Our Listeners of the Week are Chad for his donation, along with our 60 Patreon Patrons.

Congratulations to the winner of our Insteon Hub giveaway, Joshua A.! And our thanks once again to Kris P. for providing the Insteon Hub.

In the news, Karl R. forwarded the announcement that Sonos is going public with the aim of raising $100 million with their IPO. And Netflix is testing a more expensive Ultra tier that is actually just a price increase to the existing Premium tier, while removing either HDR or two of the current four streams from the Premium tier price point.

Rob Z. corrected Rob H. for getting some numbers wrong, and reminds us that sound travels roughly one foot per millisecond. And Herb from Cross-Spectrum Labs weighs in on the AudioTools App for iOS, the Dayton iMM-6 measurement microphone for phones and tablets, and Fletcher-Munson equal loudness curves.

0:19:20 Damien D. gets our comparison of all the major streaming boxes and whether Atmos is always tied to only 4K streams. Then we discuss Harmony remote options, and recommend either the TCL 6-Series or Vizio 2018 P-Series for an affordable 65-inch Ultra HD TV.

0:31:17 Josh Z. wants to know just how many Joshes out there write in to us. And Audyssey is telling him his Front Left and Right speakers are wired out of phase, so we recommend using an old DVD with the THX Optimizer, or the THX Tune-Up App to make sure his Front Left speaker is in phase with his Center speaker, and then if the Left and Right are in phase with each other.

0:36:08 Bob tried a popular VPN, but his bandwidth dropped by 95%, so he asks why that happened, and lets us know that USTVnow works well for watching American TV overseas.

0:41:13 Mark F. heard us talking about the NAD T 777 v3 AV Receiver that supports 7.2.4 Atmos processing and comes with Dirac Live LE, but we neglected to mention the much less expensive NAD T 758 v3 that has all the same features, just with lower Wattage amplifiers and fewer HDMI ports. He wants to know if that changes the value proposition.

0:44:52 Rick F. asks if he should use his available budget to either add a second subwoofer or expand to Atmos. If he goes the Atmos route, we mention the low price (and low stock) on the Marantz SR6011 from Accessories4Less right now, as well as the Marantz SR6012 as alternatives to the Denon AVR-X4400H. And we recommend Outdoor Speaker Depot MK650 in-ceiling speakers to go overhead.

0:51:11 Carlos P. asks about the TCL 6-Series deinterlacing quality, and reports a USB port error that has us urging him to exchange the unit he bought.

0:54:36 Adriano M. has us weigh in on LG’s B7 OLED vs. Panasonic’s EZ950 OLED, and then OLED in general vs. LCD TVs for a large, well-lit room. Then we recommend wall-mounting the Avantree Audikast Bluetooth Transmitter for easy access and a rock solid wireless headphone connection.

1:05:29 Dave F. had to put both of his subs on his front wall, and he was very disappointed at first. Flipping both polarity switches on the subs improved things, but not all the way. So Dave asks about phase knobs vs. distance settings vs. polarity switches. And then we recommend adding a miniDSP 2×4 and using the Multi-Sub Optimizer Software to fix his issues.

1:12:19 Sushmit wants to know Tom’s and Rob’s level of experience with building DIY speakers.

1:14:42 Boshko wants to know if it’s ok to keep his AV Receiver plugged into his APC G5 rack-mounted power filter, while getting a reminder of our recommendation for the APC P8V surge protector.

1:18:04 Lee Overstreet gets some clarification about Dolby Vision pass-through capabilities of AV Receivers.

1:19:59 Chad B. wants a 75-inch Ultra HD TV for under $2,000, so we suggest either stretching the budget a bit for a Vizio 2018 P-Series, or getting a Vizio 2017 M-Series, or possibly considering an Epson Home Cinema 4000 projector. Then we talk about getting Atmos audio from streaming services while outputting video from those streams at 1080p resolution.

1:24:56 Ryan L. gets our thoughts on the layout for his brother’s basement home theater. Then we go to work to put together all the gear for between $5,000 and $7,500. Our options include: BenQ HT2050A or Epson Home Cinema 4000 projector; 120-inch Silver Ticket screen; Sony UBP-X800 Ultra HD Blu-ray player and/or Apple TV 4K; Marantz SR6011, SR6012, or Denon AVR-X4400H Receiver; HSU VTF-2 MK5 or SVS PC-2000 subwoofer(s), Dayton APA102 or Emotiva BasX A-500 amplifier; Outdoor Speaker Depot MK650 in-ceiling or Focal Little Bird on-ceiling overhead speakers; RBH Impression Series, HSU Horn MK2, or Ascend Acoustics SE Series speakers; Acoustimac DIY 4″ absorption panel kits or raw insulation with SeymourAV speaker grill cloth or Millibel black fabric over it; Monoprice projector ceiling mount, DynamicView Active HDMI Cable, and bulk speaker wire; Sanus speaker stands; and a Harmony Companion remote.

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