Basement theater / Gameroom / game repair room

[ChadTower]

More details to come with pics... but it's time to start working on finishing the basement.  I'm very new to this so this could either be very informative or a running log of my idiocy.  Might be both.  Feel free to laugh at me every time I ---fudgesicle--- up.   

[AlanS17]

 

... oh, was the premature?

[ChadTower]

Maybe.  Maybe just efficient.

Here's a rough concept sketch of about half the basement.  That's the theater area, game area, and bathroom/laundry.  Measurements are all eyeballed and such thus far.

[drunkatuw]

I just started finishing my basement about a month ago.  It's amazing how time consuming everything is.  I've got most of the framing done and a little bit of electrical.

I'm including a theater, bedroom/gameroom (it'll be a game room until we will the upstairs bedrooms with kids), bathroom, and storage/work room (where all the tools are housed).

Right now I'm building soffits around all the vents and pipes...what a pain in the butt!

[ChadTower]

I have been reading up on framing and now understand the basic concepts like 16" on center, how to measure for your top plate, measuring the top plate height by the lowest floor joist it will touch, measure the stud length as:

(floor to lowest floor joist) - (base plate + top plate + .5")

I'm still trying to figure out how to do doors and the best way to frame around windows.

[Donkey_Kong]

Am I reading this right?

4 pins upper right, 4 cabs lower left, couch and projector upper left. If that is it I'm really jealous!

[ChadTower]

Yep.  I will end up having to part with a couple of pins to get down to 4.  The bathroom will have a two person whirlpool tub in it, too.

[AlanS17]

Here in Texas you really don't see basements. makes it much more difficult to have a gameroom. 

[ChadTower]

In Texas you could get a house more than twice the size of mine with 4x the land for half the price. 

[AlanS17]

Well I reall ydon't know the details on that sort of thing. I just know it means I've probably have to buy a place with an extra bedroom to use for the sole purpose of a game room. Either that or a house with two living areas.

[ChadTower]

Which isn't hard at all in a 3000sqft house. 

[tommy]

Living in Florida I'm kinda hesitant about going all out on a game room, i really wish houses here were built with basements so i could build something down there and not have to worry about a hurricane tossing my cabs down the road.

[ClubNinja]

In Texas you could get a house more than twice the size of mine with 4x the land for half the price. 

Pretty much.  I was watching this program last night actually about this couple in Texas looking to buy a new house (House Hunters on HGTV for the rest of you HGTV addicts).  At first, I laughed at them because I have a basement and they won't find one down there.  Then, I remembered that they're in Texas and all the 3000-4000 square foot homes they looked at (on numerous acres of land) cost roughly the same as a cardboard refridgerator box under an overpass up here. 

In Texas, you don't need a basement for a gameroom - you can build a 2000 square foot detached building.

[JackTucky]

Right now I'm building soffits around all the vents and pipes...what a pain in the butt!

Use particle board and 2x4's ripped in half.

I can take a pic of mine if you want.

The framing guy I hired for that part of the job just had learned that technique recently instead of using all 2x4's.

-J

[ChadTower]

Pics would be sweet.  I'm going to have to do that too.  Have to reroute some simple plumbing and air ducts too.  Nothing major but adds to the work.

[boykster]

looks pretty good.  You might be a bit close with the couch to the screen, and make sure you research your PJ options and choose one BEFORE you run any wiring for it, as the throws/drops differ wildly depending on the optics. 

If you do really end up with the screen only 8' away from the eyeballs (couch) make sure you use a very smooth screen surface (stay away from beaded or textured screens) and keep the size down otherwise it'll be not only too big, but will look bad from being so close.

[MovingTarget]

Took me 2 years of nights and weekend work to finish mine.  I also have a home theater, pool/game room w/wet bar, candy counter, dart area, and small air hockey, plus my one MAME cab.  Since I didn't get the pool table yet I'm now thinking I would get more use out of a nice poker table...

Also have an office down there with a 75 gal. aquarium in the wall and lots of synthesizers I never use sitting around.

Anyway, 15' isn't a lot for the depth.  Will you have enough room to move the couch back from the screen (are you doing a TV or a projector?) and stil have room for arcade cabinets behind it.  What size screen are you putting in?

I've got 100" 16x9 and in the first row of seats the viewer's head is about 11' from the front of the screen, personally wouldn't want to be much closer than that with a screen this big.  That would leave about 3' between the back of the chair and the wall in a 15' deep room.

My theater dimensions are about 19'x11'.

You may want to measure everything out before you finish your wiring.  Also I HIGHLY recommend you run conduit of some type so you can upgrade speaker and AV wire upgrades incase you need to.  I've had to upgrade to DVI then HDMI cables to my PJ and somehow managed to put a nail through one of my speaker wires so had to run another after everything was finished.

[ChadTower]

All good advice.  Those measurements are all subject to change once I do things like actually measure.