Now and then a home cinema project comes along that has few restrictions… a clean slate for the designer to create something unique
One such project came to fruition last year from our Australian partners. After hearing about this unique home cinema we wanted to ask Michael Cox from Australian speaker manufacturer Krix how this project came to light and how they collaborated with Sydney HiFi Castle Hill for this epic cinema retreat, one that offers the highest level of cinema experience within a modern family home.
Can you tell us more about the speaker layout and technical journey/requirements?
The speaker layout is 9.4.6. A total of 22 channels were used, including front wides, side and rear surrounds, with top front, middle and rear overheads. The dealer was brought on board at a later stage in the construction – the ‘outer’ room shell was already complete, with the seating tiers and front wall behind the screen already finished. This meant seating and front speaker positions were already locked in, so we designed the room and speaker layout to accommodate these locations, with the Optimizer playing a valuable role in getting the most out of every seat.
So how did Altitude become the processor of choice for this luxury home cinema?
The customer had very high standards and expectations... we needed a large number of channels with the highest level of fidelity at immense volume levels. The room dimensions were huge, and the room needed the capability to deliver a commercial cinema experience and beyond.
Both Trinnov and Krix have a heritage in the commercial cinema space, which placed us in prime position to deliver that result. The engineering and technology used in Trinnov’s commercial and professional products is also used in the Altitude processor, allowing that pro-level of performance to be experienced in home environments.
Pairing the analog engineering of the Krix speakers with the digital processing of the Trinnov, we could deliver something incredibly special and the result was exactly what the customer wanted.
This photo gives a good idea of the immense scale of the speakers !
How did calibration go? and how did the Altitude32 help on that particular project?
The larger home cinema speakers are generally 3-way, bi-amped designs utilizing active crossovers as standard. The Altitude’s ability to implement multi-way active crossovers in a straightforward manner and within the same Trinnov interface made the process incredibly easy.
As the room was nearing completion, but before final furnishings, we were able to remotely join the integration team in setting up the Trinnov with crossover settings, speaker layout, bass management, and an initial measurement to see how the system was performing. Being able to dial in remotely and work on the system with the integrators was invaluable.
From that initial measurement and the resulting optimizer graphs, we could identify an anomaly in the response from one of the speaker positions. With a short amount of trouble-shooting, we traced the issue back to a cable fault, which could be rectified quickly and easily before we went on-site for final calibration. We could then spend more time listening to and configuring the system on the day.
Trinnov software and 3D microphone
With 12 seats located over quite a large area, the Optimizer was a highly valuable tool for enhancing the sound for all viewers - we could analyze, adapt and weight the measurements respectively. The way the optimizer isolates and shows the direct sound from the speakers allows us to get a really clear idea of the loudspeaker performance in the room and equalize to taste.
Maybe a general quote about this project and our collaboration?
It was really a pleasure to be able to work with a processor that has such advanced room measurement capabilities, one that allows almost infinite customization with the resulting information. The Trinnov Altitude 32 allowed us to extract the absolute best performance from the speakers and the room, delivering the clients dream home cinema.
Technical Specifications
Speakers
- 3 x Krix Cinematix
- 8 x Krix Megaphonix Flat
- 4 x Krix Megaphonix
- 2 x Krix Megacyclonix subwoofers
- 2 x Triad silver 12” in ceiling subwoofers
Preamplifier and amplifiers
- Trinnov Altitude 32-24
- Parasound Halo power amplifiers (18 channels)
- 2 x Yamaha PX-10 2 channel power amplifier
- 2 x Triad 700 amplifiers
- 1 x Pioneer UDP-LX500 4K Blu-ray
- 1 x Apple TV 4K
Projection and screen
- 1 x Barco Balder CinemaScope native 2:37 5K UHD projector
- 1 x 240” 2.37:1 Oz Theatre Screens – Majestic Acoustic Vision 4K screen
Control System and Automation
- 1 x Control4 EA-5 processor
- 1 x Control4 handheld remote
- 1 x Control4 handheld remote
