Really loud doesn't hurt your ears when the system is up to snuff
(Credit: Steve Guttenberg)I recently returned to the $6 million Kipnis Studio Standard for an afternoon of listening. Mostly to music and a bit of home theater fun, but the uber system's effortless power is what really blew me away. I was listening to the 11,315 watt system turned up nice and loud, but I had no idea how loud. Luckily, Jeremy Kipnis had a sound pressure level meter handy, so I took a reading, 105 decibels. Whoa, that's really loud, but the sound was so clean it didn't hurt. Bear in mind I'm no fan of loud movie theaters or concerts--in fact I always wear hearing protection when I hear music or movies in public. But here with the KSS loud wasn't a problem. I turned up the volume louder and louder, just to see how it would feel, and the sound just got better and better. If the goal of "good sound" is to reproduce music at the same volume as it would be in real life, you need a lot of power.
How many watts do you need?
... Read more
(Credit:
Robert Wright)
Jeremy Kipnis' $6 million home theater caused quite a stir back in February; so much so that he's now proposing guidelines for others to build a dream home theater for a mere 1 percent of his original price. Kipnis didn't recommend much in the way of specific brands or models of equipment, just the design goals for a $60,000 ultimate home theater.
Here's a brief rundown of what you would need to get close to the performance of Kipnis Studio Standard:
All of the speakers must be identical.
The six or seven-channel layout must be completely circular, and all of the speakers but be precisely placed, relative to the center point of the circle.
Seating must be arranged to be near the center of the theater, and acoustically vetted for the room.
The room must be free of parallel surfaces and acoustically treated.
The speakers should be bi or tri amplified--with a dedicated amplifier channel for each tweeter, midrange, and woofer.
The use of multiple subwoofers, ideally one per channel, would be required to produce the smoothest possible deep bass response.
As far as video is concerned Kipnis's remarks were limited to the next two sections:
Projected on-screen light levels must be or exceed 48.5 foot-Lamberts, and not deviate on screen by more than +/- 5% across the entire surface. 2K resolution is a bare minimum.
Color space, primaries, and gamma must be able to conform to Rec. 601 (NTSC), Rec. 709. (HDTV), and DCI Theater Standards, and must be thoroughly calibrated for each source media (Blu ray, DVD, cable, etc).
I did manage to get Kipnis to supply one specific recommendation, he likes JVC's DLA-RS2 projector, which would eat up $8K of the $60K budget.
Is it possible to execute all of the above for $60K? Sounds like a real stretch to me, what do you think?
I'd like to hear from any of you who attempted to build an ultimate home theater and what was required to get the job done.
This is the Kipnis Studio Standard.
(Credit: Robert Wright)
If your typical high-end home theater with rows of plush seats, velvet wallpaper, and popcorn machines offers Cadillac levels of performance and luxury, then Jeremy Kipnis' $6 million ultimate home theater is more like a fire-breathing Ferrari 599 GTB Fiorano, the fastest production Ferrari ever built.
This home theater is all about aggressively advancing the state of the art of picture and sound presentation. Yes, it's comfortable and beautiful, but its prime directive is a quest for the very best. Nothing, and I mean nothing, is overlooked. Kipnis won't settle for second best.
... Read more- prev
- 1
- next
