LATEST ADDITIONS

“Dated” is a bad word. I’ve never understood what it means to “date.” Does it have something to do with the passing of time?

Last June, Sennheiser, a multinational manufacturer of microphones, headphones, and wireless technology products, celebrated its 60th anniversary. The company was founded as Wennebostel Laboratories (Labor W) in 1945 by Dr. Fritz Sennheiser and seven other employees of the Institute for Radio Frequency Engineering and Electroacoustics at Hanover Technical University. At the time, as Dr. Sennheiser explained when I visited the company's Wennebostel facility 10 years ago, German radio engineers were prohibited by the occupying Allied forces from constructing communications equipment, so he and his crew needed to find something else they could do. In addition, supply shortages severely restricted the scope of what they might manufacture. Sennheiser determined that they could build test instruments such as millivolt meters from the parts they were able to recover from the Institute and the Allies. Seimens' Hanover branch bought the first samples and the startup company began to supply that firm with more and more complex products.

The Electronic Freedom Foundation (EFF) maintains a <A HREF="http://www.eff.org">website</A&gt; that we have found invaluable for keeping up with news about technological restrictions to information and fair use. Last week, we were directed to the EFF's new <A HREF="http://www.eff.org/IP/DRM/guide/">User's Guide to DRM in Online Music</A>, which we recommend to everyone still undecided about buying into one of the online providers.

I first heard the Totem Acoustic Tab&#249; loudspeakers at HI-FI '96, <I>Stereophile</I>'s Home Theater & Specialty Audio Show at the Waldorf=Astoria in New York City last June. A startlingly realistic vocal recording drew me to Totem's sixth-floor demo room. Vincent Bruzzese, the speaker's designer, was playing Michael Jonasz singing "Si si si le ciel" from <I>la fabuleuse histoire de Mister Swing</I> (WEA 2292-42338-2, imported by May Audio Marketing). The small, two-way Tab&#249; cast a holographic, palpable musical image with clear highs and sizzling dynamic pace. I was bitten, and set things in motion for this review. And two other things drew me to the Tab&#249;: its capacitor-less crossover and its similarity to Totem's <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com/standloudspeakers/820">Model 1</A>.

I have a theory about "showing off" systems. I call it <I>Zen and the Art of Keeping Your Yap Shut</I>. Think about it: what's the first thing that pops into your head when someone tells you how great their system sounds? "Yeah, <I>right!</I>"

"This is offensive!" muttered usually mild-mannered Malcolm Hawksford, who was sitting next to me. "I'm leaving." The good professor was right. One thousand or so attendees at the 103rd Audio Engineering Society Convention, held at the end of September in New York, were being subjected to truly terrible sound. The irony was that the sound was that of 2- and 5-channel recordings made with 24-bit resolution and a 96kHz sampling rate, being played over a colored PA system to demonstrate the future of audio, in the form of DVD-Audio.

Primedia's Home Technology Group has announced that the Home Entertainment Show 2006 will take place at the Sheraton Gateway Hilton in Los Angeles, CA on June 1-4, 2006. Previous successful events were held in Los Angeles in 1992, 1995, and 1998.