Author: Avi Greengart

Industry / PC Convergence

When the walls are open, Microsoft’s moving in

- by Avi Greengart - Leave a Comment

I was at Microsoft’s Preview Day today in New York, which for me was largely about mobile devices (see my bio). One thing that came across clearly, however, was the centrality of Windows XP Media Center (XP MCE) to Microsoft’s overall consumer plans.  This reminded me of an interesting case study in Digital Connect about a custom installer, Silicon East, which has a somewhat unique specialty putting systems into new construction. That’s nothing new – when the walls are open, it’s the best time to put in home networking gear, and the walls are never more open than during new construction. But rather than get Mr. New Homeowner to buy a typical custom installation A/V system, Silicon East is pushing PC’s with XP MCE. 

This should be a pretty tough sell, as the notion of using a PC as a media hub still hasn’t hit mass adoption yet – at best, builders are content to wire up a house for broadband and create a media nook where a plasma TV can be hung on the wall.  Silicon East gets around this by selling the builder first.  They actually go out to builders and hook their offices up with MCE boxes.  The latest version of XP MCE is nearly as slick as a TiVo (and far more versatile – I’m typing this column on one); once the builders are hooked, they demonstrate it to potential customers in the model homes.

Silicon East gives up some margin figures (7% on hardware, 30% on service), and notes that they turn down business that’s likely to be unprofitable (any time the customer uses the term, "Dell"). The initial foray is almost a loss leader – once the customer is hooked, there are follow on opportunities for display sales, system extensions, and all kinds of home automation.

-avi

When the walls are open, Microsoft’s moving in Read More
HDTV

HDTV and Plastic Surgery

- by Avi Greengart - Leave a Comment

I maintain that the worst thing to hit to our "national pastime" (officially still baseball) is not steroid abuse, but HDTV. In high resolution closeups, players spitting chewing tobacco and "adjusting themselves" is far more offensive than Super Bowl halftime shows or Desperate Housewives previews. In a high def world, certain things have to change: performance enhancing drugs are fine – until they kill the athletes, they make their muscles look nice and ripped. But chaw, and polyester pants that gather in the crotch? Those have to go.

It’s not that HDTV has so much resolution that you can see every pock mark and wrinkle on someone’s face; it’s that the camera zooms in much closer than you’d ever get in real life. OnHD.com has long maintained a snarky list of which celebs look better or worse in HD, and Hollywood makeup artists have been altering their technique to airbrush on makeup rather than simply apply it in swatches.

The New York Times Magazine finally picked up on the story, with a twist (free registration required) – younger celebs are now opting for plastic surgery. Conversely, for older celebs, surgery is counterproductive, because its so obvious. The Times also points out something most others miss – it’s not just the higher resolution that points out very human flaws, but also that HDTV supports a richer color palette.  However, the article makes it sound like there was some sort of ban on specific color shades, rather than a simple technical limitation.  You can wear subtle red lipstick on standard NTSC TV, it just won’t appear quite the same shade.

Let’s not forget the most important thing we’ve learned about HDTV: some celebs actually look better in HD. Penelope Cruz shows up as #10 on OnHD’s list (she was on Leno in HD recently, and I have to concur). It’s not just the women, either: George Clooney is #7, and Jay Leno himself gets an honorable mention – I’m sure Jay would have something to say about that.

-avi

HDTV and Plastic Surgery Read More
HDTV / Industry / PC Convergence

Yes, it was a live demo… also a misleading one

- by Avi Greengart - 1 Comment

Back in February I wrote about Microsoft’s Lightspeed IPTV demo at CES and linked to BusinessWeek’s skeptical coverage.  Well, the magazine was just biding its time and this week they completely skewer the initiative (subscription required), highlighting the endless delays in commercializing it.  It seems the impressive demo I saw at CES was real.  The problem is that the technology doesn’t work for millions of users at once, which is kind of important for the operators who want to broadly deploy it.  Live and learn.

Still, TV over IP seems somewhat inevitable. Japan and Korea have DSL service 10x faster than what U.S. operators provide and at lower prices. I’d think that deploying dramatically faster DSL would both solve many of the technical problems with IPTV and at the same time provide the service justification for consumers to upgrade to broadband (or even switch from cable modems).

-avi

Yes, it was a live demo… also a misleading one Read More
Industry

Retail Goes Custom

- by Avi Greengart - 2 Comments.

There’s a new big box retail mini-chain (5 stores) here in Northern NJ, Electronics Expo, and it is unlike any other big box retail store I have seen. The CEDIA custom installation market is growing at double digit rates, and Electronics Expo is essentially a gigantic showroom for flat panel displays, front projectors, and more flat panel displays. The highlight of the store is the second level – a walkthrough of a ‘model home’ with flat panel displays absolutely everywhere. Extremely high end receivers – though no separates – are arrayed in two of the rooms on the main floor, but the speaker selection is paltry and tops out at mid-tier brands (Polk’s LSi line and Monitor Audio). There is a whole house audio system on display (Yamaha’s MusiCAST), a few MP3 players out front, and small counters for digital cameras and camcorders near the entrance.

Some observations:

  • The first page in Electronics Expo’s brochure highlights the availability of CEDIA custom installation for its products. Given the product selection and pricing, installation services should be a significant profit driver for Electronics Expo.
  • Consumers are spending money on video, not audio, and that is the focus on the sales floor: high end video. The selection is not what a videophile would consider high end, but close.
  • It’s clear you can’t compete with Best Buy, Circuit City, Target, or Costco on cameras, computers, DVDs, video game systems, and even most TV categories.
  • Pricing is almost ludicrously high; nearly everything was MSRP, and the sale prices were not competitive with sale prices elsewhere or online.
  • The store’s square footage is equivalent to a small Circuit City. The level of sales help was equivalent, too — nowhere near as knowledgeable as at many small specialty retailers.

Bottom line: Electronics Expo has a nice showroom format, which could seriously hurt specialty retailers, forcing those without significant high end clientele (those who demand truly high end systems, not just "better than at Best Buy") to become full time custom installers, and drop their retail storefronts. But Electronics Expo is counting on the continued desirability – and premium pricing – of flat panel displays. Given the poor sales help and high fixed costs for the big box showroom format, if prices on high end panels drop, Electronics Expo is going to have to find something else to sell. I have long advocated that Best Buy dedicate more floor space to lifestyle demonstrations, custom installation, and front projection; if it does so, it could bury Electronics Expo on price.

-avi

Retail Goes Custom Read More
Displays

Front Projection: When More is Less

- by Avi Greengart - Leave a Comment

Evan Powell over at Projector Central has an insightful article up on choosing the right resolution for budget front projectors.

Bottom line:

  • In the U.S., 848×480 is ideal for DVD, video games, and regular TV. HDTV looks pretty good at this resolution, too. These projectors are cheap, the images are beautiful – go for it.
  • Moving up to 1024×576 is essential for Europeans, where the extra resolution is needed for regular TV (the U.S. and Europe use different TV standards).
  • Moving up to 1024×576 is counterproductive for U.S. consumers because the extra resolution isn’t used for TV and makes little difference on HDTV, so why spend more to risk introducing softness or artifacts on DVD, which now has to be scaled up to fit?
  • Moving all the way up to 1280×720 (or higher) makes sense for U.S. consumers who plan to watch a lot of HDTV or one of the new HD disc formats being introduced later this year.

-avi

Front Projection: When More is Less Read More
DVD

The Sony PS3 and HD-DVD/Blu-Ray Reapprochment

- by Avi Greengart - Leave a Comment

There’s been a flurry of news over the past month about Blu-Ray and HD-DVD backers getting together to avoid a format war for the next generation of high definition discs.  I’ve avoided covering each step on the drama, so here’s a quick recap of the posturing between the two camps:

  • "Hey, we’re new here at Sony, and going proprietary hasn’t worked out so well in the past few years. Let’s work this BD/HD-DVD thing out"
  • "OK"
  • "Um, we can’t,"
  • "No, really, we’re still trying,"
  • "Look! HD-DVD can do 45GB per disc, too!"
  • "A single format doesn’t look likely – the technologies don’t mesh well."
  • "…but we’re getting our CEOs involved to hash out licensing revenue share possibilities"
  • "Nope, not looking likely…"

To this, Bill Hunt over at The Digital Bits took in a bit of E3 hype and concluded that Blu-Ray has already won (5/17/05 "Early Post"), based on the potential PS3 installed base:

I’m going to go out in a limb right now and post something that some of you may consider a bit controversial. But I think the writing is on the wall. I think the format war is over before it’s even begun, and the Toshiba/HD-DVD camp is toast.

Why? You know how many PlayStation 2 systems Sony’s sold since that unit’s launch? 87 million. Let me repeat that. 87 million. 1.5 million were sold in the PS2’s first month of availability alone.

I already covered the PS3 angle back in March noting that with PS3 support, Blu-Ray should be able to solve the chicken and egg problem better than HD-DVD to get an installed base. Of course, that assumes that Sony prices the unit within reach of the masses. Despite lots of details coming out of the PS3 launch this week, pricing hasn’t been announced, so Sony could theoretically decide to sell the PS3 at $999 and kill the market.  They won’t do that, but console pricing will have an outsized impact here.

-avi

The Sony PS3 and HD-DVD/Blu-Ray Reapprochment Read More
Audio / PC Convergence

Of non-iPods

- by Avi Greengart - 1 Comment

I’ve been testing several digital music players and third party headphones – none of them from Apple. It’s not that I don’t like the iPod, I just haven’t gotten one in recently from Apple. My past experiences with iPod suggest that Apple leads the industry with good reason.

I prefer SanDisk’s Digital Audio Player to the iPod Shuffle, though I understand the Shuffle’s appeal – particularly the tight integration with iTunes for moving music on and off the device.  Still, I prefer seeing the title of what I’m listening to, and the SanDisk has both a screen and a remarkably good user interface for such a small thing. SanDisk has just announced a new flash player with removable memory; I have not gotten one in yet.

For most people looking for a hard drive player, the iPod product line has no equal. I’ve even recommended an iPod mini for my father (he uses it to study Talmud.  Really). But what if you aren’t most people? What if you want to subscribe to Yahoo!’s new service?  What if you’ve ripped all your CD’s in WMA format?  Then you’ll need to look outside the land of fruit.

I’ve used three 5GB players recently, but with Virgin’s player now off the market, I’ll focus here on Dell’s Pocket DJ and Olympus’ m:robe 100. Both can play WMA files, and the Dell is compatible with Microsoft "Janus" powered music subscription services (Windows Media 10 with Digital Rights Management). Both have excellent fidelity. Both have just slightly more storage space than the 4GB iPod mini, and cost a bit less (the Olympus actually costs more, but can be bought from discounters online).

The Dell DJ gains versatility by giving up software. It uses Microsoft’s Windows Media player for all synchronization and music management activities, which turns out is a good thing. Apple’s iTunes synchronization is slightly more straightforward (especially for novices), but Microsoft is running a close second here (and MusicMatch a close third – MusicMatch will recognize and sync with the DJ as well). The physical interface on the DJ is a scroll bar, not a touchpad, and it works fine. The user interface is nothing fancy, and does not try to add PDA functionality or FM radio or voice recording – it’s a music player.

The Olympus m:robe 100 has gorgeous industrial design. From the white back it looks like an iPod, but the front is a dramatic glassy black slab with no visible buttons. The whole front surface is touch sensitive, and bright red LEDs light up when needed to indicate where the buttons are. A high resolution red LED screen complements the "buttons." It is a striking design and works well in practice, though the sliding lock switch is a necessity with the m:robe, not an option.

However, there are problems with the m:robe. The headphone jack is on the side, which makes it difficult to pocket the device. The Olympus does not support subscription services. And here’s the deal breaker: the Olympus demands that you use its proprietary – and terrible – m-trip PC software for synchronization and music management. You can’t drag music files to the device directly, you can’t use MusicMatch or Microsoft or Apple’s to manage music on the device, and the Olympus m-trip software is missing basic functionality such as syncing playlists and the songs that are associated with them. With a 30GB player, you can move all your music to the device and then mostly forget about it.  But with a 5GB player, if you have more than 5 GB of music you need to move things on and off the device frequently. I found the m-trip software too painful to use on a regular basis.

I really wanted to like the m:robe – I love holding and playing with it – and I really wanted to dislike the Dell – design-wise, it’s just "OK." Neither beats Apple at its own game. But despite the m:robe being prettier than any iPod, the m:trip software it comes with is too painful to use. As a basic device for playing WMA files or tethered music from subscriptions, the Dell is much easier to recommend.

-avi

Of non-iPods Read More
Audio / Displays / Industry

When Manufacturers Don’t Manufacture, What Are They?

- by Avi Greengart - Leave a Comment

I wrote earlier about Outlaw’s new 990 audio processor, and was left with a few questions. They’ve since posted a FAQ that not only answers my questions, but also provides rare public insight into industry practices for cross-company parts sharing. Audio is a lot like the automobile industry – creating a platform is enormously expensive, and companies often share development to keep costs down. Sure, there are a few boutiques that create everything themselves from scratch, but custom efforts are enormously expensive, limiting the potential market size.

Outlaw uses the three different models shown below for product development, and so do all the other specialty brands to one degree or another, regardless of their distribution model. The selection of which development path to use is determined by the specific product, its cost, complexity and its anticipated volume. Going back to our first offering, the Model 750 amplifier, we have never hidden our relationships with some of the industry’s leading manufacturers. Remember that out process is not unique, and only a few of the "major" brands actually design and manufacture their own processors from the ground up. We know of no company in the "internet only" market that totally designs and builds all of their processors on their own.

The FAQ continues to describe which of its products were designed, manufactured, licensed out, or licensed in. Outlaw exclusively sells direct online; I don’t know if that completely explains their openness. But they are hardly alone, and got me thinking of some other common business models:

  • Brand A designs, someone else manufactures for Brand A. Very few – if any – of today’s manufacturers actually manufacture everything they sell. In some cases, a company will manufacture one type of product, but not others.  For example, Sony manufacturers most of its TV sets, but practically none of its headphones.
  • Brand A designs and then its design is "sublet" to Brand B to defray costs. Brand B rebadges the design with mostly cosmetic changes and sells it as its own. This has long been the way most vendors obtain their universal remote controls, but it happens in high end audio whenever a vendor specializes in one component but needs to offer retailers a complete product line to get distribution.  For example, Lexicon has been rebadging Bryston amplifiers for years.
  • Brand A designs the core chassis (in the case of a processor or receiver), core technology (in the case of MP3 players and digital cameras) or driver/crossover (in the case of speakers), and Brand B rebadges it with changes. These changes can be cosmetic, substantive, or both.  For example, most MP3 players – including the iPod – are based on chips from PortalPlayer. Companies can use PortalPlayer’s software (technically "firmware," in this case), use just some of it, or write their own from scratch.
  • Brand A and Brand B share development costs on the core technologies, then customize the surrounding technologies for differentiation. Examples here include Sony and Samsung’s jointly owned LCD fabrication plants; LG and Philips have joint ventures in plasma TV manufacturing. But in each case, the video processing, scaling, types of inputs, and case design are all different, leading to different performance characteristics and pricing.

-avi

When Manufacturers Don’t Manufacture, What Are They? Read More
Audio / Industry

New/Old Audio Technologies New Again: Part Two

- by Avi Greengart - Leave a Comment

Outlaw just announced a new pre/pro (the surround sound processing portion of a receiver without the amplifier section), the model 990, and its a doozy: a high end version of the company’s 950 for only $1099. More surprising than the product itself is Outlaw’s secrecy about it – while some analysts (including yours truly) were briefed on this last year, this is the first public indication the company has made that they were even working on a new pre/pro, and it should be shipping within the next month or two. The change in strategy was due to the flack the company took during the oft-delayed development of the 950. Not surprisingly, there has been some grumbling on the forums that not enough notice was given on the 990… damned if you do, damned if you don’t. This was the right decision though – publicly slipping announced shipping dates damaged the company’s reputation and angered the customer base, while surprising the market only means a few lost sales for customers who bought something else in the meantime.

The standout feature most will notice are fully balanced outputs, to go with a future Outlaw amplifier with balanced inputs. Most people assume that balanced outputs – found on professional and some audiophile gear – are superior to regular RCA jacks. Thus, from a marketing perspective, the 990 has something to crow about.  However, the reason why balanced inputs/outputs appear on professional gear is not because it adds a magical element to the sound, but because it allows for very long cable runs without signal degredation.  In most home environments, this is irrelevant, and balanced signals at the very least add cost (the cables are more expensive) and may actually have a slight negative impact on the sound.

Even discounting the balanced outputs, the 990 looks like a bargain compared to most pre/pros, which start in the $1500 range and quickly climb from there. Component quality is higher than the 950, though this may be overkill: I was given a chance to review a 950, and found its noise floor to be extremely low and its sound quality to be transparent. The 990 offers tremendous flexibility for bass management for all sources, and has stereo subwoofer outputs. All the usual surround modes are included, along with Dolby Headphone (and a headphone jack). All analog video can be converted to component, and DVI switching is included. The 990’s software is upgradeable, and, as an Internet-only retailer, this is something Outlaw is likely to take advantage of down the road. However, there are a few open questions:

  • There’s no word on automatic room callibration, though some sort of setup routine is included. [Update: the 990 provides automatic setup of speaker levels and delay times using an included microphone.  Automatic room callibration is not available, but could be provided as a software upgrade in the future.]
  • The 950 has an audio delay and click problem when switching inputs; hopefully that issue has been resolved in the 990.
  • Presumably, the 990 is not hardware upgradable, which means that HDMI switching can’t be added down the road. This is not so much a technical problem – for most setups, DVI switching is practically the same thing – but a marketing issue. HDMI switching would eliminate the additional cable clutter and expense of carrying digital audio signals to and from certain components. [Update: The 990 is not hardware upgradable. The company’s explanation why HDMI switching was not included is not terribly convincing.]

We will likely get a 990 in for a full review. My review of Outlaw’s LFM-1 subwoofers can be found here (links to JupiterReasearch’s Home Theater Watch) and my review of Outlaw’s 7700 amplifier is here (links to Secrets of Home Theater).

-avi

New/Old Audio Technologies New Again: Part Two Read More
Audio

New/Old Audio Technologies New Again: Part One

- by Avi Greengart - 1 Comment

I seem to have missed this out at CES (and the company is completely quiet on its web site), but AKAI is getting back into surround receivers with a pair of tube receivers. Yes, vacuum tubes. The AVR8500 and AVR8510 are 7-Channel Vacuum Tube Audio/Video Receivers.  Both receivers use 7 Dual Triode Vacuum tubes (of “Blue Tube Thermionic” design, whatever that is), one for each amplifier. Tubes actually introduce audible distortion to an audio signal, but the distortion is harmonically pleasing, giving the sound a "warmth" that audiophiles crave.

The AVR8500 is rated at 100-watts x 7, and the AVR8510 is rated at 125-watts x 7 and also throws in a universal remote control. Both units support all current surround sound modes from Dolby and DTS. Somewhat uniquely, both models also include HDMI switching capability, bringing tube warmth to the latest surround sound gear and HDTV.

No word on availability, but pricing is astonishingly low: $899 for the AVR8500, $1199 for the 8510. I actually think this is a mistake: tube gear is often ludicrously expensive, and, at this point, AKAI no longer has a strong brand in the U.S. home theater market.  AKAI could easily create a few limited edition versions of the 85×0 series at much higher price points to build buzz and audiophile credibility.

-avi

New/Old Audio Technologies New Again: Part One Read More