Home Theater Component of 1994:
Proceed PAV audio/video preamplifier ($4195; reviewed by Thomas J. Norton, Vol.17 No.9, September 1994 Review)
It took a while for high-end audio companies to wake up to the opportunities offered by the marriage of audio and video. But when they did, serious butt was kicked. B&W, McIntosh, and Fosgate/Audionics all produced some excellent THX-specification Home Theater speaker systems in the last year, but the Home Theater product that impressed every Stereophile staffer who heard it was the remote-control Proceed PAV audio/video surround-sound control center from Madrigal Audio Laboratories.
Exceptionally versatile in that it offers Dolby Pro-Logic decoding, THX processing, on-screen setup, a complete complement of audio and video inputs and outputs, and rear-channel decorrelation performed by subtly shifting the left and right surround signals randomly in time rather than in frequency or phase, the PAV is the most transparent surround-sound processor we've yet heard. Its effect on film soundtracks was magical, TJN noting its convincing reproduction of recorded subtleties such as the wind whistling around Ryan's house in the climactic scenes of Patriot Games, and the space and depth in Shawn Murphy's stunning recording of James Horner's score for the same movie. Even more important for this particular Home Theater curmudgeon, however, was that, until the appearance of the PAV, using processing on music signals to produce an enveloping soundfield without degrading the overall sound quality has been an impossible test for surround-sound processors to pass. The PAV passes it!
Tom Norton summed up his review thusly: "The PAV is expensive, but as part of a first-class, no-compromise Home Theater, it's worth every penny."
Finalists (in alphabetical order):
B&W Home Cinema THX loudspeaker system ($7000; reviewed by Thomas J. Norton, Vol.17 No.10, October 1994)
Fosgate/Audionics 3A audio/video preamplifier ($2799; reviewed by J. Gordon Holt, Vol.17 No.4, April 1994)
Fosgate/Audionics THX loudspeaker system ($7630; reviewed by J. Gordon Holt, Vol.17 No.4, April 1994)
McIntosh THX Home Theater loudspeaker system ($6500; reviewed by Thomas J. Norton, Vol.17 No.5, May 1994)
B&W Home Cinema THX loudspeaker system ($7000; reviewed by Thomas J. Norton, Vol.17 No.10, October 1994)
Fosgate/Audionics 3A audio/video preamplifier ($2799; reviewed by J. Gordon Holt, Vol.17 No.4, April 1994)
Fosgate/Audionics THX loudspeaker system ($7630; reviewed by J. Gordon Holt, Vol.17 No.4, April 1994)
McIntosh THX Home Theater loudspeaker system ($6500; reviewed by Thomas J. Norton, Vol.17 No.5, May 1994)
