Welcome to HOKEYWOOD

Welcome to our home theater; named after my wife Cindy's artistic creations.

The photos on this web page are of horrible quality, as they were taken by my $45 USB webcam, and theaters by their very nature are dark places. I will update all this in the future, but I wanted to put something together today. I will attempt to make up for some of this by including information.

Hokeywood is born

When we bought our house 9 years ago, I did not have a home theater originally in mind. Home theaters as a hobby had not yet caught on and only the wealthy had them. As we developed the room and I bought a big screen RPTV that it occurred to me that I could do something fun. So armed with very little money and a lot of effort by Cindy and myself, we created Hokeywood. The theater was only a Surround Sound setup, 2 VHS decks, a 46" RPTV, X10 lighting, and universal remote(s). The receiver was a Pioneer supporting an AC timer, so using an intelligent AC powerstrip I was able to tie the TV and receiver together so that turning one on turned them both on -- providing a good WAF (Wife Approval Factor). It was our decor, however, that we really took joy in. It was cooler than any we had seen in other homes. We painted a cheap wall unit black, covered all the sofa and chairs with theater-like fabric, installed wall sconces, and painted the room a dark burgandy. With the lights off -- the screen just seem to float in mid air. We also hung movie posters in the hall staircase leading to the theater, installed "ribbon" lights in the stairs, framed an exit sign for the door, and roped off the stairs with a velvet rope. The entrance also had an LED marquee (bought at SAM's Club). Icreated a tape of sci-fi movie trailers that would play in VCR #1 until I kicked in VCR #2 with the actual movie. Cindy and I called about 8 of our neighborhood friends over, set up chairs, popcorn, and candy -- and we all watched "The Fugative". :-)

Hokeywood Gets its 1st Major Upgrade

As time went by, we performed minor improvements to the theater. These were mostly adding decorative items like a movie clapboard, miniature spotlight, autographed photos, better movie posters, etc. However some serious upgrades started when Philips announced the Pronto Remote Control. I recognized that this was the remote I had been waiting 10 years for and was an early adopter of it. With it, and a Pioneer CD megachanger, I was able to place my entire music collection online and make it easy to play anything (MP3 had not yet caught on). I added some IR repeaters so that the system could be used throughout the house. I did not yet own a DVD player, but I knew if I waited long enough someone would come out with a DVD megachanger and I'd have it all.

Hokeywood's 2nd Upgrade

I also added an SVHS deck (since they are really cheap now). It was also about this time that ReplayTV came into beingm so I added that. Boy -- We could never live without it now! I've since upgraded my unit from 20hrs to 100hrs of recording ability. I also could see that consumer DVD recorders were on the horizon, so I began to create video tapes of anything I thought I'd want to make a DVD of in the future. Finally, I added an inexpensive wireless "rabbit" type system as a quick way to watch the Replay and DVDs on other sets in the house.

Current Equipment

My music audio system is independent of my home theater AV system. This is just a list of the theater equipment.

• Magnavox 46" RPTV
• Onkyo DS-777 THX Select Receiver
• MK THX Select LRC Speakers
• Boston bi-polar rear speakers
• Yamaha SW90 Subwoofer
• Pioneer 300+1 DVD/VCD megachanger
• Philips VRA631AT 4 head MTS VCR
• JVC S-VHS ET VCR
• Philips Pronto touchscreen Universal Remote
• X10 Lighting controls & IR receiver
• Beta-brite Multi-color LED marquee sign
• ReplayTV PVR (2020 upgraded to 100gig)
• Approximately 200 DVDs & VCDs
• Commercial low-voltage theater floor lighting
• IR repeater, posters, etc.
• My DVD Collection

Hokeywood Photos

These photos do not do the theater justice. In order to take them, I had to had a lot of light, and having a lot of light took away from the theater feel. There are no shots of the back wall because it's just a row of windows covered by curtains the same color as the theater walls.

My Pronto screen	Entry stairs down to the theater. Note the velvet rope, and the autographed photos on the wall.	Looking down the stairs at the marquee sign and movie posters	Also looking down the stairs at the marquee sign and movie posters
Looking back up the stairs.	The entrace into the the theater, showing the exit sign, sconce, and trash bin	Front of the theater showing the screen, black cabinets, LOTR poster, chair, & stool	Same shot, including a table and the Pronto
More of the right wall showing sconce and posters	Left wall showing bathroom door and director's chair	The sign on the bathroom door	Cindy relazing in the theater. Note the Star Wars poster

Hokeywood's 3rd Upgrade

Hokeywood's 3rd upgrade is now knocking on my door. First; dedicated home theaters are now becoming popular -- which means I have more sources of help and inspiration, and more things have become affordable. My existing decor is starting to look a bit tired compared to some I've seen and compared to what I know I can do given a new chance.

Now that I have the sound system, and support DVD media easily, there's the issue of getting high quality in the video image. My RPTV is 7 years old and small by today's big screen standards. It also does not support component or computer inputs -- a need for HDTV or high quality video displays. I really want the front projector experience, and front projection CRT systems are HDTV compatible and are more affordable that the LCD or DLP projectors. Home Theater PCs (HTPCs) are an inexpensive method of getting high quality video and recording your own DVDs. I also want to really do up the whole house distribution.

Kenwood JUST came out with the first PROGRESSIVE SCAN DVD megachanger (and it flips the discs too)! And Philips has released a color Pronto! And DVD recorders are hitting the market so I can convert my hundreds of tapes into Discs!

Right right now I am planning the next upgrade, which will be at least a front projector and either the Kenwood player plus a DVD recorder, or an HTPC, or perhaps both. I'd also like to have a raised 2nd row of seating. This is a difficult upgrade to consider, as Cindy and I are also thinking we should move to a better house -- and a chance to do a better dedicated room with a lobby! So I am faced with the choices of investing more into this house or waiting until the next. There have also been a lot of press releases about how the MPAA and video industries are moving to obsolete some existing hardware to stop "analog" people from getting the high quality images, so there's an urgency to purchase certain things before they become hard to get. At this momement, my plans are to purchase the electronics, but not necessarily install them. I'll post more information as it occurs.

-- Keith