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

How Much More For The Movies

[CastrTroy]

How much more are they going to charge you for the film everytime you want to watch a movie? It would be a shame to get a set-up like this and then watch inferior Blu-Rays or DVDs on the thing.

Re:How Much More For The Movies

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

Yeah cos their customers are world renowned penny-pinchers.

Re:How Much More For The Movies

[Anonymous Coward]

How much for the license to show these movies to 40 people

FTFY

Re:How Much More For The Movies

[fahrbot-bot]

... and then watch inferior Blu-Rays or DVDs on the thing.

Are you talking about the medium or actual movie, 'cause *most* movies are worth watching on IMAX even in IMAX formats.

Re:How Much More For The Movies

[Kjella]

How much more are they going to charge you for the film everytime you want to watch a movie? It would be a shame to get a set-up like this and then watch inferior Blu-Rays or DVDs on the thing.

And not to mention when. If you spend $400k on a private theater, I imagine you'll get Prima Cinema for $35k + $500/movie to watch what's in the cinema right now.

Re:How Much More For The Movies

[mark-t]

The key phrase here is the notion of "private home viewing"... and where works are licensed for such, if the viewing is occurring inside of a privately owned residence that is not being used in sort of commercial, public, or communal capacity, then the phrase is applicable, and if the work is licensed for viewing as such, then the number of people that may happen to be in attendance is irrelevant. Typically, dvds or other movie media that you might buy from a store are licensed for such viewing, and so the terms would apply, regardless of how many people are in your home.

Re:How Much More For The Movies

[malditaenvidia]

A: 10
V: 10
Thank you, yify.

Re:How Much More For The Movies

[mysidia]

You're already too optimistic. If it's an IMAX theatre, then the projection equipment is probably going to be fitted with a proprietary interface which can only play IMAX-brand specially formatted cartridges; no DVDs or Blu-Rays for you.....

Re:How Much More For The Movies

[lgw]

Yeah cos their customers are world renowned penny-pinchers.

Today. But this will come downmarket.

IMO, this is exactly the sort of business that will be creating new jobs, and lots of them, as automation does its thing. Not at this price point, of course, but a $40k version will come soon enough, with 100x the customer base. Give it a few years, and there will be a $8k version, transform an existing room into a well set up home theater with top-notch gear, that no upper-middle-class house will be complete without - an industry with several million customers.

The price of theater-quality AV gear for home use will only drop, as that's just technology. The disposable income of working professionals will buy more toys like this. But the handyman know-how to put it all together, and the bit of creativity to make it look nice, and the willingness to have good customer service? That's something people will pay for.

That's the story of automation - what the rich are paying for today, the upper middle class will find affordable due to automation (with less prestigious branding), and the median family will have in a generation after that.

Re:How Much More For The Movies

[ShanghaiBill]

That's the story of automation - what the rich are paying for today, the upper middle class will find affordable due to automation (with less prestigious branding), and the median family will have in a generation after that.

... and to be clear, we are talking about "technology generations" not human generations. Woodrow Wilson once complained that automobiles were playthings for the rich, and created envy and socialist feelings among the masses. Just five years later, the Model-T was in production, and anyone with a median income could afford one. A few years after that, the Soviet Union banned the film "Grapes of Wrath" because they didn't want their citizens to see that in America, even the dirt poor Joads, the lowest of the low, fleeing the dustbowl, could still afford to own a car.

Re:How Much More For The Movies

[Iamthecheese]

The greatest cost of this is the room. It doesn't matter how far the price comes down if the user doesn't have a spare room for it. So that price drop you're anticipating won't come with the technology costing less but with construction costs (including the seats) costing less. I'm not saying it won't happen but it will take much longer than you're thinking.

Re:How Much More For The Movies

[HornWumpus]

Nothing can transform 'any' room into a good listening space. The acoustics are typically _all_ wrong.

You want at least one set of surfaces to not be parallel. Vaulted ceilings are a start.

Of course many theaters are also terrible, boomy sound, long hall like spaces, but that's not the point.

Megabucks on sound is all about chasing the last 1% of sound quality. For $100 you get 90%, $1000/99%, $10,000/99.9% There have been no breakthroughs in speaker technology in _decades_. Electrostatics are still the 'latest and greatest'.

There is likely very little difference between 4k projectors.

Re:How Much More For The Movies

[lgw]

Most American houses already have a room set up like a religious shrine, except with the TV in place of the holy object. Dedicating a room to the viewing of TV won't be an obstacle. Sure, for the average family it won't have theater seats, it will instead have furniture arranged conventionally so that a parent can watch TV while keeping the kids in sight, but people will still pay to have good AV gear integrated into that room so it's not in the way of the kids playing on the floor.

Re:How Much More For The Movies

[lgw]

For the upper middle class, the room already has vaulted ceilings, and I'd expect the installation to include either a false wall or dressing up the wall the screen is on anyway, to properly hide all the equipment and wiring and make it all built-in and kid-safe. Making that surface reasonably dead acoustically would be good enough I think. I see the real product here as making that wall look good (non-geeky and female-approved) with all the crap in it.

For the low end, this will not be an audiophile product. It will be a "room shaking splosions" product, which will mostly be used to "have the guys over to watch the game" anyway.

Re:How Much More For The Movies

[ihtoit]

or, shock horror, Academy 1080p!

(oh, yes, that's a thing.)

Re:How Much More For The Movies

[fahrbot-bot]

... and then watch inferior Blu-Rays or DVDs on the thing.

Are you talking about the medium or actual movie, 'cause *most* movies are not worth watching on IMAX even in IMAX formats.

FTFM [ Fixed that for me ] (sigh)

Re:How Much More For The Movies

[HornWumpus]

At least one set of surfaces. Vaulted ceilings still leave the room with two characteristic frequencies. Even upper crusty homes don't have vaulted ceilings in every room.

Also double drywall and the _right_ amount of acoustic absorbing material on the walls and in the corners.

As to 'all the crap'...much less than 20 years ago. 20 years ago you had a turntable, TIVO, hacked satellite box, PC emulating satellite smart card, a CD/DVD player/changer, a cassette player, a VCR, shelves of CDs/DVDs/tapes and albums, maybe a real to real and your amplifier and speakers. Now you have amp, speakers, media PC and tablet configured as remote. We might have gained a few surround speakers, but we lost a half dozen playback devices.

Console gamers will of course have had one more item in both cases.

Re: How Much More For The Movies

[DrStoooopid]

Automation has little to do with it. Middle and working class are just good and finding cheaper alternatives that do almost the same thing as a person with more money than sense would pay someone to build

Re:How Much More For The Movies

[HornWumpus]

Most people don't want a listening room that's acoustically dead. You generally want the corners pretty dead.

Even music studios often hang hard panels on the walls to 'brighten' the room.

Also I don't want my walls covered in acoustic foam. I hang a mixture of Indian blankets (some over medium thickness blankets as extra damper) and framed art. Let the amp tune itself with pink noise and a microphone. Reaches my level of 'good enough'. Little more than 2k in the sound though. Not crazy more, but I met a few genuine 'audiophiles' and bought from their discard pile. The trick is don't buy from rock and roll fans. Jazz and Classical people baby their gear.

Re:How Much More For The Movies

[lgw]

Having the wall where the sound is coming from be acoustically dead is generally a good idea. First order reflections give the room it's sound, but you don't want resonance. Similarly, you either want carpet or vaulted ceilings, and something to keep both side walls from being a sonic mirror box - a wall hanging, a triptych screen, whatever fits the decor (in my unclassy apartment it's just the vertical blinds

Making that wall look OK is really what they'll be selling, IMO. No one wants to start at acoustical foam, but there are other approaches.

Best Buy has a better deal...

[__aaclcg7560]

The theater room at Best Buy starts at $250K.

Re:Best Buy has a better deal...

[aardvarkjoe]

If you have $400K to spend on a home theater, somebody will show up to take your money.

Re:Best Buy has a better deal...

[__aaclcg7560]

If you have $400K to spend on a home theater, somebody will show up to take your money.

You shouldn't carry that much cash on your person. Pay by check instead.

Re:Best Buy has a better deal...

[OakDragon]

Monster Gold HDMI cables, naturally. It adds up.

Do they have layaway?

[gachunt]

A nice 40-50 year plan would be helpful...

Does it come with a

[trevc]

Warranty?

This is a case of time or money

[magarity]

If I was out making that kind of money, I wouldn't have time to lounge around watching movies on this kind of home system.

Re:This is a case of time or money

[110010001000]

Yes you would. Rich people don't work as hard as their gardeners. There is this fallacy that the rich "work hard" for their money. Most inherit it.

Re:This is a case of time or money

[CRCulver]

And if I had the time, I certainly wouldn't be wasting it watching movies, aka pop-culture training.

It has been over a century since cinema has been recognized as a valid form of art. Sturgeon's law applies, of course, but among works of film are some timeless contributions to world culture. Why do you assume that people who buy such a home theatre would only be watching vacuous pop-culture films in it? Men like Ingmar Bergman and Michelangelo Antonioni had their own fancy home theatres, and the films they screened for themselves and their guests were mainly the work of their fellow auteurs.

Re:This is a case of time or money

[__aaclcg7560]

There is this fallacy that the rich "work hard" for their money.

The rich works harder at being richer than the merely affluent. Conspicuous consumption ain't what it used to be.

http://freedommyway.com/being-rich-or-merely-affluent/

Re:This is a case of time or money

[110010001000]

Actually I inherited most of my wealth. Who said I hated the rich? I am just pointing out facts here.

Re:This is a case of time or money

[110010001000]

They don't work harder. It is easy to get richer when you are rich. It is much more difficult when you aren't already rich.

Re:This is a case of time or money

[OakDragon]

Most inherit it.

Not even close. Maybe 20% tops, depending on how you ask the question. http://www.cato.org/publications/commentary/real-1-percent

Re:This is a case of time or money

[thegarbz]

Yes you would. Rich people don't work as hard as their gardeners. There is this fallacy that the rich "work hard" for their money. Most inherit it.

That depends on how you are rich. If you're rich because you inherited old money, yeah. If you're rich because you're on the board of directors for multiple companies, CEO / COO of some other, chances are you're likely divorced from the wife you're ignoring, don't know the kids you pay someone else to look after, and the reason why you have a private jet or a Rolls Royce with a phone and a driver is because you're too busy to do shit like getting to work yourself, and that typically includes having multiple PAs on top of your receptionist.

Re: This is a case of time or money

[dnaumov]

The "most inherit it" is a fallacy. Look at the Forbes 500 list and you will realize more than half the people on it are self-made.

Re:This is a case of time or money

[SonicSpike]

Actually only about 20% of those who are wealthy inherited it. Read the book "The Millionaire Nextdoor" and it goes into great detail about a study conducted on this very topic. It's a great read.

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.

Re:for the man with more brass than sense.

[Blaskowicz]

According to the article IMAX provides the signed hardware and media you refer to. It's likely ad hoc licensing, TFA refers to a competitor that does that at $500 per viewing.

Given that the screen is "small" I doubt they will use such a powerful light source. You would blind the people that are supposed to watch the movie anyway.
I suppose "IMAX" is a brand, because I've seen IMAX over 20 years ago : the movie was on film, the screen was a dome and we wore LCD shutter glasses. Thus for years I thought the IMAX format was that ;)

The home theatre is said to use two 4K projectors, in other terms a couple video projectors.

Re:for the man with more brass than sense.

[danbert8]

The domed screens are actually typically branded as "Omnimax"

Re:for the man with more brass than sense.

[CaptainLard]

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.

Did you mean to say: "As an IMAX competitor I'd appreciate if you don't buy IMAX stuff"

Re:for the man with more brass than sense.

[adolf]

Yep.

And as an IMAX competitor myself, this doesn't sound like a particularly bad value -- part of which includes the IMAX certification.

It's out of my budget, but meh: I've only got about $20k worth of AV gear in my tiny living room that seats 3.

Re:Um

[HornWumpus]

Scorn for idiots with too much money to spend on ego gratification is a long /. tradition.

Re:Um

[Austerity Empowers]

Since when did Slashdot become a website for rich people who pay others to assemble technology systems for them at home?

I'm not sure, but it's always featured people with more money than brains who might require the services of geeks who can plug in some wires for rich people.

Perfect gaming environment!

[drew.kroft2490]

For my Atari 2600 Pong

Re:Perfect gaming environment!

[jedidiah]

Some of us already have MAME running in our home theaters.

That's not how it works

[drinkypoo]

If I was out making that kind of money, I wouldn't have time to lounge around watching movies on this kind of home system.

That's not how it works. You think that because you have to work for your money. But money works even when you're not looking. Once you have money, you usually have to actually try to go broke. You know, like Trump.

Re:That's not how it works

[jedidiah]

People that are driven to build fortunes don't just suddenly stop because they've reached some arbitrary limit that impresses the proles.

Couch cushions

[irrational_design]

Let me go check under my couch cushions really quick to see which one I'm going to get. Oh, does the price include raising the roof of my house? This might be a tight fit with the 7.5 foot height of my ceilings.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:Wow, just want i needed

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

ATTENTION EVERYONE: Let it be known that I do not watch TV. This is so important that I must go into every TV-related thread to announce it.

Re:Fine for my servant's quarters, not for main ho

[Luthair]

Not doing very well are you? Me and my billionaire friends just hire the actors to come to our private theatre and act it out.

Damnit, IMAX got me again

[damn_registrars]

I keep getting OMNI and IMAX flipped. A home OMNI theatre would be unbelievably awesome. A home IMAX threatre would be nifty but I'm not sure it would really get the neighbors that excited.

AVS "audiophiles"

[Hall]

I wonder how many AVS audiophile snobs will be lining up to add one of these to their homes (in addition to their already existing 'home theatre') ? Then again, they'll probably find fault with the specs of the system from IMAX....

Of course...

[The-Ixian]

Of course, if they just didn't use the gold plated monster cables and cable risers, the cost would be couple hundred bucks...

Re:The math disagrees

[danbert8]

Don't forget lottery winners! A fool and their money are quickly parted...

Christie Digital

[TomClancy_Jack]

Although it's less of a name, many commercial theaters use Christie Digital projectors and speakers. Their commercial division now sells a super high end home theater setup just like IMAX is doing. Probably similar quality for less markup. Still not cheap by any means.

Re:herp a derp

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

The butt-licking signature is comedy gold. Don't fix what ain't broken!

Re:The math disagrees

[Ryanrule]

Poor people are good at being poor.

Sounds like a great deal!

[ihtoit]

I'll take three.

I mean really?? Unless you're either a lottery winner or planning on charging admission, this is an insane waste of money.

Re:Sounds like a great deal!

[theIsovist]

My first thought was that these would get bought up for amenity spaces in high end multifamily housing. For a single home, sure, it's a ton. But we're already spending $50k on a roof top patch of turf to allow dogs to use the restroom (I'm sadly not even kidding here), why not spend a bit more on something that is slightly more useful?

Re:Sounds like a great deal!

[JustNiz]

Judging by some of the houses and supercars I see just driving around in Scottsdale AZ, Its probably pocket change to a surprisngly large amount of people.

Re:expensive stuff is expensive?

[ihtoit]

really??

The Ariel Atom (the 2.0 inline four that comes with a higher power to weight ratio than the Bugatti Veyron Supersport) goes for £38k brand new. The same price as a top spec Jaguar XF (yup, Jag do family hatchbacks). Or a Range Rover Sport.

There are far more expensive sports cars. Not counting the Veyron, there's the Caterhan Seven (£49k) and the KTM Crossbow GT (£74k), or for something with a roof, you could go for the slightly heavier (and slower) Lotus Elise S for the same price as the Atom. Or, for something a bit more familiar in the same price bracket, a third driver 61 plate Porsche 997 Carrera S Coupe with 57,000 miles on the clock.

It better have dolby atmos or DTS-X at that price!

[Joe_Dragon]

It better have dolby atmos or DTS-X at that price!

Don't hire Ice Tea

[Dareth]

Don't hire Ice Tea, he might survive your game!

The Special Place In Hell..

[zawarski]

...comes free!

If you have to ask

[ebvwfbw]

You can't afford it.