Scott Wilkinson

Richard McGready recently wrote to me with several TV questions:

<B>Thomas J. Norton</B><BR>
Finally, news from the audio side of CES. My coverage of the limited surround-sound demos at the official specialty audio venue of the Alexis Park Hotel will have to wait for our upcoming in-depth show report. Today's report will catch up on a few important demos held at hotels near the Las Vegas convention center, plus one surprise discovery at the Alexis. And the news it hot.

Maybe the economy is really taking off. Or maybe it's simply that the cancellation of the big fall compute show, COMDEX, has sent all the computer types scurrying off to CES, but this year the show seems incredibly crowded. The isles were blocked, the press room didn't have a seat to spare (in contrast to the press room at CEDIA, where you could play catch most afternoons without bothering anyone), and the traffic and parking made LA&mdash;at least on a slow day&mdash;look like Barstow.

As the song says, it's the most wonderful time of the year—or the most dreadful, depending on whether or not you plan to join the buying frenzy on Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving and the traditional start of the holiday shopping season. Many stores open at an ungodly hour and offer seemingly outrageous deals on certain products to get people in the door, hoping that they'll buy more than they bargained for and put the store's accounts in the black for the year, which is why it's called Black Friday—either that, or it might be due to all the black eyes resulting from fights over the last remaining $40 Blu-ray player.

Scanning some of the myriad Black Friday websites—my favorite is bfads.net because you can search by product category from multiple retailers—I found a few great deals on home theater gear. In many cases, however, these products are already available at less than the MSRP (manufacturer's suggested retail price), so the savings I cite here might not be as great as they appear. I've included links to HT's reviews of the same or similar items if available, so let your mouse do the clicking before you venture forth to battle the hordes.