New Connected Cinema demo theatre open for business

CI distributor Connected Distribution has launched Connect Cinemas, a ‘Cinema In The Home’ model for domestic cinema installations.

The launch coincides with the completion and opening of the dedicated ‘Cinema In The Home’ demonstration facility at Connected’s Cheltenham office. This 7.1.4 Dolby Atmos cinema has been designed to present the mainstays of the company’s cinema offering, including Aurea loudspeakers and Acurus electronics, to installers, retailers and their clients.

This new demo facility is permanently equipped with the Aurea In-wall series 6+6 model for the LCR channels, IW 5+5 model for the side and rear surrounds and the Coaxial 5 model for the four height channels. Two Sub 12 in-wall subwoofers are employed, taking the LF response down to 23Hz. The total system is capable of a maximum continuous SPL well in excess of the 105dB Dolby specification.

Processing is done using the Acurus Muse, a 16-channel processor that is devoid of unnecessary and often unused features found in other brands, allowing it to do nothing but decode the immersive audio experience to the highest possible levels of performance. Power amplification comes from the Acurus M8 eight-channel power amplifiers, delivering 200 watts per channel.

The room has been calibrated using the Acurus AspeQT speaker parameter and EQ tool, a comprehensive four microphone system that enables the room to be tuned to the required target EQ curve.

In addition to the Aurea and Acurus brands, Connected Cinemas also specifies and distributes Euroscreen screens, Yamaha AVRs and Parasound amplification, a brand used in commercial movie production studios such as Warner Bros and Lucasfilm.
Connected Cinema’s Mike Bonnette explains, “We set out to build a facility that would enable us to showcase our ‘Cinema In The Home’ offering, which differs from practically all other home cinemas as it genuinely delivers true cinema performance in the home, so much so that we don’t refer to it as ‘home cinema’.

“The Aurea cinema speakers are designed using exactly the same criteria for dispersion, SPL, intelligibility and timbre as the company’s professional cinema speakers which are used in such locations as Odeon Leicester Square and BFI Imax.

“Combine them with Acurus processors and amplifiers, whose remit is to take the encoded film soundtrack and process it without compromise, and the result is a domestic solution that is as close to the experience of being in a commercial cinema as is possible.”