Karaoke Forums

A lil off the karaoke pat, but......

So I was chatting with the local hardware store owner (member of the local Chamber of Commerce), and they are wanting to have movie nights at the local campground. One of the other members of the Chamber was at a camp ground this last year and a company came down from Minneapolis and setup a projector, screen, and sound system. All for the cheap price of $2000 for one nite.

So I am thinking...I have a projector, saw wal-mart has a 12' blow up screen for $160, and I already have the sound system.

Now I just need something to convert the optical out from a DVD player to the separate 5 channels of sound so I can setup speakers to get the full surround sound effect.

Is there any such beast out there? Preferably going from optical to 5 RCA outputs????

It shouldn't be too hard to find a mid-level home theater receiver that will do what you want.

My question is why are you trying to provide surround sound but using a Wal-Mart screen? I know movie theaters make a big deal about their sound crap, but people have been going to drive-in movie theaters for decades and they mostly do not have stereo, let alone surround sound.

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Jeff Wheeler, moonlight DJ/KJ

Some Blu-ray player have multichannel analog outputs. Also DVD players that can play DVD Audio will have them.

Because I already have the sound equipment that would give me enough "channels" to do surround sound, and don't want to spend a ton of $$$$$ on a screen until I know this new venture will make me a ton of $$$$$$.

Wow, I'd like to see what kinda setup the guy got 2G a night for.

Last summer, I provided my local county parks a recreation dept. with a setup for their Friday movie night. I had to work within their budget of $300 per week. They got a Da lite 9x12 screen, Eike 4500 lumen projector, Sony DVD player, DBX EQ, & a B-52 matrix 1000 speaker system. They supplied the movies. I have always run the system in stereo and have never hooked up any type of surround. Never had a complaint on how it sounds, only compliments. Unless you have the ideal venue with the right acoustical conditions (or your client insists on the surround), I wouldn't worry too much about 5.1.

Mojo

I agree for our movie setups we generally use 2 Bose L1's and 4 bass bins and just run stereo.

The surround sound was just an idea. Since I got enough speakers to do it, I thought it might bee cool.

Yeah, I couldn't believe $2000 for one nite. He was from Minneapolis, about a 4 hour drive. But still seems overpriced.

I figure if I can get $200-$300, the same as I get for karaoke, I will be doing good, since the only "real" work will be setting up & tearing down.

You can't run 5.1 surround sound through a PA system without a separate Dolby or THX decoder. The optical output from the DVD player IS delivering compressed 5.1 surround sound, but it take a decoder to, well, decode the compression. Surround sound home theater amps contain these decoding algorhythms.

They do make external surround sound decoders for PA applications, but they ain't cheap ($1000-5000).

I have a backyard theater at my house and have movies for peeps every Friday during the summer, and TRUST ME, your patrons won't miss the surround sound!!

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C Mc
KJ, FL