Star Trek Home Theater

Critical Facilities writes "Someone thought it would be a good idea to model their home theater after the Enterprise NCC-1701D from Star Trek: The Next Generation. The result is super geeky, but actually rather cool. Named the best theme theater installation at CEDIA 2007, this Palm Beach County, FL home features motion-activated air-lock doors with series sound effects, and a "Red Alert" button on the Crestron TPMC-10 controller to turn all of the LEDs bright red and flashing."

Comments

Very nice, but

[AC-x]

wake me up when they've actually _built_ the thing

Re:Just shoot me...

[LiquidCoooled]

This is a different build - the one you are thinking of was a guy from England who went bankrupt trying to sell his 24th century flat.

http://www.24thcid.com/
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/leicestershire/4695188.stm

Re:Just shoot me...

[karnal]

Actually, it doesn't look like he went bankrupt trying to sell it - he actually likes the 24th century interiors; it's just that he set up a business doing the same interior remodelling. With credit cards. And it didn't take off.

Tony Alleyne, 52, spent nine years and £30,000 transforming his flat and used another £100,000 to launch a company which offered similar makeovers. But the schemes were funded by loans and credit cards and he has filed for bankruptcy with debts of £166,000. To speak to the actual article here though, building a home theater is a fun experience - especially enjoying it afterwards. I would have to wonder what the pricetag is on the star-trek based theater; however against true Slashdot fashion I did read the article and there was not even a ballpark estimate given.

Link to original article

[Mononoke]

http://www.electronichouse.com/article/next_generation_star_trek_home_theater/C154

I hate getting sent to articles that are simple summaries of the original.

Re:Link to original article

[Barkmullz]

Thanks for the link, Mononoke!

The link provided also revealed some other really cool home-theaters and houses:

1. Death Star Theater
2. Extreme Log Cabin Wild on Tech
3. Model Condo Designed to Impress

Sweet stuff!

Re:Haha.

[ScrewMaster]

The girl I was living with at the time Star Trek: The Next Generation first came out was one of those people (an English major, as it happens) for whom Star Trek, indeed science-fiction in general, held no appeal. Science either, for that matter. Just didn't see the point ("What good is that Space Shuttle? Bring it down to Earth and spend that money on social programs.")

But the show was on at 5:00 PM every Saturday, and it didn't matter what social plans she might have made for the evening, I wasn't leaving until I'd received my Star Trek fix. I could have taped it, but that wasn't the point: this is my show and you will work around it. Now at first, this irritated her to no end, but as I watched each episode she would hang around in the background, feigning disinterest but with her curiosity obviously piqued. After a couple months of this, she sat down next to me and asked, "so ... who's the guy with the greenish skin that talks so oddly?" I explained to her that Lt. Commander Data was actually an android, who was trying hard to understand us better so as to be more human. A couple of months more, and she would answer the phone with, "Sorry, Debby, we can't come over now ... Star Trek's on. I'll call you later. Bye!" Turned her into a Trekkie just from secondhand exposure, and as a consequence she began to think about the relevance of science and technology to any modern culture, that in fact they make our lifestyle possible. She'd never really thought about that before. Most Americans don't, when you get right down to it: everything might as well be powered by magic.

So it is possible. Trekkiedom is not solely the province of male geeks and nerds, much as some of us might like to believe that. I remember reading in the book "The Making of Star Trek" (original series) that the female test audiences were just completely in love with Mr. Spock, and oddly enough resented Uhura ("Who does she think she is, anyway, doing man's work on the bridge and wearing an outfit like that!") Things were a bit different back in the sixties.

Re:Just shoot me...

[Anonymous Coward]

You think the land owners and banks would sit idly, waiting for that one wealthy buyer per thousand ? No, they would adapt, or else we would mob them! Your model is somewhat naive. Someone ALWAYS owns a home, houses don't just "exist". What happens in the short term is rent goes up until the monthly rent exceeds the price of a monthly mortgage, then (smart) people start buying. Monthly rent basically fluctuates (region by region) around that mortgage value boundary and vice versa. So, in the short run, there may be small advantages to renting if you are trying to save for a down payment. However, in the long term, owning is an obvious choice. Assuming you don't live on the street, you either rent or own. If you rent, you hand over whatever the landlord asks. Do this for 30 years and you have NOTHING to show for it except paying money to a landlord just shy of the rent-mortgage balance curve. All the money is basically wasted. Also, your rent and income basically go up at the same rate (if you are lucky). With a mortgage, it stays fixed while your income goes up. After 30 years, not only have you saved the difference between a fixed mortgage and your income, you have something which has actually appreciated in value (this is called "investing"). Fold in massive tax breaks (you get to write off the yearly interest, which is really high in the first 10 years) and you actually get a big flux if EXTRA money over the year by systematically (and strategically) going into "wise debt." This long term (10-50 year time scale) strategy seems pretty much like a no brainer to me. Buy as soon as possible, but do it wisely because the alternative is to just give away your money.