Audio Video News

Black Friday has come and gone and early reports indicate it was a record-breaker — not for in-store sales, which were down slightly compared with 2017, but for online purchases. That consumers took to their phones on Black Friday to the tune of $6.2 billion bodes well for today — Cyber Monday. If the pundits at Adobe Analytics are correct, U.S. consumers will buy a record breaking $7.8 billion worth of goods online today. Will you be one of them?

Yes, it’s that time of the year again — time to start putting together a holiday shopping list, not to mention your own personal wish list. Here we present the first installment of our 2018 Holiday Gift Guide series, featuring gear that grabbed our attention for one reason or another. With any luck you’ll be able to kick off the holiday season by crossing one or two names off your list. Unless otherwise noted, we haven’t done any hands-on testing, so be sure to check return policies and, if possible, take items of interest for a spin.

SVS, Klipsch, LG, and others get the BF party started.

LG got Black Friday sales rolling a week ago when it announced its “Best Prices” of 2018 sale, and momentum continues to build this week as companies decide to get the Black Friday party started now rather than wait until after Thanksgiving.

Palo Alto, CA-based startup Essential Products has announced that the digital-to-analog (DAC)/adapter that enables its Essential Phone to stream Master Quality Authenticated (MQA)-encoded music via Tidal is now available in the U.S. and Canada.

Riva Audio today announced that its new Alexa voice-enabled Riva Concert Smart Speaker is now available on amazon.com for $199.

McIntosh today introduced an “equally impressive but more accessibly sized” version of its 7-foot XRT2.1K flagship speaker.

Black Friday used to be a big deal. Die-hard shoppers waited with great anticipation to see what kind of crazy deals retailers would come up with the day after Thanksgiving. These days you have to wonder about the fate of The Big Sale Day considering how retailers have been invoking Black Friday” in their advertising for months now. Black Friday is certainly not what it used to be.