Industry

The New HT Sales Environment

- by Avi Greengart - 2 Comments.

HomeTheaterReview – not HomeTheaterVIEW, which is what you're reading right now – has an interesting take on how the home theater sales environment has changed since the recession, and how to cope. It's partly a pitch for online advertising, partly a manifesto. Oddly enough, I agree with the advertising part, but he's missing a few pieces in the manifesto: Are boutique bricks-and-mortar A/V stores relevant in an amazon.com age? (Short answer: only if they're truly boutiques.) Is seated home audio relevant in an iPod/dock age? (While there are exceptions — witness the rebirth of vinyl — generally speaking the answer here …

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Mailbag: Is it Time to Upgrade to a “Blu-ray capable” Receiver?

- by Avi Greengart - 3 Comments.

Here's one from the mailbag: I’m thinking about upgrading my receiver. Currently I have a Denon AVR-987. It’s 3- 4 years old and does not have the current technology for blu ray. I’m thinking of going with a Sony STR-DA2400ES receiver. I have a 52” Sony XBR and a Sony BDP S-300 blu ray player. My speakers are Soundworks MC300 front/Soundworks original surrounds and JBL Northridge for the center. Any advice would be appreciated. It really depends on why you think you need the upgrade, but I wouldn’t do it. You’d be surprised, but your current receiver can handle Blu-ray …

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Off to Apple’s Special Event

- by Avi Greengart - Leave a Comment

I'm off to Apple's Special Event tomorrow. Journalists who want to contact me for comments afterwards can call me at 201 658 7729 or email me at agreengart @ currentanalysis com. Once Apple madness is behind us, more HTV posts are coming, including a post-CES wrap-up, VUDU review, and an end to my quest for an A/V receiver with enough HDMI inputs to serve as a test center.

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Audio

Strange New Home Theater System from Yamaha

- by Avi Greengart - 2 Comments.

Yamaha just announced the YHT-S400, a two piece home theater in a box. The soundbar is par for the course, giving people pseudo surround sound from just a single enclosure you can mount below your flat panel TV. Soundbars are incredibly popular right now, as they match the design of today's televisions (which also don't intrude on the living space) and don't require stringing wires all over the place. The YHT-S400's receiver is unique, in that it has a built-in subwoofer. Oddly enough, it reminds me of the mid-1980's PC, the Coleco Adam, which combined a daisy wheel printer with …

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DVD

Cheap Blu-ray Upgrades from Warner

- by Avi Greengart - Leave a Comment

Well, this is nice: some of us have felt like suckers, buying the same titles over and over as formats have shifted from VHS to letterbox VHS to laserdisc to DVD to special edition DVD to Blu-ray (and I probably missed a few format changes in there). If you've got a bunch of Warner DVDs and feel compelled to upgrade them to Blu-ray, check out this Warner Brothers site: http://www.dvd2blu.com/. You'll have to physically mail in your DVDs, and shipping charges apply if you have less than four to upgrade, but if you have four or more from the list …

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Displays / HDTV / Industry / Television

Lessons From Panasonic’s Plasma Day

- by Avi Greengart - Leave a Comment

On Tuesday, I, along with a handful of tech journalists, was invited to attend a briefing by Panasonic in New York to show off their latest line of plasma televisions. The emphasis was on the technical capabilities of Panasonic's plasma technology relative to the latest LCD with LED backlighting.  Some things I learned: Never have a Japanese engineer who doesn't speak fluent English give a marketing presentation to journalists. Yes, there was a lot of technical detail included, but the fundamental reason Panasonic was doing the briefing was to spin the technical detail, otherwise they would have just provided a …

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Logitech Harmony 900 First Take: Not a Pretty Upgrade

- by Avi Greengart - 15 Comments.

I'm a bit backed up here at Home Theater View, both with posts (they're in my head but haven't quite made their way out of my head and onto the site) and with products to review. Logitech had sent over the Harmony 900 remote control just before it launched, but I first attempted to configure it last night.   The Harmony 900 is essentially an RF version of the IR-only Harmony One. In English, that means that the 900 is a universal remote control that looks nearly identical to another universal remote control in the Harmony line, but instead of …

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Product Review: Monster Turbine In-Ear Headphones

- by Avi Greengart - 2 Comments.

[CEDIA post coming soon] Monster introduced its first in-ear headphones, "turbine," in November 2008. They promised me review units right away (they actually gave out units at their CES press conference, but ran out), but I finally got them last month. At CEDIA last week, Monster announced an even higher end model, "turbine Pro," so I thought I'd better get this review out of the way before the new ones come. I have to admit, I had really low expectations. Monster claims that the turbines are the best headphones on the market. However, Monster's CEO, Noel Lee, is given to …

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