The Ridge 4K ATMOS THX Ultra II Cinema

[JoshH]

Decided it was time to share my home cinema build. The room is completely dedicated and measures approx. 5 metres long by 4 metres wide by 2.9 metres high. Its only a 4-seat cinema room - which is enough for my family needs. The cinema was designed by David Mosely from Wavetrain Cinemas. I invested quite heavily in room design and acoustically the room is an amazing place to just sit and have a conversation with someone. The sound is completely immersive when playing film soundtracks. Speakers and walls just disappear and the overall sound field is totally cohesive and transcends the room boundaries. That said, the system is also mercilessly revealing of any flaws. If the sound engineer and mixer didn't do a good job, you can hear it; or if the mic dubbing was too close for voices you can hear it. On the flip side, if its a well engineered sound track it takes your breathe away.

 

There are a few changes coming to the system in the coming months - and I have also made a number of recent updates over the last few months as well to bring the system up to 4K / ATMOS standard. I don't listen to audio music in this room. I have a seperate 2-channel system for that in my living room. Its not as high an end system as my cinema as I don't have a lot of time these days to just sit and listen to music as much as I would like. The cinema is where I spend my free time to watch movies.

 

I considered recently making some changes and moving to a scope 2.4:1 Screen - but I have quite a short throw distance in my room which would necessitate quite a bit of engineering (curved screen), new shadowbox etc. so decided to stick with 16:9.

 

Projector

BenQ W11000H CinePro Series 4K Ultra HD THX 100% Rec. 709 with Cinematic Color and HDR DLP Home Cinema Projector

Recently Upgraded: BenQ W12000HX CinePro Series 4K Ultra HD THX 100% Rec. 709 with Cinematic Color and HDR DLP Home Cinema Projector

 

Screen

Screen Research 16:9 ClearPix 4 4K 92" inch Diagonal THX ISF Certified Acoustically Transparent Projection Screen

-The screen is housed in a custom made shadow box

(This was a recent upgrade from a Clear Pix 2 to the Clear Pix 4 4K)

 

Digital Sources

1 x Oppo 203 4K Ultra HD Universal DVD Player

1 x Apple TV 4K

 

Audio Processor

1 x Acurus Muse Dolby ATMOS DTS X Home Cinema Processor

 

Video Processor

1 x Lumagen Radiance Pro 4242 Ultra HD 4K Video Processor 

 

Amplification

2 x Cary Cinema 5 - 5 x 250 watts per channel into 8 ohms Power Amplifiers (total 10 channels of amplification)

 

Speaker System - 5.2.4 

3 x M&K Miller and Kreisel S300 THX Ultra II Reference Speakers - Left / Centre Right

2 x M&K Miller and Kreisel S300T Tripole THX Ultra II  Reference Speakers - Left Surround / Right Surround

2 x M&K Miller and Kreisel X12 THX Ulltra II Reference Powered Subwoofers

2 x Triad Bronze In Ceiling LCR Speakers - Dolby ATMOS Front Height Channels

2 x Triad Bronze In Ceiling LCR Speakers - Dolby ATMOS Over Head Channels

 

Analog Cables

AudioQuest CV-4 Solid PSC+ Speaker Cable

AudioQuest Solid PSC+ King Cobra Balanced interconnect Cables

 

Digital Cables

AudioQuest Cinnamon 4K Ultra HD 18 Gbps HDMI Cables 2m

Fibre Optical HDMI 15m 

 

Acoustic Treatments

4 x Wavetrain Acoustics Custom made Bass Traps

2 x Wavetrain Acoustics Custom made First Reflection Absorbers

2 x Wavetrain Acoustics Custom made Diffuser panels

2 x Wavetrain Acoustics Custom made Diffuser panels with accent light inserts

2 x Wavetrain Acoustics Custom made Absorber panels

2 x Wavetrain Acoustics Custom made Ceiling First Reflection Absorbers

1 x Wavetrain Acoustics Custom made 'Behind Screen' Absorption panel

2 x Wavetrain Acoustics Custom made Front Corner Absorption panel and bass trap combination panels

1 x Wavetrain Acoustics Custom made Absorption Cinema Door with DTS insert

Under-carpet Acoustic underlay

 

Seating

4 x Leather motorised recliners with chiller cup holders

 

Whats missing?  I don't have a universal remote system at the moment. My old RTI T2C died and I didn't bother to replace it. A Crestron touch panel would be nice, but not sure if I want to go down the expensive path of another universal remote system as these days I can control the processor and DVD player easily enough from my iPhone. 

 

 

 

 

Edited July 15, 2020 by JoshH

[Satanica]

Logitech Universal Remotes are good and relatively cheap.

[audiohippo]

 

10 hours ago, JoshH said:

Whats missing?

Popcorn? 

[JoshH]

1 minute ago, audiohippo said:

 

Popcorn? 

Gets stuck in my teeth

[Whites]

Awesome room...I am jealous

 

I do have one question, do the chiller cup holders actually work?

[audiohippo]

1 hour ago, JoshH said:

Gets stuck in my teeth

Beer?

[JoshH]

12 hours ago, Whites said:

Awesome room...I am jealous

 

I do have one question, do the chiller cup holders actually work?

Thanks

 

Yes, they do work, but they wont really cool a warm drink. You need to start with something cold, and it keeps it cold quite well for the better part of most movies. I thought it was a bit of a gimmick initially but its actually pretty nice to have.

[709er]

Looking very nice indeed!

Do you have any photos of the room from start to finish? Always interesting to see the process.

Are all the panels on the screen wall AT fabric? Looks very smooth and urbane.

The projector platform really fits in nicely. Must be quite strong as the BenQ looks large.

You must be thrilled.

[JoshH]

Thanks! 

 

No photos from start to finish I am afraid.. didn't think to take any. I started with a basic empty room though.

 

All the panels on the walls are AT fabric.  All of the front shadow box is AT as well except the equipment doors and the DVD drawers.

 

The projector shelf is basically part of the rear wall. I think the house will fall down before that shelf....

[Home theatre rookie]

Very nice ht mate. Very neat with some nice room treatments.

I have to ask, why did you opt for such a small screen?

And what was the reasoning behind putting the projector cables under the shelf opposed to above and out of sight?

Would love to see some shots with the projector on.

[JoshH]

Thanks, I sit only a little over 3 metres from the screen (its not a big room) - so the screen is pretty much ideal for the seating positions. Its all about optimiztion. The seats are in the best position for audio, well off the back wall. The shadow box means the AT screen sits quite a bit off the front wall (leaving room behind for speakers and Acoustic treatments) - that means seat position is quite close to the screen. So 92" is optimal. It also means I get fantastic brightness for HDR material (higher NITS).

 

The projector cables location is a hang over from my previous projector which was slung under the shelf on a bracket. I just haven't had time to re-route the cables to the new projector position.

 

Ill take a shot later today with a film on.

Edited September 20, 2018 by JoshH

[JoshH]

Here ya go - just an iPhone shot, but should give you the idea of it

Edited September 21, 2018 by JoshH

[Rockford]

The movie picture looks longer and narrower than the screen in the first pic, or is it an illusion?

 

Very nice setup.

[JoshH]

you are looking at a film with an aspect ratio of 2.39:1 on a 16:9 projection screen. So there are black bars top and bottom. Hence the picture is longer and narrower than the screen. If you look very closely at the photo you can see the difference between the black bars and the shadow box

[Kezzbot]

Very nice, making me impatient to complete my room.

[JoshH]

I made a couple of upgrades to the Cinema last night:

 

Added the BenQ 12000H projector and a Lumagen 4242 Radiance Pro. Will try and write up my thoughts on the Lumagen as I am totally blown away by the performance of this unit. Probably the biggest video upgrade I have ever done and absolutely worth every single dollar.

[drummerboy01]

Nice work JoshH looks great mate. 

[JoshH]

Just wanted to do a bit of an update: Since I posted this originally Acurus have released the brand new ASPEQT EQ system for the MUSE processor and I have now had a chance to do a calibration with the kit. This kit has been a long time coming and the results were absolutely worth the wait.  I wont repost all the images from each channel here - but they can be seen on my post on the AVS forum HERE: And a couple of samples below.

 

My initial impression post ASPEQT calibration was exceptionally positive - especially on the way the calibration seems to lift a ‘veil’ and greatly improve soundstage and transparency. The MUSE sounded great before the calibration. Post, its most definitely an immediate audible improvement. I really haven't heard a better sounding processor. Bang for buck, I believe the MUSE to be unmatched.

 

Just keep in mind that this pertains to my cinema and the equipment in my room. The room itself is extensively acoustically treated and was designed from the ground up as a dedicated cinema. From the results ASPEQT has given me you can clearly see that ASPEQT is making only minor adjustments and is subtle and not aggressive in those adjustments. In other rooms that are not acoustically treated ASPEQT would I believe behave very differently (as it should) with more aggressive adjustments to tame room issues.

With that caveat out of the way my feelings on ASPEQT results post calibration are exceptionally very positive. Overall the soundstage is larger with greater depth and is more integrated. Dialogue is clearer with ASPEQT clearing up the boundary gain from my centre channel very nicely. I would say that movie sound tracks feel more holographic (trying to find a word to describe how the speakers just sort of further disappear) than before and thats a great result.

What I like very much is that the results for each speaker channel give good detail on what adjustments are being applied. You can see from the screenshots I posted above exactly what is happening with each speaker. That is pretty cool and something I missed with Audyssey stand alone processors. I also appreciate very much that it is possible to restrict the frequency range that ASPEQT is working. Of course, the on screen GUI is gorgeous and clearly the best in the market. They really knocked it out of the park with the GUI.

If you are using ASPEQT in a treated room such as I am I would recommend starting with the gentle roll off curve. If you are in a multi purpose space that is not ideal acoustically then it is likely a steeper roll off curve will be preferred. I cant think of a reason you would want the flat curve, unless you were using some other device in combination with the MUSE and ASPEQT to do room correction. Or, perhaps if your room is just way over damped. Anyway, I guess its a good thing its there as an option.

The bass boost options are good to have on tap - but keep in mind, each bass boost jump requires a doubling of power. Some systems may not be able to cope with that. In my own room, using the gentle roll off curve with the lowest bass boost produces thunderous, powerful bass. Too much? Nah... its awesome. I am running multiple subs in my room and bass is tight controlled and has serious impact and slam. 

From information received from Acurus directly, I believe there are more features coming to ASPEQT in future firmware updates that include the ability to customise curves. I also requested a THX curve be added and the ability to do A/B before / after comparisons more easily. We will have to wait for these, but its good to know that they are being worked on.

 

 

[JoshH]

Another update to the Cinema today - The Acurus Muse is gone... replaced with the new Storm Audio Core 16.

[JoshH]

A bit more of an update on the Storm Audio now that I have done a good amount of listening and calibrated it with Dirac. My impression is its the highest quality, most immersive experience I have yet had in my cinema.  Its always hard to put into words how things sound, so I will leave it at that

 

the Muse was excellent. The Storm Audio - thats in another league; in fact its playing a whole other sport.

[JoshH]

Another upgrade this week - one of the subwoofers has been upgraded to the new M&K X15+ THX Dominus. 

 

Scott from the Digital Picture in QLD flew down and we spent 5 hours last night calibrating it. To say the bass is earth shaking would be an understatement

 

Next update - a Scope screen; which involves modifying the front of house joinery, so its a fairly major project.

[JoshH]

Some big updates to the cinema: New Screen 2.7 metres wide 2.39: 1 Severtson SAT 4K Acoustically transparent screen is installed and a new Barco Bragi 5K Cinemascope projector with the E63 Lens.

 

We need to complete the joinery modifications to accommodate the new screen properly, but it's up and running. Photos are to come once the joinery is completed.

 

Coming soon also will be 2 Storm Audio High Powered 8 channel power amplifiers that will be replacing the Cary Audio power amplifiers. Wil run them in bridged mode for the bed layer for 800 watts per channel

[Hi-Fi Whipped]

Nice upgrades, look fwd to the pics!

 

Good to see someone else using MK Sound speakers, I’ve been blown away by my S150 limited LCR speakers behind my screen.

[JoshH]

On 18/1/2024 at 12:45 PM, Hi-Fi Whipped said:

Nice upgrades, look fwd to the pics!

 

Good to see someone else using MK Sound speakers, I’ve been blown away by my S150 limited LCR speakers behind my screen.

The MP300 and S300's are phenomenal speakers. I have not heard the 150's, but I am told they are close in performance. The X15+ subwoofer is also absolutely phenomenal. 

[Kaynin]

Very nice set-up indeed, first I've come across this thread.  I see your gear are enclosed in cabinets, what do you do for ventilation?