[K. T. Walrus]

I'm wanting to put in a home theater in a new house that will be built over the next 6 months or so.

I know very little about how to build/design a theater room that has good acoustics and looks like a theater room should.

I have a budget of $25,000 for this project, and I would like to find a design consultant that would work with me through email to help with:

1. Room dimension/construction consulting
2. Equipment selection
3. Speaker/seating placement
4. Needed acoustical treatments
5. Acoustical treatment fabrication and installation

I'd like to find a design consultant that:

• charges a flat fee (around $1000)
• willing to exchange emails over the entire period of time
• has professional experience at home theater design

I don't want someone who wants me to buy product/material from them or expects that I do that. My budget is limited and I may need to do a lot of DIY (especially in the acoustical treatment category since these things seem very expensive).

I found one fellow on the web that would have been good for this, but he declined to take on the task given my budget. I also talked to a couple of designers at the local home theater stores, but they all work on the condition that all equipment (and installation) is done by them and this won't fit in my budget (given their markups).

How exactly does one find a home theater design consultant on the internet? Is there somewhere they hang out or look for consulting work? I'm in the web business, and there are plenty of good places on the web to find and hire people to do web work, but I am having much more of a time finding a home theater design consultant with a budget of about $1K for the service.

Hope someone can post some advice... or even some referrals...