GETTING DOWN TO WORK Kevin says the basement wasn't anywhere near ready for an installation. "These past years have been hard on us. We ran out of money trying to rebuild the house. But winning this contest was a huge motivation to get the room finished."

Cara adds, "Kevin had been working almost around the clock - his day job, his volunteering at the fire department, then coming home and working on the house until the early morning. For nearly two years, we barely saw him at all. This has been an amazing shot in the arm."

So Kevin threw the tool belt back on. Before Ken and crew arrived, he had to finish the drywall and the electrical work, install pocket doors to close the room off from the kids' playroom, and prime and paint the walls.

Eagle saw the room with an installer's eye. "Since Kevin had almost finished the basement before we got here, we had to put wire in finished walls and ceilings without damaging the existing drywall."

Ken and Phil were able to use the wires that Kevin had run to the positions for the surround speakers. But they had to run new wires to the front speakers plus all of the cabling for the projector. "We average about 40% retro and 60% new construction," Eagle says, "so we were totally comfortable with it."

Being an installer myself, I was thoroughly impressed with eMagine's retro chops. Especially hard was running the video cabling to the projector. "We had to fish the wiring through a space filled with ductwork and plumbing, up into the ceiling, and through a joist above the projector," Ken says.