search

Added to the Archives This Week

From the October 2004 issue, Larry Greenhill reviews the REL Studio III subwoofer, explaining, "Determined to experience sub-bass in my listening room, I arranged with REL's US importer, Sumiko Audio, to audition their largest subwoofer, the Studio III."

Also from October, Paul Bolin diverts a bit of time to check out the Siltech G5 Classic Cables. "The G5 Classics use a proprietary geometry called X-balanced Micro Technology, which, according to Siltech, makes the G5s the quietest cables, with the lowest distortion, to be found," expains PB.

Six years ago, Shannon Dickson extensively…

CD Recorders Hot Commodity This Season

People love to make their own compilation recordings. That fact helped make the cassette deck the most successful audio format of all time, and it is driving sales of CD recorders, a product category new to most consumers. As predicted last summer, CD recorders have become one of the hottest niches in consumer audio, exceeding MiniDisc machines in total sales dollars. Sales are brisk despite the fact that CD recorders are among the priciest components on the market, ranging from $500 to $600. MiniDisc recorders for home use are priced at about $250 and up.

Electronics retailers are…

Sirius Gets a Boost

Combine the challenge of establishing a start-up with the launch of an entirely new consumer electronics market and you've got the recipe for a highly volatile and explosive brew. But news of a successful $1.2 billion re-capitalization announced last week indicates that three-year old digital radio pioneer Sirius will likely remain intact—at least for now.

It has been a touch-and-go ride for both Sirius and competitor XM as they race to establish digital satellite radio services in the US and struggle to increase the ranks of their subscribers. XM got a shot in the arm last December…

Rega Retires the Planar 2

Let us pause for a moment to reflect on the passing of one of hi-fi’s most venerable components. For 30 years, Rega’s Planar 2—recently, simply known as the P2—has provided countless hi-fi enthusiasts with their first taste of the potential that the vinyl disc has to offer. Now Rega has decided to stop making it.

The Planar 2 wasn’t Rega’s first turntable. It was preceded, in 1973, by the Planet, whose "platter" was created by three outrigger weights. Very stylish, perhaps, but glass and felt worked better, so 1975 saw the introduction of the Planars 2 and 3. Early models used a tonearm…

The RIAA's Digital Radio Copy Protection Proposal; Plugging the "Analog Hole."

The hits just keep on coming in fair-use land. The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) has proposed legislation that requires that all digital radio content be encrypted, including works that now exist in the public domain. The proposed legislation would apply to satellite radio (Sirius, XM) as well as conventional terrestrial broadcasting. As proposed by the RIAA, content could be recorded only in blocks of 30 minutes or longer, and the recorded data could not be exported from the recording device (in other words, you could only play it back on the device you had recorded it on…

CD Surround Sound

Will surround sound rejuvenate the music industry? That's the position many record label execs took when adding the capability to DVD-Audio and SACD years ago. But while they wait for the high-rez formats to catch on, SRS Labs has decided to add multichannel audio to the conventional compact disc.

SRS recently announced that Lava Records' artist Uncle Kracker has chosen the company's Circle Surround (CS) multichannel encoding technology for a disc that will be released this week called Seventy Two & Sunny. According to SRS, CS provides the capability to encode up to 6.1 channels of…

American Technology Corporation Announces New Patents

Last week, American Technology Corp. (ATC) announced that three additional patents on its loudspeaker technologies have been granted by the US Patent and Trademark Office (see previous story). The company also announced that it has acquired the rights to "strategic" patents from the former Carver Corp. covering a variety of audio reproduction and amplifier technologies.

The company says that its intellectual property portfolio now includes over 100 US and foreign patents and patent filings relating to its HyperSonic Sound Technology (HSS), Stratified Field Technology (SFT), PureBass,…

The ELF Foundation

The Elf Foundation's accomplishments are extraordinary. In just four and a half years, the nonprofit organization has facilitated the design and construction of more than 40 Rooms of Magic. These are private entertainment theaters in medical facilities for children: hospitals, as well as centers for autism, abused children, and kids with long-term disabilities. And none of the design work or state-of-the-art equipment for these children's oases costs the host facilities a cent.

Elf is the brainchild of Doug Weinstein, 49, and his partner, Carol Campbell. After one of Weinstein's young…

Lucent's 400Gbs Fiber and ADSL = High-Speed Downloads

Build a road and traffic will flow.

Lucent Technologies recently announced that it has developed a technique to transmit 400 Gigabits of data per second over one fiberoptic strand. Lucent's technology, called dense wavelength division multiplexing, divides a strand into multiple channels of light. Some fibers may be split into as many as 80 channels, according to Gerald Butlers, president of Lucent's optical networking division. With eight fibers, data can be transmitted at 3.2 trillion bits per second. The Wall Street Journal described this as "the equivalent of 90,000 encyclopedia…

Peter J. Walker 1916–2003

I am saddened to report that Peter James Walker, the founder of quintessential English audio company Quad, passed away on December 10, after a long illness. He was 87. Peter Walker had been married twice; both his wives had died before him. He is survived by a daughter, Victoria, and a son, Ross, the latter having played a major role in managing Quad through the 1970s and '80s.

Peter had started his Acoustical Manufacturing Company (as S.P. Fidelity Sound System) in London before WWII to make public address equipment. After his premises were destroyed by bombing, he relocated to Huntingdon…