Here's my home cinema gear... all bought in
2003/4, so rather aged now but still works fine. The hardware setup consists of:
-
LG
MZ42PZ17 plasma screen - from
Richer Sounds
This was a cheap and cheerful plasma for 2003, generally performance is very good
for the price, but it suffers from flickering in almost-black scenes
which is distracting. It is still performing well 5 years later. It has component (YUV)
and VGA inputs.
-
Limit 9900SE DVD player - from
Richer Sounds
At the time, a bargain progressive scan DVD player, hacked to be region-free.
Has trouble reading some dodgy DVD-Rs though.
-
Thomson Tivo - from Powerhouse for
£99!
I could not live without my Tivo. I have upgraded the hard disk to 200GB
and installed a serial console for hacking, following the information on
TivoCommunity. Sob!
Tivo sold! Replaced with
-
Sony HXD870 HDD/DVD
Recorder
-
Sony STRDB930 Dolby Digital Receiver -
from someone in Germany off QXL
A great amp for the price - does DD and DTS and comes in a very fetching
silver finish. Plenty of inputs, only thing missing is YUV switching.
-
Mission FS1
flat-panel speakers from Richer
Sounds
Great little speakers with a big woofer to fill out the sound. Perhaps a
sound that is a little more "thin" than full-sized speakers, but a good
compromise if you don't have the room for huge speakers.
Everything is held together by:
Overall it works pretty well, considering
it was a relatively cheap setup. It is a reasonable compromise between
aesthetic considerations (nobody wants their front room to look like a
branch of Dixons) and performance.
Are you wondering how the plasma TV is held up? Read my
guide on how to wall-mount a
plasma TV...
