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<B>Larry Archibald on CD:</B> <BR> This article on Compact Discs and CD players is by Doug Sax, president of Sheffield Records and a longtime opponent of digital recording. J. Gordon Holt offers a <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com//digitalsourcereviews/193/">response</A&gt; elsewhere in this issue, in which he advises readers to buy a Compact Disc player as soon as they can afford it. Gordon in general hails the Compact Disc as the greatest thing to hit audio since the stereophonic LP.

Recording and music production technology has seen enormous change in recent years. Engineers and producers now have unprecedented power to manipulate the tinest details in recordings using computers and other tools. But the process may be taking the life and soul out of music. Some feel that commercial recordings lack the spontaneity that makes live music so immediate and satisfying. Others prefer the "perfection."

In the <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com/news/10054/">first set</A> of prophecies, we foresaw the effects of DVD-Audio, high-end sales around the world, and tweak multidisc CD. For the second installment, we look into our crystal interconnects and foresee new audio data-distribution methods for the coming year.

<B>DELBERT McCLINTON: <I>One of the Fortunate Few</I></B><BR> Rising Tide RTD-53042 (CD). 1997. Gary Nicholson, Emory Gordy, Jr., Delbert McClinton, prods.; Russ Martin, Marc Frigo, engs. AAD? TT: 38:12<BR> Performance <B>****</B><BR> Sonics <B>****&#189;</B>

Digital Versatile Disc (DVD)---the well-publicized successor to VHS tapes, compact discs (CDs), and CD-ROMs---will struggle in the video and music industries, but be a major success for the personal computer industry, according to a recent report from Forrester Research. The report concludes that PC manufacturers will rapidly embrace DVD, resulting in an installed base of 53 million DVD-equipped PCs by 2002.

Only a few days remain until Christmas. Trees, tinsel, twinkling lights, and . . . tunes. It's the audiofool's most dreaded time of the year, when he once again suffers through his nine-thousandth experience of Bing Crosby crooning "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer." Sheer torture.