HDTV Home Cinema

Home Cinema Introduction

The excitement of the cinema, from the comfort of your sofa... Home cinema brings the full sound and big-screen experience of the movie theatre into your living room. Technology has moved on so much in the last few years that you can enjoy amazing quality audiovisuals without paying a fortune. Dolby Digital Surround Sound allows you to immerse yourself in the action, while large plasma and LCD TVs offer incredibly clear widescreen viewing.

Almost any TV will work with a home theater system, but for the best possible experience, a larger screen is the way to go.

For optimal movie viewing, you'll need a "wide-screen" set with a 16:9 (width to height) aspect ratio. These most closely duplicate cinema screens, so you'll see the movie as the filmmakers intended. HDTV and most DVDs play in the wide-screen format.

When planning your home cinema system you can go for a ready made (out of the box) solution or you can build your own from seperate components. We will look at following these two different routes in the following sections. As sound plays such an important element of your home cinema system we also have a section dedicated to optimizing your systems sound.

http://www.hdtvorg.co.uk/technology/home_cinema.htm