Home Cinema vs Media Room - What is the difference?

The language home integrators using can be baffling, and while at Homeplay we attempt not to use too much jargon, we can often be guilty of overcomplicating things. Call it our enthusiasm, or our in-depth knowledge of the systems we design and install - we often make it a bit tricky for a home owner or interior designer to understand, so here’s our attempt at answering the question, what’s the difference between a Media Room and a Home Cinema.

Thoughts Behind a Home Cinema

The Home Technology Association (HTA) defines a home cinema as a space that is optimised for a theatrical experience. This means a controlled environment that provides the best entertainment experience possible. 

What is so unique about a dedicated home cinema room? 

Control

You need the ability to control (or completely eliminate) ambient light, for one. Many home cinemas are designed without windows or have blackout shades to eradicate outside light sources. The absence of unwanted light creates a better onscreen image.

Because you have the ability to completely control your environment in a dedicated space, you have more options when it comes to image size. Larger screens and video projectors are available to you because they perform well in light-controlled environments, and because homeowners are more apt to allow a large portion of their wall space to be taken up by a projection screen if it isn’t a multi-use space.

Sound

Home Cinemas are usually acoustically-treated for sound control and designed to optimise sound quality within the room (and keep it from leaking out), while also keeping outside noise at bay. This means special sound isolation design, acoustic treatments, and special construction techniques (in practice it is like building a room within a room). Because the room is optimised for sound quality, surround sound is more palatable with speakers hidden behind acoustic treatments or displayed loud and proud without getting in the way of the room’s other functions. After all, you would not put seven floor standing speakers and massive subwoofers in a dining room/kitchen area. That is why dedicated home cinemas exist! And the audio experience is one-of-a-kind and more immersive than can be obtained from a media room. 

Seating

Cinema seats are designed to be comfortable for long periods of time, like a binge-watching session or movie marathon. They are often built on risers to provide ideal viewing angles and unobstructed views from any seat in the room. Equipment is either displayed front and centre in a home cinema or relegated to an equipment room or rack elsewhere in the home.

For all these reasons, a home cinema is often retrofitted in an enclosed ‘bonus’-type space, such as a basement, a garage, or a spare bedroom, or designed into a floorplan in a home's early design stage. The end result of a dedicated home cinema space is an amazing, exacting experience designed purely for entertainment. 

Makings of a Media Room

What the home technology professional traditionally calls a media room is not necessarily optimised for the ultimate audio video experience, though it can be to an extent. Here, ambient light is less of a concern. Windows are welcomed and therefore you will not find as many separate video projector / projection screen systems in a media room. However, most technology designers have automated shades in their repertoires and projector/screen technology has advanced to the point where a two-piece projection system can accommodate ambient light much better than they have in the past. 

SCREENS

In these cases, it is recommended (and most clients demand) a motorised projection screen that stays out of the way when not in use. More traditionally, flat-panel TVs are the stuff media rooms are made of. A good technology designer will be able to hide the TV when not in use through motorised art, mirrors, lifts, cabinetry, and other creative solutions, such as using the video display as a digital art display when not being used to watch video.

Sound

You typically will not find acoustic treatments or sound isolation in a media room, though these days there are some very beautiful acoustic treatments that can hang like artwork in any space. In the media room, audio systems are usually smaller surround systems (think bookshelf, wireless, or in-wall / in-ceiling architectural speakers) or soundbars that go under the TV and can project the illusion of surround sound to a certain degree.

Seating

In the media room, regimented cinema seating gives way to relaxed seating arrangements that are friendly for multiple uses such as entertaining guests, relaxing with family, or watching a football game.

For all these reasons, media rooms are often multipurpose and are more adaptable and can therefore be installed in virtually any space-whether it’s the living area, a great room, a game room, or an open floor plan of some sort.

When you are embarking on your next media room or home cinema project, contact us to discuss how we can help you to create a space in your home that perfectly suits your needs and functions exactly the way you would like.