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In: Home Theater
With: 36 Comments

I just ran across an article on DigtalHome.ca [via Engadget HD] singing the praises of Plasma over LCD. Although I agree with most of the points, there are a couple with which I completely disagree. In fact, both of the posts seem to be overly-biased toward plasma, to the point that it is almost misinformation. Here are the points with which I disagree, which are probably major enough to push most people to pick LCD over Plasma. Screen Glare and Dealing with Ambient Light Taken from the article: LCD superior in brighter rooms – simply speaking plasma is glass with white phosphors behind it. TheRead More →

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In: Home Theater

I’m passing along my good fortune. The good folks at Rocketfish sent me review sample and I’m giving it away to one lucky commenter. Don’t know what a Rocketfish Wireless Surround System is? Well, it’s a 2-part system that eliminates the need to run wires from your A/V receiver to your rear surround speakers. The system consists of the following: the Rocketfish transmitter – connects to the rear channel speaker outputs of your audio/video receiver the Rocketfish receiver / amplifier – powers your existing rear surround sound speakers For any contest to be interesting, there have to be some rules. Here’s the deal: You mustRead More →

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In: Home Theater
With: 11 Comments

THX just announced a new specification for home theater: THX Loudless Plus. My initial thought was, “I bet this means yet another new THX equipment specification.” Well, yes, it does. The benchmark specification for all future receivers will now be THX Ultra2 Plus and THX Select2 Plus. But this is not a bad thing; this specification addresses a real need in home theater: consistent surround sound levels regardless of the listening volume.     Currently, the best way to reproduce a movie sound track is to calibrate your speakers to a certain reference volume level and make sure the volume knob is always at thisRead More →

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In: Home Theater
With: 15 Comments

A few weeks ago, I received a review sample of the RocketFish Universal Wireless Rear Speaker Kit. I’ve spent quite a bit of time with it; here are my thoughts. For those of you not familiar with the Rocketfish, it is a new brand that is exclusive BestBuy. The products range from cables to computer accessories to flash cards. The term “wireless rear speaker kit” is somewhat of a misnomer as it does not include rear speakers, but this is obvious at first glance of the packaging or description. The kit consists of two components: a small transmitter unit that is located at the sourceRead More →

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In: Home Theater
With: 1 Comment

I just posted a revised version of my home theater calculator.  The new revision adds the following enhancements: Added feature to allow calculation of Visual Acuity Viewing Distance based on eyesight of the viewer. (The default is 20/20 vision; changing the input to 20/10 vision with show that the viewer will be able to spot resolution deficiencies at much greater distances due to more acute eyesight.) Fixed bug in the aspect ratio input that caused international users to have problems (problem was related to using “,” as decimal delimiter instead of “.”) Added cells to the far right of the spreadsheet to allow changing andRead More →

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In: Home Theater
With: 6 Comments

I was ready to abandon the Philips Pronto platform, but the new Pronto Professional TSU9400 and Pronto Script save the day! Background: I’ve been a user of Philips Pronto remote controls since the original TSU-1000 was released in 1998. Since then, I’ve upgraded twice and I carefully consider each new product cycle. I’d become a bit disappointed because new product releases seemed to be “two steps forward and one step back.” (For example, the TSU7000/TSU7500 still does not have automatic backlights behind the hard buttons.) Also, Philips released a new product, the customer-installer-only TSU9600, a year ago but offered no third-party support for features orRead More →

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In: Home Theater
With: 5 Comments

Overview: A frequent question I receive is “which HDTV should I buy?” The answer is not simple and represents a significant monetary investment. Sure, a bunch of future displays were probably just announced and there is always something better on the horizon, but at some point it’s time to pick a technology and pull the trigger. Due to my price and space considerations, most people focused on HDTV displays ranging from 42″-50″ that are available at most local big box retailers. This write-up summarizes the general recommendation I give when someone asks me the question. Flat Panel or Rear Projection or Front Projection? This isRead More →

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In: Home Theater
With: 7 Comments

I receive a bunch of questions in reference to my 1080P Does Matter article. Some of the questions are along the lines of “Do I really lose the benefits of 1080p if I sit too far away from a small screen? How? The lines of resolution don’t go away.” While the lines are still there, you’re eye can’t detect them, but I haven’t found a simple way to explain this. Then I came across this article and picture (via digg) that demonstrate a great, simple-to-explain example. quoting http://bloggerwhale.blogspot.com/2007/03/dont-trust-your-eyes.html# In the pic below you can see two faces. A normal face on the right and aRead More →

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In: Home Theater
With: 2 Comments

I have a front projector in one room and a flat panel display in another. Instead of purchasing separate sets for components for each display, I’d rather just use a HDMI distribution box so any source could be routed to either display. Unfortunately, this is turning out to be an impossible dream. Most of the devices available are HDMI splitters, so they can display the same source on both displays. However, they can not display different sources on different displays and this is the functionality I really want. A HDMI matrix switch is required to do this. The Gefen 4×4 HDMI HDTV Matrix Switch willRead More →

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In: Home Theater
With: 5 Comments

I recently wrote a short review of the Harmony 1000 touch panel remote. Yesterday afternoon, that post received a suspicious comment entitled “Screw Harmony, the iconRemote Rocks!” from someone using the name illuminati and the e-mail address [email protected]. The problem is that the comment was posted by an employee of X10 Wireless Technology Inc and they did not divulge their affiliation. I’m not making baseless claims — I have proof and can share it if necessary. In my opinion, this is deceptive marketing and is in violation of the marketing code of ethics. The comment told the story of how the person purchased a LogitechRead More →