LATEST ADDITIONS

Back in 1992, Robert Harley's <I>Stereophile</I> review of the <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com//amplificationreviews/520/">McCormack DNA-1</A> and Parasound HCA-2200 amplifiers (April 1992, Vol.15 No.4) and the accompanying technical measurements piqued my interest. So, with great curiosity, I arranged to borrow a DNA-1 to audition, along with competitive amps from Aragon, Bryston, and PS Audio. They were all a leap ahead of my Adcom GFA-555, but it took an act of great courage to accept that, despite its less-than-stellar measured performance, the DNA-1 was my favorite. The bottom line was that the DNA-1 excelled at driving my Apogee Duettas to make lively and harmonically pure sounds. I bought my McCormack DNA-1 amplifier before I began reviewing equipment for <I>Stereophile</I>, and it still occupies an honored place in my system.

The battle rages on in the audio shops, the pages of <I>Stereophile</I>, and in the online news groups: Subjectivist (relies on direct experience to judge audio quality) versus Objectivist (relies on experimental evidence to judge differences and quality). What are your tendencies?

According to the latest figures from the <A HREF="http://www.ce.org">Consumer Electronics Association</A> (CEA), the month of August showed positive gains in the overall factory sales of audio products to dealers. The CEA reports that sales for the month rose six percent compared to the same period last year, resulting in year-to-date sales of $5.3 billion, an 11.2% rise over last year.

Five years after opening a research office in Moscow, <A HREF="http://www.bmg.de/">BMG Entertainment</A> has launched an affiliate called BMG Russia OOO, which will work from the capital. The intent is to develop the Russian market for BMG products, discover and sign new musical talent&mdash;and combat piracy.

A group of researchers has claimed success at cracking four digital audio watermarking technologies presented in a challenge by the <A HREF="http://www.sdmi.org/">Secure Digital Music Initiative</A> in September. The claim has been denied by David Leibowitz, chairman of <A HREF="http://www.verance.com/">Verance Corporation</A>, creator of one of the challenged watermarks. SDMI has made no public statement on the claim, and has resolved to remain silent until all 447 submitted hacks are evaluated.

Artists' groups are celebrating what they hope will be more than a symbolic victory over the recording industry in the wake of legislation signed by President Clinton the last week of October. Known as "The Works Made for Hire and Copyright Corrections Act," the repeal negates a provision that was inserted into last year's "Satellite Home Viewer Act" at the insistence of the <A HREF="http://www.riaa.com/">Recording Industry Association of America</A>, designating musical recordings as "works for hire." Such a designation catergorizes a musical recording as a commodity that can be purchased at a fixed price, such as a table built by a furniture craftsman, rather than as a performance subject to syndication and royalty fees.

A much-touted benefit of DVD-Audio and Super Audio CD is that these new media can store digital audio data extending one or more octaves higher in frequency response than the capabilities of the CD. In the August issue's "Industry Update" (pp.27-29), Paul Messenger reported on an add-on supertweeter from English manufacturer Tannoy that would extend the ultrasonic response of loudspeakers so they can reproduce this new information. Putting to one side for now the issue of whether a loudspeaker really needs to be able to reproduce frequencies that no one can hear, the subject of how much ultrasonic content is present in real musical signals is still a contentious one.