Audio

Creation date: 6/28/98
Updated: January 27, 2007

Walter's Audio/Video

Home Theater Page

In addition to being a big time Babylon 5 fan and J-POP music fan, I am a long time audio & video phile. (Like, since the late 1960s!)


My first audio component, a Lafayette FM receiver, circa 1966.	The audio system I owned in 1973. Components included a Thorens TD-125 turntable, McIntosh C24 preamp and MC 250 power amp (still powering my surround channels), and a Tandberg 6000x reel to reel tape deck.

In December of 2004 we decided to bring our audio/video system into the 21st century. We replaced our 15 year old Sony TA-ESD1000 surround sound preamp with a Pioneer VSX-54TX Elite receiver. Since my existing power amplifiers for the front and rear speakers were nicely wired and working well, I decided to use the Pioneer as a Pre/Pro (Preamp/Processor). A few months later we added a home theater PC (HTPC) and finally, a Panasonic plasma display panel.

Our Home Theater along with a couple of action figures


SonyTA-ESD1000, 15 years old last December!	New Pioneer receiver being wired up

Mike The TV, Home Theater PC	Mike's monitor

The Home Theater PC is a P4, 3.2 GHz machine running Windows XP Pro. Mike was built to my specifications by Tim's Computers He is named Mike the TV as all of the computers on our network are named after characters from Reboot. Mike contains three Hauppauge PVR-250 (pronounced "Hop- Hog) tuner cards and runs Sage TV software. Mike was inspired by my friend Terry Stockdale who has a lot of good info on his own Home Theater PC Page

You will note there is no cassette player in our Home Theater. There is a VCR but it does not get much use anymore! The Pio has an FM tuner but it is not connected. All of our music is in MP3 format stored on Mike the TV.

Here is a link to a printable block diagram, showing how everything is connected together in our home theater. All of my speakers are full range, and wired with Monster Cable. When they are combined with the subwoofer, I get a plethora of low end. The cannonballs exploding in Master and Commander are awesome! Our display device is a 37" Panasonic TH-37PWD7UY industrial plasma display panel, which I have calibrated with Digital Video Essentials

Latest developments: My old Carver power amp died, and so I'm now using the Pioneer’s front channel amps to drive the front speakers. The Mac is still going strong for the surrounds. I've upgraded to Sage TV version 5, and installed Sage Placeshifter on our laptop. A few weeks ago I tore things down enough to run coaxial digital audio and component video cables from Mike The TV to the Pioneer, with a subsequent improvement in audio and video quality. Finally, we replaced our 25 year old couch, and so now I never leave the media room! In fact, I think I will turn it into my Burial Chamber, so I can enjoy my media in the next life!

Our new recliner couch.

My wife and I conduct workshops on digital video and other topics for our local computer club, Cajun Clickers. We have given presentations on Introduction To Home Theater and The Care and Feeding of MPEG Video Files, topics of interest to home theater and video fans.

Here is a short document I prepared for a friend on building a Budget Home Theater PC

We love our Home Theater System, dubbed the S&M Cinema-plex!

Home Theater Humor!