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Help me choose screen material for my setup... please ? :)

 
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Rattanee




Joined: 18 Jan 2015
Posts: 193



PostLink    Posted: Wed Feb 18, 2015 9:53 pm    Post subject: Help me choose screen material for my setup... please ? :) Reply with quote


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Okay guys, I'd like some opinions regarding screen size and material... trying to make most out of the available space... if I can...

I have a fairly low ceiling in my basement where I want to set up my little HT. I have a wall I've specified to use, with an absolute maximum floor-to ceiling space of 212 (gonna round down to 210) cms, and 287cm of width. I've already tried, and I'm fairly happy with the above image size, using the entire wall area.

The problem I have is that my wall is not exactly flat, and has a lot of imperfections. I've thought about doing a drywall thing in front of the actual wall, but I quickly gave up on that. I've done drywalling in the neighboring room and I'm -not- cleaning up all that dust again... that is just inhuman.... so I've no choice but to sink some money in and do an actual screen.

Home made or pre-made? Roll-up or on a frame? What screen material? How much screen gain? ... so many questions...

The PJ I'm going to be using on it is a NEC 9PG and a low res Sony for retro gaming. Possibly looking to do a blend later on using two NECs, but that's besides the point right now. All new tubes, so light output is great so far.

Is it worth getting higher gain screens, or do they unavoidably hotspot? What is the gain factor at which a screen starts getting noticable hotspotting? Do 'cheapo' screens have usable screen materials, or should they be avoided for reasons other then crappy roll-up mechs ?

I've pretty much decided against a roll-up screen, because I'm pretty sure that no matter the material, after a while it will start to wrinkle. So I'm stuck with fixed frame screens... however noone does the size I'd need... unles I order to spec for an arm and a leg...

I've come to the conclusion that I'll need to build my own screen frame, but am not at all certain what material to use for the screen surface. Would I be better off using some sort of blackout cloth, or would my plan of stripping a roll-up screen of the screen material and stretching it onto my custom frame be the better solution?

Please take it into account that while I don't intend to use any form of 'serious' audio for my setup, I do intend to put up a small 5.1 system. It would be nice if I could hide the center speaker behind the screen... so I've even considered several layers of simple white cloth as the screen material...

Do you think that using two smaller speakers wired in series (matching impedance for the amp of course) placed on the sides, and connected to the center output double well as a center speaker? If so, I'm probably going to go ahead with getting the screen material from a roll-up screen.


Anyone with experience, please help me out here:)

Cheers!
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CIR Engineering




Joined: 25 Aug 2008
Posts: 4264
Location: Chicago USA & Berlin Germany


PostLink    Posted: Wed Feb 18, 2015 11:39 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Fixed frame screen for sure. Why would you want to roll it up? To see your unfinished wall?

The technically correct seating distance from a screen is 1.3x the width of the screen. This correlates with gain. If you have a gain of 1.3 and you sit 1.3x the width of the screen back (or more) than you won't see hot spots. If you have a 1.0 gain and sit 1x the width back no hot spots... if you have a 2.0 gain screen and sit 2x the width back no hot spots.

That being said, a little hot spotting should not necessarily rule out higher gain. Your projector is not a very bright machine though it is sufficient. I would certainly not go below 1.3 gain and I would consider a gain of 2.0 or maybe even higher depending on material.

What's your screen budget anyway?

craigr

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Spanky Ham




Joined: 22 Mar 2006
Posts: 5643
Location: Comedy Central


PostLink    Posted: Thu Feb 19, 2015 4:04 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

First off, it sounds like you have a lot of reading to do. I wouldn't even waste my time trying to blend to PGs.

Second, you are talking two totally different screens with an AT and solid screen. With your pj and wall size, I think you might like a 200 cm width AT screen. You can put the speakers behind the screen and don't have to worry about trying to wedge the speakers around or under the screen.
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Rattanee




Joined: 18 Jan 2015
Posts: 193



PostLink    Posted: Thu Feb 19, 2015 9:00 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Thanks for the replies guys.

My wall -is- finished, but it's not a drywall down there, and the painted surface is less then completely flat... and straight for that matter... whoever pulled it up must've been on some good moonshine Very Happy The right side curves inwards slightly, making a not so noticable, but nevertheless irritating geometric distortion... hence the reason for the screen. So a roll-up could work... especially against my brother's kids when they come to visit Very Happy But I'm concerned about the longevity of roll-ups. I've not yet seen a roll-up screen that was more then 5 years old and had no wrinkles...

I'd like to use the full width available. With a black frame let's round that down to 280cm wide. My PJ is if memory serves me correctly 3.4metres from the wall for full coverage. I plan to put seating right below the PJ. So that would mean a gain of 1.2 would be the maximum I should get to avoid any hotspotting?

Both PJs are like new as far as tubes go, so there's plenty of light output. It's pretty sweet just using the matte wall to be honest.

I'd like to not pass the magic $400 mark for the screen...


Spanky:
That's just going to be an experiment, I'm not really aiming to do a long-term blend setup... I consider it too much of a hassle... but I'll probably give it a shot just to see if I can do it at all.

I really want to try and go for the maximum possible size. I could get 200 width screens dirt cheap and I wouldn't even need them to be AT as that'd leave more then enough room for a center speaker. I have not really considered AT screens because from what I gather they're expensive as all hell, and at this short distance apparently you can see the holes in the material? The whole reason for me going CRT was to get rid of pixels... I don't want to introduce another kind of artifact into the image with the holes Smile



Unfortunately, I can't seem to find anyone nearby who actually sells screen materials (in Hungary EU), so my options are rather limited.

1, Buy el-cheapo but brand new matte white (unity gain) roll-up screen that is larger then the size that I need, strip out the material, mount on custom frame.
2, Buy fairly pricey but like-new second hand brand name screen with 1.6 gain, strip out the material, do as above (this would pretty much max out my budget)
3, Buy white fabric for canvas material, apply in several layers. Acoustically transparent, but I have doubts about image quality.
4, Do the blackout cloth thing... preferrably without paint...

All the solutions bar the traditional fabric use would require me to find a way around a center speaker... I did think about just pulling all the speakers closer to the seats so the center doesn't have to be mounted all the way back at the screen... but they might get in the way ....

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draganm




Joined: 08 Mar 2006
Posts: 8990
Location: Colorado


PostLink    Posted: Tue Mar 10, 2015 9:38 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

blackout cloth is awful, it's not even 1:1 gain. the stuff I saw looked dull and lifeless. Also, AT screens you will be throwing away a portion of your light output, it stands to reason that if the sound is coming thru one way, the light is going thru the other way.
I would contact Da-lite and ask them for the free sample swatches. They send you as many different kinds of fabric as you want in 12" squares. Don't forget to ask for piece of High power 1.7 gain, people here poo-poo it but every time i show it to a HT user they pick this one.
You can also ask for Cineperm, Da-Mat, Cinema vision, etc.

Fixed screens are really nice, but also very expensive. You can get a decent Da-lite roll-up for less than $300.
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