Accessories – Page 3 – Devices View

Headphones To Lure the Next Generation

February 7, 2011 - by Avi Greengart - 2 Comments.

Great article in Dealerscope on how custom audio shops can prepare for the future by focusing more on headphone sales. Money quote:

"There are no new audiophiles entering our community any more," Abplanalp said. "For young people experiencing music, the art of building a stereo has lost its cachet. So selling headphones is a very important part of introducing music lovers to different performance levels…"

The article also notes that Monster's Dr. Dre Beats line is a key sales driver for this demographic, but oddly undersells the ability to properly demo in-ear headphones in-store.

Accessories / Audio / Music

Slate talks about the wonders of outboard DACs, I talk headphones

December 30, 2010 - by Avi Greengart - Leave a Comment

Fred Kaplan is apparently writing for Slate now*, and he correctly points out that digital music often sounds terrible, either due to poor sampling or poor encoding. He recommends using an outboard DAC to correct the problem. It's a great suggestion for people who listen to music in one spot using high end speakers or headphones, but not at all practical for those who are mobile, using an MP3 player or a smartphone as their playback source. Aside from echoing his related note to bump up the encoding rate when you rip music or download higher quality encoded music in the first place, the best suggestion I can make for mobile music listening is to invest in higher quality headphones. My first pair of Shure e535's had an almost magical ability to smooth out ragged MP3s without losing any detail (as well they should for $499). When they broke on me, Shure shipped out a replacement pair, but the new model doesn't sound quite as exceptional to my ears in the MP3-magic area — it is still a fantastically neutral pair of headphones with exceptionally clean mids and rich bass, but jagged highs due to MP3 encoding faults still sound jagged on my new pair. The drivers are supposed to be identical, so I'm not sure if I got lucky on the first pair or less lucky on the second (or that I am/was hearing things that weren't there. Also a possibility).

I love the Shures, but my headphones of choice these days are etymotic's flagship ER-4's, which are hardly new, but have been transformed by custom earpieces etymotic had made for me. The program, which I called out in my Holiday Gift Guide, is called CUSTOM•FIT, and costs $100 (in addition to the cost of headphones). If you care about comfort and noise isolation, it is worth every penny.

*UPDATE: Fred got in touch to point out that defense and foreign policy are actually his primary coverage areas – and he modestly left out the part where he won a Pulitzer on those subjects. I know him from his sideline as an A/V writer.

Accessories / Audio / Industry / PC Convergence

Last Minute Holiday Gift Guide

December 19, 2010 - by Avi Greengart - Leave a Comment

My Last Minute, Non-Obvious Holiday Gift Guide 2010 has been posted over at Slashgear.com and includes a Home Entertainment section.

Accessories / DVD / HDTV / Industry / PC Convergence

Kaleidescape Ships Blu-ray Server (Sort of)

December 14, 2010 - by Avi Greengart - Leave a Comment

First a bit of background: Kaleidescape is a high end media server vendor. They make boxes you have a custom installer put in one spot, which connect over a wired network to smaller boxes your installer connects to each TV and projector in your home. You – or your installer – copies all your DVDs onto the big box, and then you can watch all your movies anywhere in your home. Basically, it's Sonos for movies for rich people. How rich? Kaleidescape was actually the reason I instituted a policy not to review anything I could not reasonably afford. Years ago Kaleidescape offered me a full setup to review; I refused because I didn't want to take out an insurance policy on a loaner, and I didn't want to take out a second mortgage on the chance that I couldn't bear to return it. A full Kaleidescape system in those days easily topped $50,000. Prices have come way down, but most systems will still end up in the $20,000 range with installation.

I had good reason to fear wanting to keep a system. I have used Kaleidescape at trade shows and have been consistently impressed. It is fully babysitter proof and requires no technical knowledge to use whatsoever. As all the movies are ripped to the system's hard drive(s), movies start instantly. However, its one downfall is that until now it only supported DVDs, not Blu-ray discs. As many installations include equally expensive HD projectors, this is a real problem.

Kaleidescape's first stab at the problem was adding Blu-ray support to the M500 player – one of the small boxes you'd have near your TV. That certainly enables you to play a Blu-ray disc (both at that TV or anywhere else in the house), but it still requires physically handling the disc every time you want to watch a movie and it is not all that much better than a regular Blu-ray player from Sony or Samsung. The whole point of Kaleidescape is access to any movie you own instantly thoughout the house.

Kaleidescape is now selling a partial solution to the problem: you can rip Blu-ray discs to the hard drive in the server, and it will play off the server (which means you can include it compilation video playlists). However, to appease the copyright gods, Kaleidescape still has to physically verify that you own the Blu-ray disc before playing any of its sweet 1080p content. To do so, you'll need a media vault ($1500), the ugly box pictured on the right, which can hold up to 100 Blu-ray discs. You can add as many of these as you like, but each needs to be connected to an M-class player (like the M500). In short, Kaleidescape now allows Blu-rays to be treated just like DVDs, only there is a lot more complexity and kludginess involved. It's better than nothing, but it has to seriously pain Kaleidescape's management and engineering staff who have made simplicity and elegance a core part of the product's value proposition.

Accessories / Audio / PC Convergence

Onkyo <3 Apple

November 24, 2010 - by Avi Greengart - Leave a Comment

As if the iPhone/iPod touch/iPad family wasn't already encroaching on distributed audio and home automation control systems, Onkyo announced that its future A/V receivers will come with free iOS remote control apps. This is a good idea for Onkyo on several levels: it allows Onkyo to tap into Apple's marketing momentum, and gives it the ability to market a rich touchscreen remote control without having to add anything to the bill of materials for the receiver.

Of course, using a phone as a remote can be problematic – what happens when someone wants to use the system and you're on the phone or out of the house? Dedicating an iPod touch to remote control duty – especially if you invest in a charging dock so it stays charged and doesn't wander off – solves this problem, and gives retailers who carry both Onkyo and Apple products a nice add-on sale at time of purchase. Consumers may balk at the added price, but the truth is that Apple's component prices are so much lower than specialty A/V vendors that it would probably be cheaper for Onkyo to buy an iPod touch and include it in the box rather than try to build an equivalent product for use as a remote control.

Accessories / Audio / Industry / Music / PC Convergence

RIP Snell, Escient

July 14, 2010 - by Avi Greengart - Leave a Comment

Not sure where I was when this crossed the wire back in April, but I was saddened – but not surprised – to learn that D&M Holdings shut down both Snell and Escient.

Snell was a high end speaker brand without enough brand recognition. Selling $30,000 speakers in a recession is extremely hard. Selling $30,000 speakers from a brand that only involved enthusiasts have heard of is basically impossible, no matter how terrific they measure and sound (Snell was famous for rigorously achieving ridiculously flat frequency measurements).

I suspect that the recession did in Escient, which made well regarded music servers, as well. Sure, some of Escient's functionality made its way into Windows and iTunes over the years, but the general collapse of the custom installation business was the bigger culprit. That and the rise of Sonos, which is dead simple for regular consumers to install, and considerably less expensive than any custom solution.

Accessories / Audio / DVD / HDTV / Industry / PC Convergence

More Inputs, Please!

August 12, 2009 - by Avi Greengart - 2 Comments.

I was talking with Microsoft about the XBOX 360 earlier this week, and one of the things they said will drive consumers to their console vs. the competition is the integration of multiple features into Live, such as Netflix streaming, gaming, and other content. At Current Analysis our Digital Home service covers game consoles from the perspective of connected services; we treat a PS3, XBOX, or Wii like the fancy set top boxes (that not coincidentally also play games) that they have become. However, I thought we were a bit ahead of the curve – most consumers haven't fully embraced this vision yet. But when FedEx dropped off yet another box here this afternoon, I started thinking: how on Earth am I going to connect this? Is Microsoft right – will consumers buy a game console to access digital services simply because they're out of HDMI inputs on their TV?

Now I know that my situation is not something everyone faces, but how many devices can a consumer reasonably connect to a TV or even a sophisticated A/V receiver? I'm not sure there are enough inputs any more – even on flagship receivers – to connect all the possible devices an early adopter/TV nut might want to. (Some of these offer redundant functionality, but even then there are typically unique functions that could justify their purchase.) Here's a sample list:

TiVo HD (DVR and cable/OTA tuner, Netflix)
Cable box (tuner and VOD, may have integrated DVR)
Satellite Box (tuner, VOD, unique sports programming, may have integrated DVR)
SlingBox (to stream content to PCs and mobile devices)
SlingCatcher (to integrate PC content)
XBOX 360 (some unique game titles, Netflix, DVD playback, streaming PC media)
PlayStation 3 (some unique game titles, Blu-ray playback, DVD playback, streaming PC media)
Wii (many unique game titles)
DVD/Blu-ray player (if you don't have PS3)
AppleTV (iTunes integration)
Roku (for Netflix, but even if you have a TiVo HD or XBOX 360 with Live Gold which also offer Netflix, you still might want a Roku for Major League Baseball access)

I'm trying to integrate about eight or nine of those, and I'm not sure that there is a receiver on the planet that can handle more than about half that list.

Accessories

New Logitech Products

August 11, 2009 - by Avi Greengart - Leave a Comment

A few months back Logitech sent over their PS3 Harmony adapter, and I've had a half-finished review sitting in my Typepad queue ever since (it's the sort of device that you set it up once and then forget about – in a very good way). I'm going to get that done and posted soon so I can move on to today's news: the Harmony 900, which is what you get when you refine the Harmony One and add RF capabilities to control devices behind closed doors (or, in my case, behind a motorized screen). I recommended the Harmony One in last year's Holiday Gift Guide, and I have a Harmony 900 in for review and will post my impressions shortly.

Accessories / Audio / PC Convergence

Odds and Ends

September 23, 2008 - by Avi Greengart - Leave a Comment

Logitech sent over Z-5 Omnidirectional notebook speakers. They're not going
to put my Klipsch THX speakers of business (not by a long shot), but you need to remember that they're powered
entirely via USB and don't take up too much desk space. Simplicity is clearly the goal here; the last USB-powered speakers I looked at, Altec Lansing's XT1's were designed with portability in mind. Compared to the XT1's, Logitech's Z-5's play extremely loud and sound
extraordinary. They should make a great holiday gift for the notebook user who listens to music through fuzzy notebook speakers.

Logitech also sent over triple.fi 10 pro's from their recent Ultimate Ears
acquisition, and I had them on hand at the recent Apple "Let's Rock" event, where I pitted them up
against Apple's upcoming $79 in-ear headphones.

You get what you pay for – on
both ends of the price spectrum. For $79, the Apple headphones sounded great –
easily competitive with the low end of Shure and etymotic's range, and they blow
away Bose's in-ear efforts (I can't comment on UE's entry level headphones, as I
haven't listened to them). But they couldn't hold a candle – on bass or midrange
– with the $399 UE's triple.fi 10 pro's. I was also annoyed that the Apple
headphones are not fully compatible with the iPhone, just the iPod touch and new
nano. (That new nano needs to be felt to be believed – it is vanishingly thin and the colors are gorgeous. Apple did a really nice job with this one.)

I'm really enjoying the triple.fi headphones, and finally had a chance to do some quick listening tests vs. one of their main competitors: Shure's $499 SE530. For natural, neutral sound quality, the
SE530's are incredible, as well they should be at that price. The UE triple.fi 10 pro is a bit less neutral and seems
to amp up the body of bass and warmth of the lower midrange – which is often
lacking on headphones. Both are equally revealing, but I would describe the
sound of the UE's as more "fun. Which is better? It's a matter of taste. While I suspect the Shure's are more accurate, listening to rock and pop with the UE's is more involving.

But my favorite headphones for the iPhone (and any phone with a 3.5mm jack, which includes most new RIM BlackBerries, Nokia's XpressMusic line, and select LG and Samsung phones) are still Shure's SE530's with the Shure iPhone microphone adapter, pictured below. They sound great
with the compressed music you have on an iPhone, have the most comfortable
shaped foam earplugs in the industry, and the modular design allows you to swap
out various cord lengths or accessories.

Accessories / Industry

Blogging for Dollars

September 3, 2008 - by Avi Greengart - Leave a Comment

Blogging is strange. I can’t tell you how many times I get asked to provide links or link exchanges or even the occasional "please review our stuff and we’ll pay you for placement." Now, if this were about my day job (Research Director for Mobile Devices), it would be somewhat understandable – I am quoted by the press, and it’s my job to influence industry decision makers. But Home Theater View? Who reads this? Coverage here basically just influences my brother – my mother doesn’t even read this! Perhaps all they’re trying to do is up their Google rankings.

So, here is a link to an article I was asked to highlight on home theater seating. I didn’t write it, I don’t know the people who did, and I couldn’t even tell you if they’ve sat in all the chairs they write about. But the pictures are definitely fun to look at. No money changed hands for my inclusion of this link in this post. Enjoy your link, boys.

Next up, an electronics review site, TestFreaks. They offered to pay me for reviewing the site. I never agreed to anything, but since it makes for an interesting post about home theater blogging, here goes. I don’t like the site at all. It aggregates reviews from all over the Internet – sort of a Rotten Tomatoes for A/V gear and gadgets. That part might be useful if you couldn’t just Google the product name and get the same information. Where it could still be interesting is if there was some editorial judgement applied to the rankings so you’d see a decent list of speakers or receivers to start a comparison shopping exercise. Nope, it’s all automated, and the results appear to be completely random.