When I was asked to review the APC S20, a power conditioner with battery backup, I didn’t fully appreciate how important or perfect this unit would be in controlling and protecting the gear in our Home Theater, but after using it for a few months, I now consider the APC S20 an essential part of our setup.
Dallas, TX, December 26th, 2007 • Usher Audio Technology, manufacturers of high-value, high-performance speaker systems and electronics, wins accolades and awards for the Be-718 Monitor speakers featured at this year’s CES, hailed as the new bar-raising price/performance king of the class.
Oppo Digital is a very rare light among the stifling mediocrity found in most low to middle priced digital audio and video electronics. Readers of this website know that we all have a virtually uniform love for their products, and it is for extremely good reason.
When you are out shopping for a home theater system, and you take your DVD player, receiver, speakers, and subwoofer home, two of the things you might realize when setting it all up are (1) you didn't get enough cables and the cables you did get are not long enough; and (2) the bookshelf speakers don't fit very well on the shelf.
There was a lot of buzz after CEDIA and CES this past January. The projector market has been going through a huge change over the last year and the evolution of this market segment has been amazing to say the least.
The SSP (Surround Sound Processor) world has been a sad place for the last couple of years. All the mass market companies were implementing HDMI on just about every model of receiver they had, but all the high-end SSP companies hesitated, because HDMI versions kept changing.
Over the last two years, the Korean company DViCO has proven to be a worthwhile player in the media streamer market. The company is now producing its third generation in the TViX family of products: the TViX HD-M4100SH.
BenQ has been one of the more elusive projector manufacturers for the home theater market. They are huge in the world of professional projectors for business use, but have only dabbled a bit in home theater.
Over the past few years, several new companies that manufacture A/V cables have emerged. Most of them sell these cables at entry-level prices. The cables are good, basic designs. Legenburg, although a new cable company, is definitely not in the entry-level arena. It is high-end.
Outlaw Audio, those "Internet only" rebels lead by head wrangler Peter Tribeman, have finally satisfied a large following by entering the speaker market.
Although Usher may not be a name that comes to USA consumers' minds when thinking of speakers, they have actually been making them for more than 30 years. Perhaps the lack of name recognition comes from the parent company being in Taiwan.
B&W (Bowers & Wilkins) speakers have been around since the 1960's when John Bowers and Peter Hayward built the P1 using an EMI woofer and Celestion tweeter. By the end of the decade they had constructed the DM70 entirely in house with a 12" woofer and electrostatic midrange and tweeter. This was the beginning of B&W's pursuit of loudspeaker perfection.
While most consumers are probably into surround sound, the reality is that a fair percentage still listen to two-channel stereo. The shift to flat-panel video displays and "thin-is-in" look of home theater has perhaps increased the interest in two-channel.
As much as I enjoyed reviewing the Marantz SR7500 receiver (was it really 18 months ago?), at the time I found myself lusting over the next-in-line receiver, the 8500 ...
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