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There's nothing unusual about a father who's eager to show off pictures of his kids and rave about how great they are. This is one of those moments, except Ken Hecht, the president of Phase Technology, isn't showing me pictures (I'm getting a real-life look), nor is he exaggerating how good these particular offspring are. In truth, we're not talking about little people at all. What Hecht is so proud to show me is a very special—I know, that's what they all say—home theater speaker system he's been dreaming about and working on for the better part of 15 years. It's a system that, he tells me, "will make any room sound like the best theater in the country." As if that weren't enough, he claims that the system can expand the sweet spot from the typical single-pair-of-ears hot seat to an area large enough for half a dozen or more people to sit comfortably and enjoy a movie. He's christened the system with the name Digital Audio Reference Theater System, or dARTS for short. (Thankfully, his real children have names that roll a little more easily off the tongue.)

Earlier in the year rose-colored glasses must have been somewhat in style when Warner's Steve Nickerson was <a href="http://ultimateavmag.com/news/081006sopranosHDDVD/">quoted</a> as saying that Warner, which supports both Blu-ray and HD DVD, expected consumers to spend "between $225 million and $500 million during the fourth quarter (of 2006)." He also predicted that by the end of 2006 that there would be 500,000 Blu-ray and HD DVD standalone players sold, plus two to three million game consoles and two to four million computers with HD DVD or Blu-ray capability.