The Consumer Electronic Association's (CEA) Gary Shapiro is known for maintaining an ever-optimistic stance on the progress of home entertainment, and a recent keynote at the Semiconductor Market Outlook Conference earlier this month provided an opportunity for him to reveal his top predictions for the future.

Sam Tellig and Kalman Rubinson each take a run at the unique <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com//amplificationreviews/729/">PS Audio HCA-2 power amplifier</A> 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?

Want your kids to grow up smarter? Have them study music. Want to hold off the mental ravages of old age? Listen to music. Want to get high (legally), feel ecstatic, make your pain disappear? Music is the cure for what ails you.

<A HREF="http://www.warnermusic.com">Warner Music Group</A> is supporting efforts by the DVD Forum to create a hybrid dual-layer CD/DVD-audio disc, according to reports from New York the first week of December. WMG, a unit of AOL Time Warner, is one of the music industry's principal backers of the DVD-Audio format.

Wireless local audio/video networks and surround sound systems have long been one of the electronics industry's holy grails, given the fact that a major cost in installing home theaters or whole-house audio systems is the wiring. The market potential is so great that major chipmakers have invested enormous amounts of research in developing products that would enable easy placement of audio and video systems anywhere in a home without the need for dedicated wiring.

Visit any major metropolitan city, and chances are you'll eventually stumble upon vendors selling pirate CDs from outdoor tables, often for as little as $5 each. But for the suburban resident in the US, flea markets are where the pirate action is.

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 <I>building</I>. 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?

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 <I>building</I>. 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?

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 <I>building</I>. 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?