LATEST ADDITIONS

Sam Tellig and Kalman Rubinson each take a run at the unique PS Audio HCA-2 power amplifier to see what it's made of. Will Tellig and Rubinson agree on the HCA-2's worth? Furthermore, what do the odd results of John Atkinson's measurements mean?

"Suicide junctions," I calls 'em. The ones with which I'm most familiar are on I-278, just north of the Verrazano Narrows Bridge in Brooklyn, New York, and along North Mopac in Austin, Texas, but they must exist all over the US. Traffic about to enter the freeway must first cross the line of faster-traveling offcoming cars, the intersection's on- and off-ramps crossing in a shallow X.

Computers and vacuum tubes go together like Trent Lott and flyaway hair, right? The last time filaments glowed in computers was during the 1960s, when a computer was a building. I remember laughing at the ponytailed computer-science dweebs back then, who spent their college days playing nursemaid to a football field's worth of electronics capable of little more than adding two plus two. Chained to a computer half the day, as most of us now are, guess who had the last laugh?

As tighter restrictions on the use of both audio and video digital content loom in the legislature, the Home Recording Rights Coalition (HRRC) and the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA) have teamed up to counter the ever-increasing demands from copyright holders. The HRRC, founded in 1981, is a leading advocacy group for consumers' rights to use home electronics products for private, non-commercial purposes.