Wall of Sound: Three new surround formats from Audyssey, Dolby and DTS aim to bring your theater sound to a whole new dimension. Literally.
You want me to buy more speakers? Yeah, I get that. To be honest, that was my first thought when I heard about height speakers. Just a gimmick, right?
Well, to find out, I journeyed up and down the California coast visiting the headquarters of the formats’ creators.
When Digital Met Analog
Ditch the transistors and go tubing with old-fashioned, oh-so-analog vacuum tube audio gear from Peachtree Audio and Fatman.
Ultimate Hybrid
One of the fastest-growing product categories is high-end audio devices that decode digital audio from a computer or iPod.
This amuses me, as for years many in the high-end audio realm thought of the iPod somewhere above the Anti-Christ but just below one of the Horsemen of the Apocalypse.
Not sure which, maybe the green one.
The Crestron Experience Center in Las Vegas is one of the few places in the world delivering hands-on demos of the wonders of home automation.
With its new Las Vegas Experience Center, Crestron—which in home automation is perhaps even more pervasive than Microsoft is in the computer business—seeks to make its creations more accessible to dealers and customers. The Experience Center is one of only a few places in the world where one can witness home automation at work.
The Pass Laboratories INT-30A integrated amplifier doesn't do much, and that's what makes it great!
I've probably reviewed well over a hundred amplifiers, but I can't say I've ever really heard one. I'm always listening to an amplifier driving a speaker, so the sound is really the combination of the two.
I'm pretty sure Nelson Pass has not only listened to more amps and speakers than I have, he's designed more than a few of my favorite high-end amps.
Silver Sounds
Well, it looks huge. Maybe not huge, but certainly hefty.
And yet at 38 pounds, it’s not.
There must be some kind of magic in there doing something.
All the bells and whistles
Reading the features list on modern receivers is like some sort of Tolstoy-esque torrent of acronyms and abbreviations.
This is a good thing, believe it or not, at least when it's all implemented correctly. Denon has a strong history at being able to get it all to work together, so we take a look at their AVR-4810CI to run it through its paces.
