Michael Berk

We've talked a fair amount in this space lately about how much of a difference a headphone amplifier can make in your portable listening. Whether it's correcting for out-of-whack output impedance or simply providing more juice for difficult-to-drive cans (here's looking at you, on-the-go planar magnetic fans), you can get a better experience for surprisingly little money, with a wide range of pocketable amplifiers on the market right now, ready to interface with your iDevices, Androids, and other portable media devices. Here we look at two interesting and affordable newish devices: the latest miniature amp from FiiO, the E02i, or "Rocky," and the latest incarnation of DigiZoid's unique ZO².

Back in June we got to check out the premiere of guitar legend Pat Metheny's unique new concert film, The Orchestrion Project, featuring Pat performing "solo" - with an orchestra of robots, captured in glorious 7.1 (and 3D) by director/producer brothers Pierre and François Lamoreux. 

Well, the film's come to Blu-ray - and not just in Dolby TrueHD 7.1, but with the company's new Advanced 96k Upsampling feature, to deliver lossless audio - no extra hardware required - of the highest possible quality along with the pristine visuals. And we've got a couple of copies to give away.

It's a given that smartphones and tablets are at the heart of today's digital media experience. The latest wave of small, mobile devices provide access to every streaming service under the sun and enough file storage to make not only portable media players, but pretty much every other part of the traditional listening rig obsolete. Big systems are going the way of the dodo - little wireless table radios are where it's at nowadays. Enter the Logitech UE Smart Radio and Phorus' Play-Fi system, two worthy contenders with very different design philosophies.

Scottish headphone manufacturer RHA hasn't had much of a stateside presence, but this week marks their arrival in Apple stores, with the MA450i in-ear ($49.95) and SA950i on-ear ($59.95) set to appeal to budget-minded consumers looking to accessorize their iDevices. And appeal they may.