search
Yamaha Electronics Corporation has introduced four new A/V digital home-theater receivers equipped with XM Satellite Radio capability (XM-Ready). The $649.95 RX-V757, $549.95 RX-V657, $449.95 RX-V557, and $349.95 RX-V457 will allow users to plug an XM Connect-and-Play home antenna into the Yamaha XM-Ready A/V receiver and activate the XM service to receive 150-plus digital radio channels—no other accessories or installation are required. Using XM's industry-leading chipset technology, as well as a new proprietary chip and signaling protocol, the XM Connect-and-Play home antenna is capable of…
Operating at the fringes of the audio world, binaural recordings have continued to maintain a hardcore group of advocates. Creating a convincing three-dimensional surround effect using only a two-channel source, binaural technology is especially impressive with headphones.
This past month, John Sunier, host of the excellent PBS radio program Audiophile Audition, has brought high-quality (for the internet, anyway) samples of binaural recordings to his website at www.binaural.com.
These files offer an opportunity for anyone with a set of headphones and a stereo soundcard to get a taste…
How much does it cost to license DVD-Audio patents to create players or discs? That information was revealed last week when the DVD6C Licensing Agency, which represents the founders of the DVD Forum (formerly called the DVD Consortium) in the area of patent licensing, announced that it expects to start global licensing of essential patents for DVD-Audio and recordable DVD products on or about January 1, 2003.
DVD6C—which currently represents AOL Time Warner, Hitachi, IBM, Matsushita, Mitsubishi, Toshiba, and Victor Company of Japan (JVC)—notes that licenses will cover both drives and media…
The word's largest Internet service provider has decided to forgo an MP3 search feature until it figures out how to distinguish legal recordings from illegal ones. America Online made the announcement August 11 after discovering that the feature, which it hoped would enhance its Winamp site, might encourage piracy of copyrighted recordings.
AOL had wanted to add a music-search function, but has postponed the project until a copyright-secure system can be developed. "Now that it's up, we see we don't have an efficient process for distinguishing between legal and illegal MP3s," said AOL…
At CES2006, we were pleasantly surprised to encounter Jim Shannon in Quartet Marketing Group's exhibit room at the Alexis Villas. "What are you doing these days?" we asked. He gestured around the room. "I'm a partner in Quartet," he said. "I've been here since July."
Why are we always the last to know?
Shannon brings formidable experience to Quartet. He began working for New England Audio Consultants in New Haven, CT, where he became familiar with the then-new Mark Levinson Audio Systems, before starting his own high-end store in North Hampton, MA. He later joined Madrigal as West…
If you've ever hunted for a song title or a performer's name on the Internet, you've probably used CDDB, the Compact Disc Database.
Operated by Berkeley, CA–based Gracenote, CDDB is the world's largest online database of CD album information, enabling music fans to access information about recordings by album or song titles, genre, or artist. The company's continually updated server computers contain information on 1.4 million albums encompassing 18 million songs, and are accessed each month by approximately 30 million users.
On June 17, Gracenote announced a plan to expand its…
Last week saw a flurry of announcements in the online audio and video streaming business, capped off by Yahoo!'s acquisition of Broadcast.com. Yahoo! says it has signed a definitive agreement with Broadcast.com whereby Yahoo! will issue 0.7722 of a share of Yahoo! common stock for each share of Broadcast.com common stock. In addition, all outstanding options of Broadcast.com will be converted into Yahoo! options. The acquisition is expected to be completed in the third quarter of 1999 and is valued at around $5.7 billion, including $4.8 billion in Broadcast.com common stock and $900…
Conventional wisdom has it that, compared to men, few women express much interest in consumer electronics, and especially audio equipment. In fact, according to Consumer Electronics Association statistics, women accounted for only 22% of the $81 billion spent on consumer electronics in 1999. Prognosticator Jupiter Communcations predicts that, in spite of this, women will account for 46 million online buyers by 2003, and will overtake men in online purchasing.
Online retailer Hifi.com took note of this phenomenon and spotted an opportunity. According to a national survey conducted by the…
While some are trying to push the quality of paid music downloads up, others are pushing in the other direction. SanDisk, primarily known for flash memory cards used in portable devices like digital cameras, is launching "gruvi," described as "the first removable flash memory card of its type to be sold with premium music content."
Yes, this is yet another new format for buying music aimed at replacing the CD, and the first release in this new medium is the Rolling Stones' A Bigger Bang from EMI Music's Virgin Records. The Stones' gruvi album will hit the streets next month on a SanDisk…
Having a great product at a fair price is mandatory practice in the ever-competitive audio business. But getting the word out and placing those products in front of the customer is just as critical—some might argue, even more important. If this is true, then Canadian speaker company Athena has just made the score of a lifetime.
Last week, Athena Technologies announced that it has entered into an agreement with Best Buy Stores to market the Athena Audition and Point 5 speaker systems through Best Buy's more than 500 retail stores in the United States starting in April. Athena adds that…