CurtPalme.com Home Theater Forum

[CIR Engineering]

[Tim in Phoenix]

Uhhh

I believe I read it was $500 each movie, plus the hardware. Fingerprint reader activation so no one can say the dog hit Play.

[jeffslife]

Please post more info.

[CIR Engineering]

It's super expensive right now, but I am hoping to "negotiate" something...

Here is a review:
http://www.digitaltrends.com/home-theater/prima-cinema-brings-hollywood-inside-your-home/

craigr

[Nashou66]

Looks cool , but for 500 id want the movie to be there for a year at least. But then again I have a moome Mux and could copy them

Nashou

[ecrabb]

[ecrabb]

I posted about the Prima last fall in another thread where we were talking about streaming, picture quality, content availability, etc. I've seen one several times now, and it's frickin' awesome. There's something really magical about seeing something on a home screen that's currently in theaters.

The $35k price tag and $500-600 per movie fee is absolutely intentional and is very much designed to make the numbers very small to keep theater owners from throwing a hissy fit about this. If only the wealthiest 1% of the population can afford this thing, and only 1/10 of those will actually buy one, they have nothing to worry about in terms of ticket sales. So, for us enthusiasts who aren't CEOs of major corporations, it's out-of-the-box cost-prohibitive right now, but on the plus side, I think it bodes well for the future. That it exists at all is a bit of triumph in my opinion.

Right now, my wife and I are pretty happy to pay $5-6/movie to rent from Vudu and iTunes. PQ is typically very good; not quite BD, but very good. Much bette than DirecTV or Dish Network. Sound could be better, but the overall experience is actually very good. We save the big-budget blockbuster stuff for BD, and watch everything else rented over streaming. In most people's setups - especially anything less than a good digital or 9-inch CRT with excellent sound setup - I'd say the difference between streaming and BD is practically nil at this point if you have good bandwidth.

So, back to the Prima. If the studios can convince theater owners that this won't hurt their business, this model could be expanded. If I could pay $9.99 to watch a movie while it was still in the theaters - say 30 days after release date - I'd do that at least once or twice a month. Invite a friend or two over, and it's easily justifiable compared to going out, and not at all bad compared to renting a Blu-ray six months after everybody else has already seen it. The theater owners get their one-month exclusivity, the Prima owners can pay $500 to watch on release day and for the next 30 days, then the rest of us could watch on our $500 Oppo BDP-205 or whatever, and pay $10 or $15 to rent and watch for 24 hours.

I think it's very cool step in the right direction for us HT enthusiasts.

SC

[jeffslife]

35K ! Nevermind

[ecrabb]

Not for us right now, Jeff. Think of it like a $120k car, and the technology in it that will be finding its way into affordable cars in 5 or 10 years.

SC

[Nashou66]

I wonder if it can be used commercially? I have always wanted to incorporate my cooking and my love for movies into a Theater diner. Set up a small screen about the size of mine now and maybe 20-40 seats. Have viewing dinner times so maybe three movies per day starting at 1 for matinees' and then two more. And possibly on week ends a late night one with just drinks, like a bar/Cinema .

I have seen screening rooms/ restaurants , but they are set up all wrong.

And you can rent them like halls for benefits , Birthday parties for kids etc.

And using current releases it be awesome! parents could rent the theater for a kids party on the release of say Frozen. they all know each other so it wouldn't be as embarrassing if the kids get out of control.

Just an idea i had mulling around.

Athanasios

[ecrabb]

[CIR Engineering]

The PRIMA can definitely NOT be used commercially. It is intended for high end HOME theaters. Before they will even consider selling you the box, a representative has to come out and servery your site. The site must be a home theater with "enough" seats, but no more than 25 seats. You must have a static IP address and if the IP changes or the player loses connection it will not play a movie. The player also has an accelerometer in it... if the player is moved it will not play another movie until it is reset by PRIMA.

The player also has a finger print scanner and only the one authorized user can actually purchase a film. This way the dog can't accidentally buy a $500 viewing, but neither can anyone who tries to steal your player.

You could copy off the HDMI to an HDMI capture card with an HDCP stripper. However, there are several layers of protection after the fact. The most notable is that each player puts its own water mark on the HDMI signal so if the copy were ever distributed they would know exactly where it came from. This brings powerful meaning to the FBI warning at the beginning of the film.

I agree with Crabb, this is promising for the future for regular people. I'd go a step further and say that I would easily be willing to spend $50 to see a film still in the theater a month after release (maybe even $100, maybe even more). We do movie night with 8-10 about twice a month. If everyone throws in $10 it's not a bad deal.

The PRIMA is using YCbCr 422 as opposed to BD that only uses YCbCr 420. So the PRIMA will have much more realistic colors and color fidelity to boot.

craigr

[Nashou66]

Craig you have to become a dealer and get one in your theater for "demo" purposes !

Nashou

[CIR Engineering]

Sound and Vision in Chicago is having some PRIMA reps in for a demo in their room. I'll be doing a fresh calibration on their Titan Reference 3D and Radiance combo this Friday to get it prepped. I tuned up a Titan Reference 3D with Radiance today so they're fresh on my mind.

If anyone is interested I could ask if Sound and Vision has space left for anymore guests? The demo is going to be Wednesday 2/19/14 5:00pm to 9:00pm. Shoot me an email if you would like me to ask.

http://www.soundandvision.net/

In my opinion, the Titan Reference 3D with (or without even) a Radiance is the best looking digital out there. If you want to see the best of digital to compare against your CRT, this would be it. If I couldn't have a CRT anymore I would want a Titan.

craigr

[AnalogRocks]

SO I take it I can't get one of these if I'm using a 5" B&W TV with a 12" Fresnel lens?

[AnalogRocks]

SO I take it I can't get one of these if I'm using a 5" B&W TV with a 12" Fresnel lens?

[ecrabb]

[AnalogRocks]

[AnalogRocks]

[CIR Engineering]

Needless to say, the demo was awesome. The thing that did surprise me most was the incredible color fidelity. The PRIMA is using YCbCr 422 as opposed to BD which is YCbCr 420. It was really easy to notice the incredible realism in color fidelity on the PRIMA. Colors were just drop dead gorgeous.

I wish we could get a new BD standard that contains YCbCr 422 so BD could look so nice. We'll probably get 4k BD before we get YCbCr422 though.

craigr

[Spanky Ham]

Paging Hog! Yeah this has been talked about over at AVS, but I haven't followed it. I think Kris Deering has said on more than one occasion that he would prefer 422 or better over 4k.

[CIR Engineering]