While an ordinary large television with some good quality speakers can provide you with much enjoyment, it’s the surround sound – sound coming from all around you rather than just from the television set, that truly makes the experience theater quality. Now, getting surround sound built into your home’s walls is an option for the movie enthusiast. If you are currently working with a contractor to build your home, now is the perfect time to consider a home theater for your den or living room.

First, it might be useful to understand why surround sound is so great. It works to make the movie you are watching far more realistic to your senses. Movie editors design the sound to come from different speakers depending on its location and context in the movie. Having speakers all around you allows actors to the right of the screen to sound like they are speaking to the right of you, or for background sounds to sound like they are behind you. They even allow sound to move from one place to another, as with a train that starts off in the distance on one side of you and ends up sounding just like it is roaring right by your ear. In short, surround sound allows the sound to be completely and accurately integrated with the movie you are watching.

If you have already built a home, you can install surround sound by placing speakers around the room. There are a lot of systems designed to do this, with elegant, tall speakers. Many are wireless so you don’t have cords running all over your floor or up your walls. However, building a home from scratch allows for a unique opportunity to embed speakers right into your walls, exactly where you want them. Although wireless home theater systems eliminate the need to run wiring around the room, hiding the speaker body right in the wall frees up even more space in the room. It also allows you to mount the speakers at just the right height to suit your sound preference, without the awkward look of surface mounted speakers.

Now the major decision you have to make is whether you want a system with 5, 6 or 7 speakers. The quality and diversity of sound increases with the number of speakers, as you can increase the angles at which they surround you. All of these come with a sub woofer, which will give you that deep base, and help with the rumbling affect when that train I mentioned goes by. If you feel like you’re maxing out your budget already, don’t fret. The 5 speaker systems still offer excellent quality sound, and will be a vast improvement from your average front speaker television set.

Once you’ve got a wonderful speaker system lined up, you need to decide on the type of television you will watch it all on. The largest conventional, cathode ray tube television screen you will be able to find is 40 inches across. Plasma screens are popular because they are flat, lightweight, and take up far less floor space. The also have a screen size ratio that closely matches current movies. The drawback to these is that they aren’t able to produce really dark blacks, so the contrast is never that great. However this technology is improving. The other drawback is that static images, especially those of a light color, can burn into the screen, meaning when the image on the screen changes, a mark of the previous image may be left behind. This only happens if it remained static on the screen for a long time, as is the case with station logo watermarks, text banners or unchanging video game backgrounds. LCDs are another flat-screen option, but they are bigger than plasma screens, have even less ability to produce deep contrast (dark blacks), and have a narrow viewing range, meaning the view is distorted if the viewer is too far off to one side. However, they are immune to screen burn, so are an excellent choice for video gaming. They also run cooler, meaning a noisy fan won’t kick in while you’re enjoying your new surround sound. There’s no easy option when choosing a screen, but it helps to do some research, and consider resolution, aspect ratio (screen size ratio), and contrast when making your choice.

So talk to your contractor, and see if they have experience installing in-wall surround sound systems. The money spent on a quality home theater system will surely be saved by not paying the mark-up on theater pop and candy.

By: Kim Hunter