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Streaming Device Reviews
Western Digital WD TV Live Streaming Media Player
Barb Gonzalez  |  Jul 12, 2012
Performance
Features
Ergonomics
Value
Price: $99 At A Glance: Great picture and sound quality • Wi-Fi-enabled • Clean, easy-to-use menus • Variety of streaming content services • Quirky difficulties with file indexing

The WD TV Live streaming media player has much in common with its predecessor, the WD TV Live Hub. When the WD TV Live Hub came out, I thought it was the best network media player and streamer on the market. It has a clean menu system; can play movies, music, and photos on my home network, and simply works.

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Ask S&V
Video Dynamic Range and Color Space
Scott Wilkinson  |  Jul 11, 2012
I recently read HT's review of the Panasonic TC-P55ST50 3D plasma TV. (Good review, by the way.) I noticed that the display was calibrated using a brightness range of 0-255. My understanding is that digital video (Blu-ray, DVD, digital TV) is encoded in YCbCr with a video brightness range of 16-235, and one should set the source component to output YCbCr and set the display to accept the brightness range of 16-235 to preserve the signal and avoid processing and interpolation. Just wanted to get your thoughts and reasons if one way is better than the other.

Stephen Lin

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New Products
New Gear: Krell Phantom III Preamplifier
Michael Berk  |  Jul 11, 2012

Krell is synonymous in the minds of many with high-performance audio, but they're not the first manufacturer that comes to mind when you mention DACs or headphone amps. That's about to change, perhaps, with the introduction of the Phantom III stereo preamplifier.

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Headphone Reviews
Review: Dusting Off Some Vintage Headphones
Brent Butterworth  |  Jul 11, 2012

Checking out the latest acquisitions during a recent visit to Vancouver, BC vintage audio dealer Innovative Audio, I noticed a lot of headphones that I hadn’t seen since the days when I wore Qiana shirts and had hair down past my shoulders.

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Vintage Gear
Shure V-15 Phono Cartridge
Steve Guttenberg  |  Jul 10, 2012
The original Shure V-15 phono cartridge debuted in 1964 as a "statement" design. The engineering team was headed by Jim Kogen, who later became a Vice President of Engineering, and after that the CEO. The V-15 Type II arrived six years later and it was the first computer-designed cartridge. The Type III was the best selling model in the series, it came along three years later, long before the CD changed the course of audio history.

Shure was huge in the mainstream market, but by the late 1970s and through the 1980s most analog-loving audiophiles had graduated to moving-coil cartridges (the V-15 was a moving-magnet design). I preferred the sound of moving coil cartridges, but conceded the V-15's tracking abilities were well ahead of most of the expensive Japanese moving coil designs of the time.

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AV Receiver Buying TipsAV Receiver Tech
How to Buy an A/V Receiver
Rob Sabin  |  Jul 10, 2012
Of all the components in your home theater system, none gets more playtime than your audio/video receiver. But buying an AVR can be daunting for home theater newbies or even seasoned enthusiasts diving back into the upgrade pool. AVR technology and features have been constantly moving targets these last few years. Here are some basics to help you make your selection, circa 2012.

A/V What?
An A/V receiver combines three audio components in one box. Primarily, it performs the traditional roles of a preamplifier and power amplifier. The sound for any home theater begins as a relatively low-level audio signal coming off a source component such as a cable box or disc player. These days, it’s more likely to be a digital audio signal than an analog signal. That signal gets converted between digital and analog as needed, manipulated to affect your volume adjustment, and might perhaps have some bass and treble contouring (or more sophisticated equalization) applied before it’s sent to the power amplifier, whose only job is to pump it up to the power level necessary to drive your speakers to sufficient volume.

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Home Theater Geeks Podcast
Podcast 119: Bob Heil
Scott Wilkinson  |  Jul 10, 2012
Live-sound pioneer and microphone maven Bob Heil returns to talk about his mic designs, new USB mic preamp/EQ, and headphones as well as his work with The Grateful Dead, The Who, Joe Walsh, and other rock legends, and his association with Paul Klipsch and organist George Wright, whose recordings helped launch the entire field of high-fidelity audio. Plus, answers to chat-room questions and more.

Run Time: 1:00:04

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Signals
Blind as a Brit
Ken C. Pohlmann  |  Jul 10, 2012

As Mark Twain (and other others) have noted, “There are lies, damn lies, and statistics.”

Blu-ray looks a zillion times better than DVD, right? Are all of those British viewers blind, or are we asking the wrong questions?

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Music ReviewsBlu-ray Movie Reviews
This Week in Blu-rays and Music, July 10, 2012
Ken Korman  |  Jul 10, 2012

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Ask S&V
Setting Lip-Sync Delay
Scott Wilkinson  |  Jul 09, 2012
Is there a test disc with content that helps you dial in audio delay so the video and audio are in sync? My receiver and my Blu-ray player both have this adjustment, but it's very difficult to get it right just watching people talk. My old TV never had this issue, but my new Vizio TV seems to have an inherent delay. What do you advise as a solution?

Craig Weinheimer

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