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Home Entertainment
Most of us have dreamed about creating the ultimate home theatre environment, complete with comfortable chairs, low lighting, surround sound and a giant screen to watch the action unfold.
Your version of the ultimate home cinema experience could involve anything from a simple DVD player hooked up to a big-screen TV, to a fully kitted-out home theatrette. Whatever your choice, home automation technology can up the ante and add that ‘wow factor’ to your home cinema experience.
Why automate your home theater?
This one’s a bit of a no-brainer: if you spend a lot of time watching television and movies, then you ideally want to create your own sanctuary in which to enjoy them.
Today’s home entertainment systems have enough power to achieve many tasks at once. They can broadcast a movie with high-quality picture and sound in one room, for example, while simultaneously allowing a different film to be played in a different room.
They can also be easily integrated with home automation systems, which provides for an extravagant level of extra convenience. Say you’re watching a movie, and someone knocks on your door; you could set up your system to automatically ‘pause’ or ‘mute’, while you attend to your visitor.
Types of devices
This is where you can really have some fun!
Expensive home cinema set-ups can include custom-built TV screens, high-powered theater-grade surround sound systems, carpeted walls and cinema-style chairs. They can cost upwards of half a million dollars – but you obviously don’t need to spend that much money to create your own home entertainment oasis!
Designing your automated home theater system can seem like a daunting task, but keep in mind that it can be a constant work in progress. As technology changes – and as your budget allows – you can upgrade your system to include better quality components.
Want to really impress your friends? Consider adding a media server to your system. A media server lets you store all of your music in one spot, which you can then broadcast to different areas throughout your home. You could program one style of music for the dining room, and a different style for the lounge and home theater sanctuary. Depending on how complex you want to go – the sky’s the limit!
