AV Education on RHT Sound Tips 6 By Bob Hodas This month we are going to finish looking at my room. In Sound Tips 4 & 5, we addressed my speaker placement and acoustic treatments. We are now going to look at the final issue, the icing on the cake, equalization. Now, I know that word, “equalization,” strikes fear and loathing into the hearts of many audiophiles, but hey, let’s get real. If you have a home theater, you should know that almost every commercial movie theater in existence uses EQ (equalization). Every dubbing stage (film mixing studio) uses EQ. All of the places doing high-end film audio remixes for DVD release, like Mi Casa Multimedia (which works with New Line on films such as “The Lord of The Rings” trilogy), uses EQ. In fact, the Mi Casa guys are so tweaky about the sound in their rooms that I have a lifelong gig ...

title: How to Integrate Digital High-Resolution Multi-Channel Playback Into Your High-End Two-Channel Sound System Without Compromise category: Feature Articles review date: February 2003 reviewed by: Jerry Del Colliano How to Integrate Digital High-Resolution Multi-Channel Playback Into Your High-End Two-Channel Sound System Without Compromise With two new high-resolution formats causing all sorts of controversy, audiophiles and music enthusiasts alike are getting increasingly curious about how one or both of these formats will work into their lofty stereo systems. As many of us having tens (or in some cases hundreds) of thousands of dollars invested in stereo gear, the decision to make sweeping changes to a finely tuned high-performance stereo music playback system cannot be taken lightly.

In case you haven’t noticed, the high-quality audio disc marketplace is in the middle of a format war, reminiscent of the days of VHS vs. Betamax. But unlike that combat, when the clearly superior technology lost to more powerful marketing and the undeniable power of porn, this time it is much less clear which technology is superior, and even less easy to guess who will win. But while the war goes on, we consumers are the losers. Several years ago, there was talk about the need for a new, high-quality audio disc (HQAD) format that would overcome the limitations of the CD. An obvious physical basis for the format is the Digital Versatile Disc – DVD – which has the high-density storage capability required to get super-quality audio on a disc with a respectable playing time, along the same lines as ...

As a dedicated music and car enthusiast, I must admit there is quite a buzz involved in having the right tunes blasting as you rip through sweeping curves on Pacific Coast Highway in a spirited car with a stellar music system. Properly mixed with the growling intonations of a sporty exhaust, a tasteful car audio system can take you places that your home system simply can’t. Considering how much time most of us spend behind the wheel, as opposed to sitting in front of our AV system at home, one can see why mobile entertainment has become the fastest-growing segment of the multi-billion-dollar consumer electronics industry. When I worked as an audio/video salesman in Philadelphia in the early 1990’s, car audio was a purely aftermarket luxury that many of the older salesmen wouldn’t even discuss with prospective clients. I loved it ...

Sharing files for free on the Internet is now a fact of life and no matter how hard the major record labels and movie studios try to suppress this practice, computer programmers will always be at least one step ahead of them. The number of people who are downloading music is growing exponentially. In a number of recent polls of college students, a majority of those who regularly download music said they would be willing to pay a subscription fee to legally use a service such as Napster. This of course would result in a multi-billion dollar industry, but the major media companies may have missed the boat completely, since programmers have now figured out new ways to anonymously trade files. The RIAA has been focusing on putting the brakes on Napster, but all the while, a host of alternatives ...