<B>BILL FRISELL: <I>Gone, Just Like A Train</I></B><BR> Bill Frisell, electric & acoustic guitars; Viktor Krauss, bass; Jim Keltner, drums, percussion<BR> Nonesuch 79479-2 (CD). 1998. Lee Townsend, prod.; Judy Clapp, eng. AAD. TT: 69:58<BR> Performance <B>*****</B><BR> Sonics *****</B>
At the recent <A HREF="http://www.microsoft.com">WinHEC '98</A>, <A HREF="http://www.nec.com">NEC Electronics Inc.</A> made available prototype sample units of 1394-to-POF (plastic optical fiber) repeater boxes that extend transmission of video, audio, and textual data over long distances via plastic optical fiber and copper media. NEC Electronics, one of the first companies to demonstrate this technology over plastic optical fiber and copper and wireless media, is also one of the first to demonstrate transmission speeds of 200Mbits/s over plastic optical fiber.
Not long after the single-disc CD player was introduced, the multidisc changer followed, with products from companies like <A HREF="http://www.sony.com">Sony</A> and <A HREF="http://www.pioneerelectronics.com">Pioneer</A>. Shortly after the changer was introduced, it became the most popular version of the new hardware format. In the past eight years, changers have consistently outsold single-disc machines. The high-end market was characteristically slow to embrace changers, but companies like <A HREF="http://www.calaudio.com">California Audio Labs</A> have been successful in this category with products like the CL-10, a five-disc carousel changer.
High-end journal <I>The Abso!ute Sound</I>, long rumored to be circling the drain, has been officially revived. According to a press release dated March 24, <I>TAS</I> will be operated under a new company, Absolute Multimedia, owned by Tom Martin, a vice-president at Dell Computer. Martin has reportedly arranged serious financing for the new venture, which will be based in Austin, Texas.
One of the keys to enjoying the tweak audio hobby is having a good place to learn about the art of sound. A good dealer can also help you make good choices for your personal needs when it's time to buy.
A few nights ago, John Atkinson and I played host to a speaker designer and a turntable manufacturer. We were all chewing over the 1998 Consumer Electronics Show, talking about different systems we'd heard there and speculating as to which designs would be around for the long haul. The speaker designer said he'd heard no truly bad sound at the Show. Nods all around the table—none of us had. The turntable manufacturer asked if any of us could recall hearing <I>any</I> spectacularly bad products recently. We all shook our heads.
Call it the comeback kid. Only a year ago, electronics retailer Best Buy Company was on the brink of disaster. Reeling from rapid expansion---34 new stores in two years---and suffering from an industry-wide sales slump, the retailer was said to be close to defaulting on some large-scale loans. Customers were being offered no-interest long-term credit as an inducement to buy anything on the sales floor.
I first met <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com//interviews/274/">Jacques Mahul</A> (the JM in JMlab/Focal) when my wife Kathleen and I traveled to Paris to cover HiFi (Hee-Fee) '96. The sound produced by the JMlab Grand Utopias—on a collection of many-chassis'd YBA electronics—got my enthusiastic vote for best of show (footnote 1). JMlab's large demo room was always packed to the rafters with avid listeners. (As a group, <I>melomanes</I>, as audiophiles are called in France, exactly mirror their stateside brethren in appearance and general demeanor. Yes, they're a raucous and demanding bunch!)
Jacques Mahul is an interesting, thoughtful man. He's entirely Parisian: international, urbane, and sophisticated. During "HeeFee" '96 in Paris, Kathleen and I sat down with him and spoke about his early years as an audiophile. To accompany <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com//loudspeakerreviews/273/">my review</A> of the JMlab Utopia, We tried to find out what drives him—to make the drivers he makes today! I asked him when had it all started:
The performance of deep bass is one of the most perplexing questions we face. Timeless as the search for eternal youth or the meaning of life, the quest for truly satisfying deep bass has engaged generations of philosophers and inventors. Until recently, the subject was primarily one of conjecture, opinion, and hypothesis. Even so, almost no hard science had been devoted to this enduring issue.