights, tubes or any source of light near the screen wall. I have toyed with the idea of wall papering the room with the same black felt like material our screen frames are covered with but other issues keep taking precedence. I guess in reality I am satisfied with what I have and do not feel the need at this time to spend money on it. I have had a Hi Fi since I was 13. I did't get a TV until I was around 28.
I had Krell amps before I had a TV. Get the picture?:)
mijostyn's avatar
mijostyn
8,248 posts
 
I'll side with millercarbon here. Two channel audio is king. I do not have enough room or money for a separate theater. I have found for myself at least that as long as I have a BIG screen and a patently ridiculous amount of bass power I am a happy camper as far as movies are concerned. I could put surround stuff in but I would rather buy another cartridge. We watched Ford vs Ferrari last night and the wrecks kicked you right off the sofa. Works for me.
mijostyn's avatar
mijostyn
8,248 posts
 
Oh MC, I also use a Steward Greyhawk. Nice screen. It still is faded during daylight hours. Not sure if a laser projector will fix this. I doubt if it would ever match a flat screen TV but nobodies making one 130" diagonal....yet.  
mijostyn's avatar
mijostyn
8,248 posts
 
I can explain that mahgister but I don't think you will like the explanation.
There are times when my system sounds even more magical than usual having done absolutely nothing to it. Barometric pressure? Voltage running a little hotter than usual? The alignment of the planets? More than likely it is just the physiologic state of my mind at the time. 
One thing I find interesting is that we have very different visual concepts.
millercarbon likes to see tubes glow and cables up on little stands etc. It makes him happy which makes his system sound better. Me? I like to see as little as possible. No tubes, wires, everything is hidden. It makes my system sound better. It shows in the turntables we buy. I like subdued designs like the SOTA but some people like more flashy Clearaudios or VPIs. All three companies make a good product but owners of all three will swear their turntable sounds better. In reality the visual differences are far greater than the audio ones.  
mijostyn's avatar
mijostyn
8,248 posts
 
Oz, I could make an incredible combined system with absolutely no compromises. I would just turn off the theater stuff for serious listening.
Steward Screens are extremely well made and are well dampened. Hung correctly they do not buzz, rattle or affect the sound in any way. You could do a retractable screen but I am sure mc will tell you that there is no way you can get a retractable screen perfectly flat leading to some distortion of the picture. 
The only problem is that doing it in a manner compatible with a high end Hi Fi system is very expensive and I feel no need to spend that money. My Hi Fi system is in no way compromised by the screen on the wall or the projector hanging from the ceiling it is just another sound source on the inputs of my preamp. The last guest I had over to watch a movie wondered where I had hid the surround speakers.
mijostyn's avatar
mijostyn
8,248 posts
 
Yes, mc I am kidding in one way but serious in another. We all have different perceptions of how our systems should be and this is on display. I find it interesting in the variety of solutions. You have your way and I have mine. In no way am I saying one is better than the other. Theoretically it should make no difference whether your equipment is visible or not (other than the lights:) as far as sound quality is concerned but it does! Whatever makes you happiest sounds better. None of us can separate our emotions from our perception of sound. Why does music make us happy?!
Mahgistar, I am not saying that there are not meaningful improvements you can make in a system and some of them can be dirt cheap. I once had a pair of loudspeakers that I could not get to image (Allison One's.)
One day out of frustration I turned them sideways and darn if the image did't snap into focus.  Placebo is really not the right term in this case. Placebo infers a false effect. Sound affects our emotions and emotions affect what we hear. We hear what we hear. Nothing false about it. It is just that what affects what we hear is a complicated issue and hard to fathom. Adding just one dB to the volume, a barely noticeable amount can make things sound surprisingly different. I believe you have to appreciate this when evaluating equipment especially when dealing with minor differences. 

mijostyn's avatar
mijostyn
8,248 posts
 
Mahgister, I must have missed something somewhere. What do you mean by the "controls in the triple embeddings?" 
mijostyn's avatar
mijostyn
8,248 posts
 
Geoffkait, I think you have been reading Shakespeare again:)
Mahgister, On thinking about it I made one mistake. While dealing with the acoustics of a room is pretty straight forward there are some rooms that are never going to sound great. Most of us do not have the opportunity to build a room specifically designed for audio. We are stuck with whatever came with the house we bought and with whatever our spouse will tolerate. So, in this regard coming up with a top notch audio room is difficult and for some of us impossible. You can tame things but you can't cure them.   
mijostyn's avatar
mijostyn
8,248 posts
 
Thank you mahgister. I have the picture. Yes, these are all important considerations that need to be addressed for the best performance but neither are they a mystery or all that difficult to deal with. 
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