All men shall become brothers. At least that’s what Schiller proposed in his Ode to Joy, a proposal tunefully endorsed by Beethoven. In practice, we sometimes act more like distant cousins, or like neighbors who scream at each other and throw dog poop on each other’s lawns because one guy votes democrat and the other votes republican. Local law enforcement knows who we are. And then there’s analog audio guys and digital audio guys.
In case you haven't noticed, a beach volleyball tournament is going on, apparently in some large city with a beach. This tournament, which includes miscellaneous other non-beach volleyball events, is on TV. Also, in case you haven't noticed, the quality of the TV audio feed is, um, variable.
Things you will find on the side of the road: shredded truck tires, plastic hubcaps, baseball caps, too-fast squirrels, too-slow turtles, Bud Light cans, men’s underwear. And, of course, scratched, shattered, and otherwise discarded CDs. It wasn’t always like that.
If the rumors hold true, the next iPhone, iPhone 7 or whatever Apple calls it, will not have a headphone jack. As Chicken Little noted, "The sky is falling!" Or is it? Is it possible, just possible, that losing the headphone jack could net us a nice step forward in audio playback quality?
It is summer. Soon it will be fall. That means Apple will introduce a new iPhone. Reportedly, the new phone will be thinner, more water resistant, have a better camera, have more memory, and not have a headphone jack. Wait. What?
Your daily driver is a Bugatti. Your "casual" wristwatch is an Audemars Piguet. (Note: Rolexes are for tourists.) Your third home is in Jackson Hole. I hate to break the news to you, but you are a 1 percenter. Fortunately, now you can drown out the cries of the masses with a superb new loudspeaker from Devialet.
Do you hate the silvery sound of CDs? Then you can rejoice because a bunch of them just got crushed. Do you think LPs are just scratchy pieces of plastic? Then be happy because a load of them just got crushed too. In fact, a misunderstanding between two bands with automotive-inspired names recently resulted in an apocalyptic day for physical media.
A couple blogs back, we discussed the ascent of glorious stereophonic sound in “The Rise and Fall of Stereo (Part One).” Stereo was a true revolution in audio playback, and it quickly condemned monaural to an eternity of lo-fi hell. Audio manufacturers’ marketing departments had an easy time convincing consumers to upgrade to stereo; everyone could easily hear the improvement. Now, 50 years later, stereo is unraveling.
I don't always carry my phone because having a high quality music library and player is more important to me than checking Facebook on a phone and I'm too lazy and uncoordinated to carry two things at once. Sure, there are phones with good music storage capacity and good music playback fidelity. But because I am an audio snob, those phones just aren't good enough. That might change.
In the beginning, Edison created the phonograph, and it was good. It was also monaural. The vertical modulation (referred to as hill-and-dale recording) of the groove neatly encoded the amplitude variations of the analog-input waveform and likewise could reproduce the waveform. If engineers had stuck with hill-and-dale, the world would be a very different place. But they kept tinkering, as engineers are wont to do, and they found an improvement.
Referring to the sound of the 12-cylinder engines in Ferrari cars, conductor Herbert von Karajan said it was, "a melody that no conductor would ever be able to reproduce." Considering that the maestro was not modest when speaking of his abilities, that is quite a compliment. He was right, of course; some engines, tuned with the right exhaust, yield a glorious sound. With further tuning, apparently they can also yield glorious music.
Quick. What's the company everyone loves to hate? The cable company, of course. The aggravating installation, the inexplicable outtages, the maddening programming bundles, and the fees. Oh yes, the fees. But there's hope, and possibly change. President Obama has endorsed a proposal that would eliminate perhaps the most annoying cable TV fee. That's good, right?
I am sorry. Only certain people will be allowed to read this column. To ensure that you are qualified, you must first correctly answer this question: What is the relationship between cassettes and pencils? If you can answer that, feel free to read on. If you can’t, please move on.
Vizio recently unveiled its new P-series models. And they are pretty impressive, featuring 4K UHD and the very cool SmartCast app that essentially builds in all the capabilities of Google Cast. Since they are Vizios, they are very competitively priced. Very nice. The problem is, if you want to be a stickler for details, these devices aren't actually TVs.