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Audio Video News
TV Ownership Compromise
Barry Willis  |  Dec 01, 2003  |  First Published: Dec 02, 2003

Give-and-take is the essence of politics. On Monday evening, November 24, demonstrating that it's better to compromise than to lose entirely, US lawmakers agreed to cap broadcast ownership at 39% of the national market of potential viewers—less than half-way between the old limit of 35% and a new one of 45% approved by the Federal Communications Commission last June. Some Democratic lawmakers decried the 39% deal as a betrayal by their Republican colleagues.

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Audio Video News
Industry Roundup
Barry Willis  |  Dec 01, 2003  |  First Published: Dec 02, 2003

HP entering TV business? The line between the computer and consumer electronics industry gets blurrier by the day. During the last week of November, computer giant Hewlett-Packard announced that it would begin offering its own brand of large flat-screen TVs. Already in discussions with several Asian manufacturers, HP will deliver both LCDs and plasma display panels (PDPs) under its own name, probably by spring.

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Blu-ray Movie Reviews
DVDs: Sci-Fi Sequels
Steve Simels  |  Dec 01, 2003
THE MATRIX RELOADED Warner
Movie •• DVDs •••••
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Custom Installation How-To
Hewlett-Packard dc3000 DVD Movie Writer
Michael Antonoff  |  Dec 01, 2003

Ever since I got my DVD player and video hard-disk recorder, I've been itching to throw my VCR in the garbage. I haven't done it, though, since I have no other way to play my many VHS tapes - or even VHS-C tapes without using a camcorder.

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Hitachi 57T500 57-inch Rear-Projection HDTV Monitor
David Katzmaier  |  Dec 01, 2003

Photos by Tony Cordoza

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Other Tech
Speaker, Speaker on the Wall (full lab data)
Tom Nousaine  |  Dec 01, 2003
Click here for PDF
Accessory Reviews
Philips TSi6400 iPronto
Darryl Wilkinson  |  Dec 01, 2003
The best thing to happen to home theater since the DVD.

Quick, what do your home theater system's remote control and your underwear have in common? (If your answer is that they both require batteries, I don't want to hear about it.) The correct answer is that they both need to be a comfortable fit (physically in the case of the underwear and ergonomically/functionally in the case of the remote) or else they'll annoy the hell out of you all evening long. Unfortunately, while the standard remote controls that come with most home theater components may be able to control multiple devices, when it comes to using them on a daily basis to operate an entire home theater system, they're usually about as cozy as a tight pair of burlap boxers.

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Other Source Component Reviews
Pioneer DV-563A Universal Disc Player
Geoffrey Morrison  |  Dec 01, 2003
A Combi for Everyone

It's finally happened. No longer does the desire for high-resolution audio mean that you must decide between two formats or max out your credit card on one of the high-end combi units. With the DV-563A, Pioneer has released a DVD player that not only offers progressive scanning and multichannel SACD and DVD-Audio playback, but it costs only slightly more than an entry-level DVD player. The difference in price is so slight that anyone looking for a DVD player would be insane not to look at the DV-563A. Keep reading because, believe it or not, the review's not over.

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Toshiba 46HX83 HD Monitor
Geoffrey Morrison  |  Dec 01, 2003
Bigger than a direct-view, smaller than a big-screen, Tabletop TVs offer an almost perfect balance between two sides of the TV world. On one side of that world, you have the direct-view TV's small footprint and commensurate aesthetic niceties. However, with a maximum 40-inch-diagonal screen size (38-inch for 16:9 models), these sets aren't very big. On the other side, you've got big-screen rear-projection TVs, which offer a much bigger image at the expense of a much bigger footprint on your carpet. Until recently, almost all RPTVs were quite an eyesore. Even now, no matter how nice an RPTV may look, it's still a huge box taking up real estate in your living room. On the other hand, tabletop TVs like the CRT-based Toshiba 46HX83 offer a far more-pleasing aesthetic and larger screen sizes than are available in the direct-view category.
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Tower Speaker Reviews
Atlantic Technology System 6200 speaker system
Steve Guttenberg  |  Dec 01, 2003
Tune Your Room. Atlantic Technology's new speaker system will do just that.

If there's one evergreen audiophile fantasy, it's the perfect speaker. I know lots of guys who obsess about this sort of thing, but I always remind them that, even if they had a home theater packed with perfect beauties, they still wouldn't attain audio nirvana. The perfect speakers would be confronted by the realities of a very imperfect room—its standing waves, peaks, dips, image-smearing reflections, and reverberations would conspire to muck up the sound.

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