Home Theater Hacks (Hacks)

Rating:
Summary: Educational
Review: I am by no means a home theater nut, but I figured I could always use a few pointers on setting up my living room to improve my viewing experience. The nice thing about this book (and all "hacks" books, for that matter) is the broad spectrum of ideas and suggestions. As a lot of this stuff was new to me, I appreciated the amount of detail the author goes into for each hack.

I found the hacks on Calibration (#60 - #74) the most helpful for getting noticable improvements quickly. There are also plenty of other simple tips here and there (i.e. lighting, wiring, warm-up vs burn-in) to enhance my home theater. However, the book was a bit over my head at times -- therefore very educational. I'm going to have to install some bass shakers (Hack #40) into my couch as my first project. =)

Rating:
Summary: Useful hacks for amateur home theater
Review: Sometimes the Hacks books go a little too far. The iPod book for example spent eighteen pages on how to mold a new iPod console for your car. It would have been very easy for this book to go over that edge but it keeps it's focus and stays well within the realm of practical advice to enhance your home theater.

The sections on how to enhance your projection TV is excellent and very practical. There is good coverage of speaker calibration, system maintenance, and TiVo. There is also good material on acoustic tremblers which will bring the experience really close to home.

A must buy book for home theater enthusiasts. There is lots of material here that you can find on the web, but it's better organized, illustrated and explained here.