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Describing the Audio">http://www.stereophile.com//amplificationreviews/288/">Audio Research Reference Two preamplifier, Michael Fremer writes "Audio Research's first 21st-century, audiophile-quality line-stage preamplifier combines retro-tech vacuum-tube amplification and power-supply circuitry with innovative, remote-controlled gain, balance, tape monitoring, and signal routing. The price is also 21st-century: $9995." Worth every penny? Fremer offers his assessment.

Flexibility is the name of the game as Theta">http://www.thetadigital.com/">Theta Digital plays it. The innovative Agoura Hills, CA company has announced the Casablanca II, a modular upgradable preamp/processor for music and cinema applications, as well as two-channel modules for its Dreadnaught power amplifier.

When audiophiles speak of "imaging," they may not be using the term metaphorically. Recent research at the University of California at San Diego's School of Medicine indicates that hearing and vision are more closely related than had been previously thought.

Last week's Comdex convention in Las Vegas showcased more examples of convergence between the consumer electronics and computer industries, especially in the areas of portable devices, home theater, and digital">http://www.stereophile.com/news/10893/">digital audio. DVD-Audio also received notice at the show, as chip developer Zoran">http://www.zoran.com/">Zoran Corporation announced the Vaddis V, its latest DVD multimedia processor, slated for mass production in spring 2001.

Investors have shown an inexplicable willingness to foot the bill for MP3.com's">http://www.mp3.com/">MP3.com's $53.4 million settlement with Universal">http://www.umusic.com/">Universal Music Group. In the four days following the announcement of a settlement on Tuesday, November 13, the now fully legitimate Internet music site watched its stock surge to four times the value it had only a month before. Shares of MP3.com closed Friday, November 17 at $9.42 each, triple the per-share price on the morning of the announcement. The stock had sunk to a 52-week low of $2.50 per share on October 11.

Two top executives at Bertelsmann">http://www.bmg.com/">Bertelsmann Music Group will depart in the wake of the company's recent settlementhttp://www.stereophile.com/news/10885/">settlement; of its lawsuit against Napster. Citing irreconcilable differences with parent company Bertelsmann AG over company strategy, BMG chief executive Strauss Zelnick and chairman Michael Dornemann announced their resignations Sunday November 5.

For the music industry, copyright and royalty litigation is like an endless war fought on many fronts. During early November, as four of the industry's "Big Five" continued their pursuit of the file-sharing service Napster, a parallel trial in US Federal Court in New York against music archiving-and-accessing site MP3.comhttp://www.mp3.com/">MP3.com; by Universal">http://www.umusic.com/">Universal Music Group entered its penalty phase, that segment of the proceeding in which aggrieved plaintiffs seek to extract money from guilty defendants. Other plaintiffs in the trial—Sony Music Entertainment, BMG, Warner Music, and EMI—have all settled with the San Diego-based Internet service for an average of $20 million each.