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Is bigger better? Michael Fremer sets out to determine just that as he reviews the <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com/amplificationreviews/1103pass">Pass Labs XA160 monoblock power amplifier</A>. As Fremer explains, "While the industry-feminizing tiny triode set has made a great deal of noise in the past few years (I can hear them hissing now), soft-walking, big-stick-carrying, mega-power amplifiers still circle the globe."

<I>See update at end of article.</I> iTunes continues to grow and Napster has been reborn, but these last few months have been a bumpy ride for <A HREF="http://MP3.com">MP3.com</A&gt;. The music site, known for its large online music library featuring unsigned independent artists, was purchased on December 14 by San Francisco-based <A HREF="http://www.CNET.com">CNET</A&gt;.

A couple weeks back, we asked our readers for the oddest audio tweak they've come across. Reader Jeff Peterson thinks we should accentuate the positive and ask readers what they think is the greatest audio component that they've discovered, not the strangest.

In July 1877, Thomas Edison wrote that he was sure he would "be able to store up & reproduce at any future time the human voice perfectly," and the word phonograph soon began showing up in his lab notes. By the time Ivor Tiefenbrun stepped onto the audio industry soundstage, nearly a century had passed, and even discriminating listeners took the record player for granted. But Tiefenbrun had discerned sonic differences among players, and he knew that his LP12—he had built a prototype for personal use—was a superior performer. When people told him that turntables do no more than go 'round and 'round, he would rebut them by pointing out that speakers merely go in and out.

Long before the Swedes at Ikea did it, the singular Scotsman <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com/interviews/1101ivor/">Ivor Tiefenbrun</A> began giving his products funny-sounding names. For some reason positively phobic about the letter <I>c</I>, he banned its use in any of those names. Someone once told me his real last name is Tiefencrun, but since it wouldn't <I>sound</I> any different with a <I>k</I>, he settled for a <I>b</I>. "I could have been Ivor Tiefendrun, or Tiefenfrun, or Tiefengrun, for that matter," he's quoted as having said once while krunching a krakker.

Consumer electronics stores have long carried computer gear, everything from laptops and desktop systems to software and accessories. Computer stores, led by Gateway Country stores, have slowly been moving in the other direction. Now it looks as if convergence in the retail realm is about to take another great leap forward.

The music goes round and round: An investment group led by former Universal Music chief Edgar Bronfman, Jr. is in the lead to acquire Warner Music Group (WMG) and Warner/Chappell Music Publishing from corporate parent Time Warner, according to reports issued the third week of November. Bronfman's group&mdash;a consortium of banks and venture capital firms&mdash;has offered $2.8 billion for Time Warner's musical properties, possibly forcing prior suitor EMI Group PLC to drop out of the bidding. On Thursday, November 20, EMI chairman Eric Nicoll told reporters that Time Warner had informed his company of "a possible proposal from another party as an alternative to our own firm offer."