RCA Living Stereo SACDs: Round Four
The fourth round of RCA Red Seal Living Stereo hybrid SACD/CDs hit the literal and virtual shelves on February 7. [Kalman Rubinson wrote about the first batch here.—Ed.http://www.stereophile.com/musicintheround/1104mitr/">here.—E…;] Remastered from the original two- and three-channel master tapes using the DSD process, these 10 new SACDs present the material exactly as it was recorded, without equalization, filtering, or other tampering.
RealNetworks Acquires Xing, Joins IBM
Last week, RealNetworkshttp://www.real.com">RealNetworks; announced that it has signed a definitive agreement to acquire privately held Xing">http://www.xing-tech.com">Xing Technology, a developer and provider of MP3 software. Xing has been developing standards-based digital audio and video encoding and decoding technology since 1990, but eventually ran into trouble competing with other Internet-audio startups such as RealNetworks and Liquid Audio.
Recommended Components
Hard as it is to believe, next year will be the 40th anniversary of Stereophile's famed "Recommended Components" feature. J. Gordon Holt first set the list to paper when the Beatles were first breaking big in the US, and its April and October appearances have stood as biannual audiophile institutions ever since.
Recommended Components Errata
As I explain in the current issue's "As We See It" column, I decide on the ratings of the equipment featured in Stereophile's "Recommended Components" listing after consultation with the reviewers, taking into account the original review comments and, sometimes, my own experience.
Record 116dB Dynamic Range Claimed by Monolithic Audio A/D
March 9, AKM">http://www.akm.com">AKM Semiconductor, Inc. introduced the AK5392, a 24-bit stereo analog-to-digital (A/D) converter based on its proprietary dual-bit delta-sigma technology. The AK5392 reportedly achieves a dynamic range of 116dB, said to be a 15dB improvement over other single-chip alternatives.
Record Collecting Resources---Online Treasure Trove for Vinylholics
Collectors will go to to any lengths to track down the objects of their obsession. Record collectors, a particularly extreme species, are known for their incredible attention to detail and their astounding capacity for absorbing vast quantities of minutiae.
Record Label Roundup
The music goes round and round: An investment group led by former Universal Music chief Edgar Bronfman, Jr. is in the lead to acquire Warner Music Group (WMG) and Warner/Chappell Music Publishing from corporate parent Time Warner, according to reports issued the third week of November. Bronfman's group—a consortium of banks and venture capital firms—has offered $2.8 billion for Time Warner's musical properties, possibly forcing prior suitor EMI Group PLC to drop out of the bidding. On Thursday, November 20, EMI chairman Eric Nicoll told reporters that Time Warner had informed his company of "a possible proposal from another party as an alternative to our own firm offer."
Record Labels Beware
One would think the last thing the music industry needs right now is to further alienate its customers who are still buying discs. But that is just what the record labels are doing by secretly experimenting with technology that restricts how discs are used, says a new report.
Record Labels in Joint Ventures?
The need to cut costs may push the music industry to experiment with collaborative manufacturing and distribution, according to reports that emerged the first week of October.
Record Labels Sue ISPs
The music industry's anti-piracy war took a new turn August 16, when a coalition of major record labels filed suit against several large Internet service providers in the hope of blocking access to an offshore free music site.