UPDATE: We purchased a Panasonic TC-P55ST50 TV on May
12, 2012! The TV will be replacing the TH-50PZ85U shortly! The TH-50PZ85U is
going to be placed in my brother's room, hooked up to his X-BOX360,
PlayStation 2, & Nintendo Wii! I will be updating this page with the TV
goodness soon! The critics have been raving about the Panasonic ST50 series!
I can't wait to set it up!
DISCLAIMER I take great pride in what I do,
and what I possess, but I am also sensible enough to realize that the things
I possess may not always be the best. I am aware that some of you who read
this may have better Home Theater systems installed in your homes, and I
appreciate your feat. I am in no way gloating about the humble system that I
have; I created this webpage for purely commercial reasons. However, I am
open to criticism, and if you would like to share your thoughts about the
system, feel free to contact me. You WILL
have the option to be anonymous, although I would like to hear more than
just "you suck" or "your system sucks" and so on-I urge you to be helpful by
providing constructive criticism. Let this disclaimer may not discourage you
from further delving into this web page, and if you feel like it, please
share this web page with someone who may be interested, so that I will get
more hits! Thank You & enjoy!!!!
Background
We moved to our new home after living in an apartment for
2 years in the last week of June, 2008. When we bought our home, I had asked
my parents to allow me to set up a home theater. We got a new TV even before
we moved in; a Panasonic 1080p HD Plasma TV, model TH-50PZ85U. It was the
time Blu-Ray was getting quite popular, and even though the format was war
was still going on, me being a Sony lover, decided to pledge my allegiance
to Blu-Ray and convinced my parents to buy a Blu-Ray Player in August, 2008.
We were stuck with a full HD 1080p television, a Blu-Ray Player, and a Sony
1080p upconverting DVD player since then. We decided to be content with it,
and decided against cable or satellite, and were "enjoying" pure digital
televison over the air. It all changed in March 2010. About two months prior
to the kick-off of the 2010 Fifa World Cup, we decided to get DirecTV, as we
have our internet and phone via Qwest. We only got one HD receiver, and
hooked it up to our TV. Later on, during the last week of June, I got a text
message from newegg.com, around 1 am, informing me that the price of the
Onkyo HT-S6200 HTIB(Home Theater In a Box) has dropped below my preferred
price of $499.99! I was exceited! I have been keeping my eye on the system
for about a year, and convinced my parents to order it! My dream finally
became a reality! Immediately after UPS delivered the package, I set it up,
and got the system up and ready! I was able to watch the last few games of
the Fifa World Cup in 7.1 surround sound. The experience was exhilarating! I
re-watched all the Blu-Ray movies I had (20+) to enjoy the system, and the
system is incredible!!
Component 1-Panasonic TH-50PZ85U 1080p Plasma Television
(Will soon be replaced by TC-P55ST50 55" TV)
I did a lot of research before I finally chose this
television. I read it's review on cnet.com, and other sites, took other
factors, especially the pice, into consideration, and finally decided to buy
this. When Sears put this on sale on June 20, we ordered in online on June
21, 2008. We opted for store pick-up, and when it was ready to be picked up,
picked it up, and installed it in a fairly large and symmetric room
upstairs. We hooked up our Sony DVP-NS77H upconverting DVD player using a
Phillips HDMI cable that I bought from Rite-Aid to the TV, and was blown
away by the upconversion and the picture quality of the TV. I just couldn't
imagine how great Blu-Ray is gonna look like on the TV. Later on, we decided
to move the TV downstairs to our living room, as it is more convenient. One
major problem with that is that there is a large window directly opposite
the location of the TV, and the glass panel of the TV relects the light,
making TV watching quite an uncomfortable experience. However, since we live
in the Pacific Northwest, from September to April, the sun is barely out,
and the reflection during daytime is not that bad.
Here is a video that describes the styling and design aspects of the TV.
Component 2-Panasonic DMP-BD30K Blu-ray Disc profile 1.1
Player
The second most significant component of a High Definition
Home Theater set up is the Blu-Ray Player.We got this in August 2008. I went
through quite a lot of reviews to finally settle on this one. We bought this
when it was on sale at Best Buy. Don't remember the exact prize but it was about
$340. I had bought a few Blu-ray movies along with it, including 21, and Pirates
of the Caribbean: At World's End. The first movie we watched using the Blu-ray
player is 21, and I was blown away! That really made me realize what a beast the
TV really is! After watching the movie in 1080p full HD, I felt like I need to
get a 7.1 channel home theater system ASAP! DVD up-conversion was decent, and
the PIP functionality is something that I don't use that often. Nevertheless,
Blu-Ray playback is excellent, and I was able to play ALL Blu-rays that I ever
laid my hands on, although some of them required firmware upgrades. The lack of
internet connectivity is a con, and updating firmware means tossing a few
CD-ROMs. Can't use CD-RWs- only ROMs. Anyways, performance wise, the player is
phenomenal! And the SD-HC card became useful later on, after we bought the Canon
Vixia HF-20 Full HD Camcorder, as we were able to transfer the AVCHD video files
from the built-in memory of the camcorder to to an SD-HC card and play it using
the Blu-Ray Player on our TV. It can output Dolby TrueHD and DTS HD Master Audio
in bitstream format, although on-board decoding functionality is limited to
Dolby TrueHD only. It is connected to our TV (now the Onkyo Receiver) via an
HDMI cable only.
Component 3-Onkyo HT-S6200: The Commander in Chief of my
Home Theater!
I have been tracking this HTiB system ever since Onkyo
released it to replace the HT-S6100. The registered price was $699.99, but I was
determined to buy it only when the price has gone below $500. I set up a price
alert @ newegg.com to alert me when the price has dropped below $500, and sure
enough, they texted me when the price dropped down to $479.99, and even though I
paid $10 shipping, the total price still stayed below the $500 mark, which was
exactly I wanted. We ordered it, and newegg delivered it within the three
buisness days. Even thouh I have seen the pictures of the system, I was
surprised by the size of the entire box! Granted most of the size is due to the
HUGE subwoofer, it was still bigger than I expected. However, I was somewhat
disappointed at the size of the wires! They were long enough, but VERY flimsy! I
was expecting this nevertheless, as I had read reviews everywhere criticising
the thin wires. I hooked the system up with those wires, as I did not have any
specialized speaker wires. The system sounded great when I did a test run. I
played the Blu-ray of The Dark Knight, and I couldn't believe how much I was I
was missing! The TV is in our living room, and the DirecTV was already set up in
the same room. Our living room is oddly shaped, and to complicate things even
further, the TV is placed in a corner. I wallmounted all the four surroun
speakers, but the left surround speaker had to placed at a very odd spot, and I
instantly realized that the placement of that speaker is not right. It was to
the left of where everyone would be usually sitting, but much toward the front,
closer to the TV, and parallel to the surface of the TV. I didn't do the
Audeyssey calibration, as I was not satisfied with the location of the left
surround speaker. After about three weeks, I decided to do it anyway, as I
wanted to see if the calibration will cause any difference. The calibration did
not result in that great of a difference, as the surround expereince was a
little off-balance. So I decided to buy some speaker wires from Amazon.com, and
changed the location of the speaker to place where it would be to the left of
where everyone would be sitting, but this tim, itmuch closer to us. I
recalibrated it, and the result was a tremendous improvement! We watched
Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, and the track sounded great!
Three devices are connected directly to the HTiB. Our BD
player DMP-BD30K is connected to the HDMI input labeled BD/DVD, our Upconverting
DVD player DVP-NS77H is connected to the HDMI input labeled VCR/DVR, and the
DirecTV H21-200 is connected to the HDMI input labeled CBL/SAT. The fourth HDMI
input, labeled AUX is used to occassionally connect an HP-G60 laptop to the
HDTV. The remote of the Onkyo receiver can control all the devices, and it
played a big part in removing remote clutter.
One problem that I am facing with the setup is that the HDCP
content protection system is not allowing me to play the Blu-ray of
Transformers. I don't know if the TV, or the Blu-ray player or the Receiver is
causing the error, but I am terribly dissapointed that I can't watch this
amazing sounding movie! I searched online, but could not find anything regarding
this particular problem. I can't think of anything to do other than using
component video to watch the movie. However, I do have the DVD of the movie, and
so I was able to enjoy the movie in Dolby Digital 5.1.
The receiver can pretty much decode every codec that is out
there. I configured my Blu-ray and DVD player to output bitstream outputs of all
the different codecs: Dolby Digital, Dolby Digital Plus, Dolby TrueHD, DTS
digital, DTS HD High Resolution, DTS HD Master Audio, DTS-ES and so on. It can
also extend 5.1 surround Sound using the Dolby Diigtal EX codec, the Dolby Pro
Logic IIx, DTS Neo:6, DTS 96/24 etc. Honestly, I am not fully sure what exactly
these things do, but I try to get the most out of my system, and so I want to
use all the speakers, including left and right surround backs. So I always use
the Dolby Digital EX for Dolby Digital 5.1, and Dolby TrueHD media, DTS Neo:6
for DTS 5.1, and DTS HD Master Audio 5.1. I also bough the Blu-Ray of Hulk Vs.
which is a DTS HD Master Audio 7.1 movie. The reciever also has a Direct mode,
which outputs the audio without any processing.
I downloaded a 24 bit FLAC audio file from the website of
Bowers & Wilkins a few days ago, and played it on the HP-G60 laptop, connected
to the receiver using HDMI. To my amazement, the distortion was more than what I
would like. I think it's because the speakers are not good enough for 24 bit
lossless. Anyways, for $479.99, the system is a definite steal!
Component 4-Sony DVP-NS77H 1080p Upconverting DVD Player
