Tech2

Paradigm isn't a big company, only 250 people or so. It doesn't have the immense marketing budget to assault the airwaves like Bose, or the R&D budget to make every manner of gadget like Sony.

These are good things, because instead this Canadian company goes about making some solid products, loved by reviewers, and beloved by customers.

Invited to check out their factory just outside Toronto, I dusted off my American Flag jacket, trucker hat, "W" belt buckle, and headed north of the border.

Visitors to the Rocky Mountain Audio Fest that ended yesterday got to see two shows in one.

I gave in. Battlefield 3 had reduced my HTPC to a smoldering, weeping mess that begged me to put it out of its misery.

Gentlemen, we can rebuild him. We have the technology.

And to that end, I started with, well the anthropomorphic spin kinda fails here. It's a new video card, that's what I'm getting at.

It's an interesting thing, this. A tweaky audiophile program that strips away all the junk your computer could be doing while playing back your digital audio files.

The idea is to give each file as good an environment for playback as possible, minimizing jitter and maximizing sound quality.

Well, OK. That could be cool.

One of the most intensely anticipated games of the year, blah blah blah whatever...

GO DOWNLOAD THIS!!!

Battlefield 3 is in open beta until October 10th, which means you can play it in all its semi-buggy glory for free.

I'll help you sort through the hiccups after the jump.

If you've been following my progress integrating an HTPC into my theater, you'll recall my frustration with getting fluid and precise control.

Netflix announced this week that they were splitting their business, DVD/BD rentals on one side, streaming on the other. 

By all accounts, this seems like a perfectly crafted way to auger the company into the ground. Everyone hates it, customers are fleeing, there's no way it can work.

But. . . what if that's the point?