Any home theatre has two aspects attached to it. The first one is the electronics equipment you use, that actual stuff that makes a home movie theatre and the second one is the location or the space in your home where you will position the system.

Many people think that setting up your own movie system is expensive and only rich people can afford it. But that’s not true at all. Let’s have a closer look at two types of home theatre systems. This will help you to make a decision on which is best fro you.

A typical system has only 3 basic components.

1) Television to view the movies

2) DVD player to run the DVD/VCD

3) Speakers to create a good real theatre like effect.

When it comes to locating these three in a home there are two straightforward options available.

1) Locate them in a separate room

2) Locate them in an existing room with other things occupied

If you go with the first option then one great recommendation is that you hire a home theatre designer to do the job for you. This will ensure that you get the best possible design ideas to generate that dramatic effect.

A professional designer will help you on every aspect of the design process, including design ideas to which electronic equipment to buy (or not to buy). A professional designer will also help you on certain interior design aspects such as flooring patterns, acoustic treatments using acoustic panels on interior walls, placements of speakers, TV unit etc for better viewing, seating arrangements and their design. So it becomes a fairly good experience and you get the best quality theatre, the way you want it to be.

However if you are tight on budget, then you can always convert a space in an existing room into a mini home theatre. Living room or a family room is good choice for this. In such type of setup you do however have certain limitations such as placement of speakers to create a “surround sound effect”. This will have some limitation because design wise the living room is a part of the entire home plan and has it’s own functional demands.

For a mini theatre a TV with 27-inch screen, a DVD player and at least 3 speakers is fair enough for creating a good effect. Now in most cases you probably already own the TV and DVD player, so the only thing that remains is a nice speaker system that is compatible with the output of your TV and DVD player is necessary. Always remember that when you buy speakers make it a point to test the speakers in your home. Ask the store owner to play the speakers in your home because sometimes some speakers only sound good at the store but when you play then in your home, you may get a different effect because of the surrounding furniture pieces in the living or family room. There is an acoustic component attached to this whole experience, which must be taken into consideration.

All in all home theatres are easy to set up when you know how are you willing to spend and what kind of effect you are looking for. Many options are available today in the market. A little research can easily save you time and money when it comes to home theatre design ideas.

Copyright Shrinivas Vaidya