Just curious (for all those that are married at least) to see completed projects once they are in their final resting place. I'm trying to determine the best way to get power to a projector once it is mounted and how to route the cables and have everything nice and clean. I like the idea of having the projector built into a coffee table of sorts.

I have a very forgiving wife, and kids that are old enough to know that if they goof with the gear, the projector goes away... so I was a bit slack with my original setup and had wires going everywhere. I am now refitting our formal living room / dining room that had been converted into an suite for my grandmother back into a dining room / home theatre... and have plans to do things right... cable runs under the floor -- hiding speaker wires behind the crown molding, etc.

If you have the skills, the coffee table is the way to go... very neat and tidy -- easy to button up and "kidproof".

Ceiling mounts are up out of the way -- but it takes the right room for one of these -- suspended tile ceilings are ideal, and anything less than an 8' ceiling means you are gonna konk your forehead enough to warrant wearing a helmet.

Go portable -- make it easy to set up / tear down and store and bust it out for special occasions -- this seldom lasts. Most people experience DVDs and TV on the big screen, and then going back to a 27" feels like you are watching a wristwatch tv... and the projector quickly becomes a permanent setup. This is what happened to me.

Build the projector into a "tower" rig that also houses your entertainment equipment. Cuts the clutter -- but you end up with a monolith in the middle of your room.


~DM~

i'm fortunate enough to have an unfinished basement in my new house, and half of the basement that i'm going to make into my computer area will be built around the projector, mounted from the ceiling.

just got the samsung 712n, been playing on it all day, gonna have a hard time tearing into this, its so nice

I have a couple of pics in my gallery thread that show where my pj currently sits. However, I consider it temporary as when I move up to my 17" the projector will be relocated farther back to a shelf above our computer desk.

I have the same problem (I'm using an HTPC to drive my pj). I was kicking around the idea of using one of these to manage my mess of wires:

Im contemplating the idea of a coffee table design as well. I'm considering building the table to fully accomidate a PC built into the table on one side and the PS2, DVD and what other toys I can cram into the table on the other. Off the top of my head, things you may have to keep in mind when making it into the coffee table is the traffic that a coffee table will generate. The table will be subject to getting bumped and moved by your feet, a vacume, and just general traffic. The other things you have to consider for the coffee table design is routing your air thru the table is such a way that the fans arent blowing directly at you, if your couch is behind the table. That and the noise of the unit itself will be much closer to you and at more of an ear level so fan noise will be much more noticeable. But either way its a great idea if you can pull it off. im still in the desing stages now hopefully ill be able to post some CAD pics of the table as I move closer to nailing down the design. Let me know what you come up with maybe we can bounce some ideas off each other and get a nice table design going for each of us