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For many A/V enthusiasts, the hunt for new equipment is often the highlight of the home theater process. Devouring countless reviews, sniffing out deals, kicking the tires at local shops and yapping it up on the forums are all enough to get the adrenaline flowing and the significant other nervous. Eventually, however, the fun must come to an end and the trigger is pulled. You buy it, install it, and if you've done your job well, you get to enjoy it for many years or… View this story
AV Components • Displays • Speakers • Manufacturers • Installers • Dealers • Retailers • Question of the Day • Home Theater • Info and Answers

These aren’t the greatest of times to be in the housing industry, but for the consumers the benefit comes from how homebuilders are trying to differentiate themselves. That means bundling cool A/V and automation technology into your new home, as well as working in ways to make today’s new homes energy efficient. The Innovative Housing Technology Awards (IHTA) recognize the advances and practices by manufacturers, electronic systems installers and builders to bring such solutions to the home. Electronic House sister publication TecHome Builder presents these… View this story
AV Components • Home Control • Industry • Manufacturers • Installers • Enhancements • Product News

Did you have a new home built last year? If you did, chances were very good that your homebuilder offered you a solution to control the lighting in it. Automated lighting control is surging, aided recently by the green-ing of America that we’re seeing daily, for which lighting control has always served as an energy-efficient technology. The Consumer Electronics Association (CEA) confirmed this recently by reporting that 58 percent of builders offered lighting control in 2007. In the “Sixth Annual State of the Builder Technology… View this story
Home Control • Industry • Manufacturers • Installers • Lighting Control • Lighting Control Systems • Home Control • Enhancements • Product News

I might have to make a special trip from Massachusetts down to New York City. Specialty A/V dealer Lyric Hi-Fi & Video has scheduled a monthly series called “Classic Album Night” that is sure to give attendees a listening experience unlike any other they’ve had. Set for the second thursday of the month, the lineup of classic albums is, well, classic—the grouping would be pretty much in my pantheon of music, including Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon, the Grateful Dead’s American Beauty and… View this story
AV Components • Amplifiers • Preamplifiers • Turntables • Industry • Installers • Dealers • Miscellaneous • Movies and Music • Speakers • Floor Standing Speakers • Home Theater • Audio • Product News

Loyal Apple enthusiasts looking for a solution to whole-home automation and A/V integration can now get yet another use out of their iPhones and iPod Touches. Osterville, MA-based Savant Systems has debuted its unique home automation and control platform based on Mac’s OS X Leopard, giving professional installers an option for Apple fans who want to stick to their guns rather than gravitate toward a different proprietary system. Apple developers can incorporate Savant’s graphical program RacePoint Blueprint, and its configuration software, with Quartz Composer and… View this story
Home Control • Home Control Systems • Touchpanels and Keypads • Industry • Manufacturers • Installers • Multiroom AV • Home Control • Product News

No, it’s not Big Brother, but media server manufacturer Inteset has unveiled a new service to make sure your digital entertainment is flowing smoothly at all times. Inteset’s “Heartbeat Monitoring Service” will remotely monitor the hardware, software and networking of its media servers and extender systems to make life easier for the professional A/V installers who setup and show customers how to operate Inteset’s systems. Dealers can subscribe to the Heartbeat Monitoring Service and not have to make those off-hour house calls to fix or… View this story
AV Components • Digital Media Servers • Industry • Manufacturers • Installers • Multiroom AV • Networking • Product News

Custom electronics installers have access to some great A/V gear, and we know a good portion of our magazine and online readership consists of dealers. So you might get some discounts on great displays, but we figured we’d fill you in on OmniMount’s free TV contest anyway. Chances are you know plenty about flat-panel TV mounts, but there are always new products coming out in this category. OmniMount’s online Learning Library is a training institute with presentations that can help you enhance your knowledge and… View this story
Furniture and Mounts • TV Mounts • Industry • Manufacturers • Installers • Dealers • Miscellaneous • Web Services • Enhancements • Product News

A home automation installation on a project home in Westchester County, New York, won IVCi Home the 2007 Crestron Integration award for “Best Integrated Home System.” The award goes to a solution that best integrates lighting, HVAC, security, distributed audio and video and home theatre systems into one Crestron control panel. I don’t allocate many articles for those I would deem “professional integrators,” like the folks at IVCi Home. Maybe that is because I imagine only a small percentage of readers could actually afford one… View this story
Installers • Home Control • Enhancements • Product News

The next time you go for a cruise on your boat and the fish aren’t biting, you can head inside and watch “Shark Week” on the Discovery Channel in high definition. At least, you could do that—whether it’s your primary home or your hobby, boat and yacht owners can have the same type of custom electronics luxury as terrestrial homeowners. Some custom installers, like Dania, FL-based Criteria, specialize in such marine installations. Criteria is highlighting some of its custom solutions this week at the Fort… View this story
AV Components • Blu-ray • Digital Media Servers • Displays • Plasma • Industry • Installers • Shows and Expos • Lighting Control • Lighting Control Systems • Speakers • Speaker Systems • Home Theater • Enhancements • Product News

It’s a multipurpose room to the max. This 6,000-square-foot basement in Ladue, Mo., works as home theater and doubles as a dance floor, performance stage and bar. When the homeowners aren’t taking part in Hindu rituals or watching DVDs from their native India, they’re reveling in the local culture of St. Louis Cardinals baseball and teenage dances. “The space is mainly used for live performance,” says integrator Anthony Ledwon, who installed the Elan audio system that fills the space with sound. The room still had… View this story
HDTV • Video Projectors • Video Screen • In-Ceiling Speakers • Lighting Control Systems • Basement • Installers • Home Theater • Audio • Cool Homes

When it comes to optimizing a home theater, townhouses can be tricky. This Florida resident thought outside the box—in this case, his 13-by-13-foot box of a living room—to make way for a 60-inch plasma and surround sound system. To create about 4 more feet of viewing depth so the screen didn’t overwhelm him or the room (his old TV jutted out almost two feet in front of the railing and virtually hid the nearby fireplace), the owner wanted the plasma mounted onto a staircase wall.… View this story
Plasma • In-Ceiling Speakers • On-Wall Speakers • Structured Wiring • Equipment Racks • TV Mounts • Entryway • Living Room • Media Room • Installers • Home Theater • Cool Homes

Ever seen a movie so bad, it made you want to drink? Well for this Palisades, NY homeowner, “spirit”-ual relief is not far away. The big screen may be up front, but the back of this room is where the action’s at. The front of the room includes comfy theater seating and entertainment via a Yamaha DLP front projector and a Stewart FireHawk 140-inch screen. However, the homeowners didn’t want the entertainment to stop at the end of every movie. At the rear of the… View this story
HDTV • Plasma • Video Projectors • Video Screen • Floor Standing Speakers • In-Ceiling Speakers • In-Wall Speakers • Digital Recorders • Equipment Racks • Seating • Media Room • Installers • Home Theater • Cool Homes