Let’s get this party started
Creating the ultimate entertainment room
By Beth Anne Piehl
Photography by G. Randall Goss
Must be nice to be a friend of Tom and Jeanne Rankl ...
Each week, the Charlevoix couple hosts 10 to 15 friends for football parties, NASCAR races — or just plain parties.
“Now that we finally have the room to entertain, it’s a lot of fun,” said Jeanne.
And she means that literally.
After the couple sold their Top Rank Disposal company to Waste Management in 2004, and Tom retired at age 44, the Rankls moved from a 1,000-square-foot house to their spacious home on 147 feet of Lake Charlevoix frontage.
Now, it’s the party place, particularly in season on Sundays for Detroit Lions games. Often the ladies play cards and children are welcomed to join the fun, along with the Rankls’ sons, Zak, 18, and Jake, 16.
They all gather in an upstairs entertainment room, roughly 24 by 40 feet in size, that is decked out to the hilt with neighbor-waking surround sound; whole-house-shaking audio system and jukebox with everyone’s favorite bar tunes (it was given to them by a local bar owner); pool table and card table; slot machines; signed sports memorabilia; and a fully stocked bar.
There are also five large movie-theater type leather recliners that are way more comfortable than what you’d find at the cinema; two are in Detroit Lions colors. There are speakers outside on the deck and porch, upstairs and down, so no one has to miss any action if they’re grilling or enjoying the lake view during the warmer months.
And then there’s the TV. Sixty-five inches of perfect digital quality picture so clear you can see dirt underneath the players’ nails. At $11,000, it’s a beaut — and it has company. There are eight flat screens in the house and seven receivers for satellite TV.
Hey, that’s what friends are for, right?
“It’s a good group of people,” said Tom. “We’ve been together about 15 years.”
Added Jeanne: “We can always come up with a reason to party.”
Looking to create a great entertainment room?
Mark Maynard, of Get Connected in Charlevoix, offers ideas to consider:
HomeLife: What are the “must-haves” for the ultimate entertainment set-up?
Maynard: A good surround sound system adds a tremendous amount of excitement to watching TV. In-wall and in-ceiling speakers can be used to preserve the openness of the viewing area. Speaker placement puts the viewer in the middle of a three-dimensional sound stage and the subwoofer can add impact that you can feel.
• A display that is appropriate to the size of room, viewing distance and lighting conditions is important. Consider placement of the screen relative to glare from windows. You don’t want a plasma TV’s shiny glass screen facing a door wall unless you have appropriate window coverings.
• Get a big TV for front viewing and another for the bar or kitchen so you don’t miss key plays or scenes when you go for a refill.
• Get a high-definition digital video recorder (DVR) from your satellite or cable provider. The DVR will let you replay those fantastic plays or cool action scenes. You can fast-forward through commercials and record one game while you watch another.
• Right now Dish Network wins the high-definition content game with 32 channels, by spring time DirecTV will take the lead with over 100 channels. Right now they both beat cable in HD content.
• Whole house music or distributed audio is another way to make sure the ambiance of your party is consistent throughout the house. Whether your music source is coming from an iPod or the football game, pump it to the rooms where the people congregate. Create play-lists that match the theme of your party and the personality of your guests.
• How about an iPod dock that will let you control your iPod with a remote and play it through your music system?
• Maybe you would like a Windows Vista Media Center Computer to store and catalog your extensive CD collection. Have your disks loaded on the drive (or buy a 300-disk changer) and use an on-screen display to choose your music by genre, album, artist, song or album cover.
HL: What should you never skimp on when you’re outfitting your home for entertaining?
Maynard: From my own experience, never skimp on the controls. Audio and video equipment can be fairly complicated in terms of all the settings necessary on the TV, surround sound receiver and the audio and video source equipment. A good remote control that handles all of the settings is going to ensure that all family members and guests are going to be able to enjoy the equipment at their convenience …
Without a good remote you might have to press four or five buttons on three or four remotes to switch from cable to DVD. It is likely that we would have to give you a matrix that tells you the different settings necessary on each piece of equipment. Our goal with a programmed remote would be to press the DVD button and let the remote change all of the equipment setting necessary to switch over to watching a DVD.
HL: What’s on the horizon as far as home entertainment technology?
Maynard: There will continue to be what the industry is calling a “convergence” between computers, networking and audio/video entertainment. The content that is available on the Internet will continue to grow. Your in-house computer network will continue to expand as the in-house delivery system for all digital content. Media servers like SqueezeBox are able to delivery digital audio content wired and wirelessly from the Internet and local PCs. HD video content and delivery are right behind.
