I'm going out on Wednesday for a consultation. Customer has appox 30-40k to spend (equipment and labor).
It's a dedicated room. It's still in prewire phase.

The room is 20x25'. I'm not concerned with furniture. I will do some lighting controls.

I'm curious as to what products you guys are pushing in these situations. I have my list made out. I don't want to influence any opinions.

Well if it is a dedicated theater not a media room, then I would say you have your work cut out for you, at least on that budget. I would start with the acoustics, how the room sounds will make a big difference, and you can always sell him good gear with a solid upgrade path/plan. We will use suspended ceilings, and stagger stud the walls so you can isolate the walls from the floor. work with a good GC and have him make alot of the "furniture" that most of the companys in this business charge an arm and a leg for. (we had our GC use MDF and a router to make some really good looking columns). As far as lighting control I would suggest Lutron Graphik Eye, very reliable and easy to program, been around forever. With only having very limited information on this project I personally would spec an infocus 5700 FP with a Stewart firehawk, no bigger than 110" larger than that it will not look quite as good as I would want. As far as gear, take your pick, but I would use Integra, or maybe denon. don't forget the MX 700, a line conditioner ( panamax 5100 or comp. furman) and a Xantech IR system.

Good luck, I am sure you will get lots of advice/opinions, just remember you are the guy putting it all together, be familiar with what you are integrating, and know that everything will play nice with each other.

Oh yeah head end to FP- 1 composite, 1 s vid, 2 component, 1 VGA, 1 HDMI, 1 IR/12 trigger, and 2" conduit for future upgrades.

why an mx 700 and ir system why not an mx 800?

I trust a hardwired IR system more, and if the client adds new toys like game systems, IR controllers can interface easier, DV cam w/ remote...OK I am also gunshy with the 800 and the origional base station, I got burned really bad on a couple of jobs, where the RF just did not work well at all, not even close to being almost bulletproof....

Do you really talk and think this way? People who sell Bose PUSH stuff in situations, but it is not because that is the best, it is because it pays the best! THAT IS NOT WHAT CUSTOM INSTALLATION IS ABOUT! We have to make a living, and we have to have enough profit to insure that we can be there for the occasional free service call.

When I had to work at a store that carried particular lines, the things that we "guys are pushing" was whatever the hell was in the back, whether it was the best for the situation or not. If we didn't sell it, the store went out of business. Hopefully you have enough lines available to you that you can pick and choose the best for your customer. This is not pushing. It is responding.

Jeez, I have to ask again, do you think this way? After all, you wrote it this way!

Please consider when you write stuff like this that this forum is open to the public. I suppose you are sure that your client is not reading this, but mine might be, and I don't want your crass approach to influence how my client thinks of audio/video installers.

agreed, if we do not behave in a professional manner, then the general public will view us as such, making life harder for those of us that try to be as professional as possible.

I wasn't trying to be crass. What I was asking is what products are you guys using these days. I prefer Integra receivers over Denon. Not because I think either is better than the other, I'm just more familiiar with the Integra units. I prefer Pronto over MX remotes because I am more familiar with them. I use Lutron because I know them. I was just trying to pick brains to see if there are any products that are out there that are becoming standard equipment for you guys that I might not be using. I didn't want to start throwing brand names around becuase I didn't want to get a response of yeah, those are good products. I was attempting to keep myself from becoming narrow minded in my product selection.

I apologize for the use of the word push. Here is a definition of the two marketing strategies. Like it or not, we ALL push certain equipment

Marketing theory distinguishes between two main kinds of promotional strategy - "push" and "pull".

Push

A “push” promotional strategy makes use of a company's sales force and trade promotion activities to create consumer demand for a product.

The producer promotes the product to wholesalers, the wholesalers promote it to retailers, and the retailers promote it to consumers.



A "push" strategy tries to sell directly to the consumer, bypassing other distribution channels. With this type of strategy, consumer promotions and advertising are the most likely promotional tools.

Pull

A “pull” selling strategy is one that requires high spending on advertising and consumer promotion to build up consumer demand for a product.

If the strategy is successful, consumers will ask their retailers for the product, the retailers will ask the wholesalers, and the wholesalers will ask the producers.



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