LATEST ADDITIONS

Future historians seeking a thumbnail to represent the early 21st century would do well to select an image of an iPod. More than 200 million iPods have been sold worldwide, and it's a universally recognized symbol of newmillennium technology. Moreover, the iPod's arrival signaled the beginning of the Advanced Personalization of Audio, wherein playlists expanded from tens of songs to thousands.

The materials used to make speaker diaphragms are well established&#151;polypropylene, paper, Kevlar, aluminum, titanium, beryllium, silk, and even diamond, to name a few. So I was surprised to find a speaker system with diaphragms made of glass. Developed over nearly four years by a Japanese glass company called <A href="http://www.harioglass.com">Hario</A> (Japanese for "king of glass"), the Harion system is certainly intriguing, though the English-language website linked here has nothing about it, and the company did not supply much info, even after repeated requests.

Powerful But Clever

The AudioControl Concert AVR-1 embodies the paradox of high-end A/V receivers. Befitting an audiophile product, its Class H amplification can take an input signal and fill a room with commendable transparency and power. At the same time, it departs from strict fidelity to the input signal by offering pragmatic features like Dolby Volume and room correction. Let’s take a closer look at its dual nature.