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Blu-ray Movie Reviews
Blu-ray Review: Blue Valentine
Josef Krebs  |  May 13, 2011

“How do you trust your feelings when they can just disappear like that?” This piece of dialogue sums up the main theme of Blue Valentine, a film that, trying to work out where love goes, looks back to where it came from in the first place.

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Vote
Do You Use a Music Server for Most Listening?
Scott Wilkinson  |  May 13, 2011
I've been talking a lot about music servers lately. It's the subject of this week's Home Theater Geeks podcast with Jon Iverson as well as today's Ask Scott blog. This leads me to wonder how many of our readers use music servers rather than physical-disc players for most of their music listening.

As always, I really hope you leave a comment about your choice. If you use a server, which one? Why do you like using a server over a disc player? If you don't use a server, why not?

Vote to see the results and leave a comment about your choice.

Do You Use a Music Server for Most Listening?
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Blu-ray Movie Reviews
Blu-ray Review: The Illusionist
Josef Krebs  |  May 13, 2011

There’s a particularly wonderful scene in The Illusionist, the animated movie adapted and directed by Sylvain Chomet (The Triplets of Belleville) from a previously unfilmed script by Jacques Tati. When the Monsieur Hulot-like character familiar to fans of Tati goes into a movie theater, there’s Tati’s Mon Oncle up on the screen in live action.

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Ask S&V
High-Rez Music Server
Scott Wilkinson  |  May 13, 2011
I'm interested in building a music server for high-rez audio files. I'd like something such as a Mac Mini but with more drive space and lower cost. Dell Zino perhaps? Most importantly, I need a player that will handle all music file formats, including lossless. Also, I need a DAC for under $1000. Any suggestions on how best to pull this off?

Scott Kaplan

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Blu-ray Movie Reviews
Papillon (Blu-ray)
David Vaughn  |  May 13, 2011
Based on the true story about French ex-convict Henri Charriére (Steve McQueen), a petty criminal who is unjustly convicted of murder, and his constant struggle to escape to freedom from the brutal French penal system at Guiana's infamous Devil's Island. On the way to the hellhole, he meets Dega (Dustin Hoffman), a convicted counterfeiter who relies on Henri for protection. The two men end up becoming good friends and they rely on each other for their survival.

While the performances are marvelous from both McQueen and Hoffman, the pacing of this movie is horrendously slow. I understand that director Franklin J. Shaffner is trying to show the struggle that Charriére endured to secure his freedom, but a good 45 minutes could have been left on the cutting room floor improving the overall enjoyment of the film.

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Audio Video News
Pink Floyd's Wish You Were Here to Make 5.1 Debut
Mark Fleischmann  |  May 13, 2011
You already may have heard about the massive "Why Pink Floyd...?" reissue series scheduled to hit in September 2011. But the most artistically significant aspect of it has been grossly under-reported. The series will include the first release of the 1975 album Wish You Were Here in a 5.1-channel high-res medium.

There will be two ways to get it. One is the six-disc "Immersion" boxed set, which will include both new 5.1-channel and old quad mixes, not to mention stereo mixes, in multiple formats. One disc will be a DVD with lossy codecs (we're guessing Dolby Digital). The other—be still, our hearts—will be a Blu-ray disc with both 5.1 and stereo mixes in 96/24. You can read about the numerous other extras on Amazon.

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Blu-ray Movie Reviews
Blu-ray Review: No Strings Attached
Rad Bennett  |  May 12, 2011

Friends with benefits: Is that kind of modern-day relationship really possible? No Strings Attached looks into that question for almost an hour before ending up in typical Hollywood rom-com land.

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Premiere Design
Aerial Acoustics System 1 TheaterWall
Scott Wilkinson  |  May 12, 2011
As I was researching my response to Xavier Beard's question about speakers from Aerial Acoustics, I came across the company's System 1 TheaterWall. This artfully designed, decidedly high-end speaker system surrounds a screen of just about any size with speakers for the left, right, center, and subwoofer channels.
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Projector Reviews3D Projector Reviews
Sony BRAVIA VPL-VW90ES SXRD 3D Projector
Thomas J. Norton  |  May 12, 2011

Performance
Features
Ergonomics
Value
Price: $9,999 At A Glance: Deep, rich blacks • Accurate color • 3D-to-2D conversion • improved brightness and contrast

3D Gets Big

It seems like only yesterday that I reviewed Sony’s VPL-VW85 projector, but it was a year and a half ago (Home Theater, November 2009). Sony launches a new flagship home theater projector every year at the September CEDIA EXPO, and 2010 was no exception.

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New Products
Bang & Olufsen's 85-inch plasma: 3D at $1,000 per inch
Michael Berk  |  May 12, 2011

Bang & Olufsen's supremely luxurious entry into the 3D market, the updated 85" BeoVision 4-85, made its U.S. debut today.

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