Viewed by many as an essential stress relieving sanctuary, building a home theater or a multimedia room is a popular first do-it-yourself project for many homebuyers. Unfortunately, these sanctuaries do ask quite a lot from you when it comes to energy demands, quickly making your beautiful new, Zero Energy Ready Home, less… zero energy ready. As that is counter to the goal of Garbett Homes, I visited a consumer electronics store near our Aurora Heights community in West Jordan to get some insights to pass on to you, dear reader, some tips to start you on your journey towards designing a great, effective, and energy efficient home theater.
Shop Informed
Homework didn’t stop at school; it just became self-assigned based on your recreational desires. I apologize if I’m the one responsible for giving you that heartbreaking revelation. Take a minute to process it, I can wait. You good? Great! Let’s define what to look at when deciding what equipment you will want when building a home theater. The first thing you want to look for is the Energy Guide. It is a yellow rectangle that should sit on the box of any consumer electronics you purchase. The important features that you want to look for are the estimated yearly operating cost and the estimated yearly electricity use. This will tell you how much power each device asks for on average and is a great starting point for planning your home theaters energy needs.
Buy a Power Management System
A good way to describe a power management system is that they are like an evolution of the humble surge protector. Like a surge protector, you can plug in all your electronic devices and the system will then distribute electricity at an even rate. However, these devices will also allow you to turn off specific sockets so that when you don’t want a device to use electricity it will not draw power when off, preventing phantom load. Some models can even monitor the voltage running through the system allowing you to increase how much you know about your electricity consumption!
On TVs
Buy an OLED and keep the screen as dim as you can tolerate. What? You want to know more? Okay. Most modern televisions, even dumb TVs, have a selection of picture modes that you can set your tv up in. Learn which mode is the most energy efficient for your needs and desired room layout. Again, building a home theater takes homework, homework, homework.
Please keep in mind that these are only some starting tips for the do-it-yourself-er. We here at Garbett want your brand-new house to feel like your home. Self-expression is key to how you complete that transformation. We hope that this article has given you a strong foundation to create your multimedia sanctuary. To learn more about Garbett Green Click Here. For more Green Home Tech Tips Click Here.
