IMAX Will Build You a Home Theater -- Starting at $400K (arstechnica.com)

An anonymous reader shares an Ars Technica report: If you have about $400K to spare, IMAX's Private Theatre division will now build an IMAX cinema setup in your own home. The entry-level IMAX Private Theatre is the "Palais," which starts at about $400,000 for a screening room with up to 18 seats. For your money you get dual 4K 2D/3D projectors, a proprietary IMAX sound system, and a media playback system that supports everything you might want to throw at it (TV, games, Blu-ray, etc.) No word on the exact specifications of the projectors, but they're probably not IMAX-with-laser. Screen size will vary depending on the setup, but generally they will be 3 metres (10ft) tall or more. Stepping up to the "Platinum" IMAX home theatre for about $1 million gets you a much larger screening room with space for up to 40 people.

Comments

for the man with more brass than sense.

[nimbius]

As someone who works in professional lighting and sound systems for a company in Los Angeles, I cant think of a worse decision than an IMAX theatre in your home. youre literally just buying it for the brand.

you get dual 4K 2D/3D projectors

And the subsequent headache of trying to source your favourite films in a format compatible with an imax 4k implementation. Enjoy your titles that never came out in an IMAX format because the studio didnt want to spend the money. IMAX projection units are also liquid cooled, require signed hardware and media, and typically require an internet connection.

a proprietary IMAX sound system

IMAX has no "sound system." it has a rough set of guidelines for theatre based on dimensions of the room, usually "huge." That having been said, most theatres run EV amps and a combination of Electrovoice or JBL drivers based on cost in your market. scaling this to the size of a home theater means you end up with image problems in the audio. It also means you wind up with a lot of pointless extras like compander/limiter setups that theaters use but you really wont.

a media playback system that supports everything you might want to throw at it

That...already exists. its called a home theater receiver or if you're raking in cut-rate lawyer money its something like a leviton system. but beware...once this is installed you really cant just "plug in" whatever new thing comes along and hope it to work. while a modern digital multiplexer might come with 30 ports, most are shut off until you buy a firmware license that lets you use them.

all in all the biggest concern for this IMAX-in-the-home is the enormous amount of power draw and cooling required just to get 18 of your friends to gloat about your wealth. anyone with the sense could set up something comparable...and if you pick up a magic marker you can probably freehand draw the "IMAX" logo wherever you like.