Mark Fleischmann

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Audio Video News
Blu-ray Unhacked
Mark Fleischmann  |  Dec 17, 2008
Recently we reported that Blu-ray has been hacked. Well, now it's been unhacked, though the victory was short-lived.
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Audio Video News
Blu-ray Up, DVD Down
Mark Fleischmann  |  Jul 27, 2010
The numbers for home entertainment spending are in from the Digital Entertainment Group. Blu-ray and downloads are up, DVD is down, and when you add it all together, overall spending is slightly down.
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CES 2017
Bluesound Bar Needs No Sub
Mark Fleischmann  |  Jan 05, 2017
Bluesound's Pulse soundbar raises an intriguing question: Sub or no sub?

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CEDIA 2017
Bluesound Updates Pulse Soundbar
Mark Fleischmann  |  Sep 08, 2017
You may have heard about Bluesound's Pulse Soundbar before but you probably haven't heard about a couple of recent updates.

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Ears On
Boltz CD600, CDEXP-T, CD600x2 CD Racks
Mark Fleischmann  |  Oct 20, 2006
Buying a fancy CD rack may seem counterintuitive in the iPod era. After, even a drop-dead-gorgeous piece of industrial design like the Boltz CD600X2 still takes up space. Isn't it more elegant to rip everything and dump your discs?
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Ears On
Book Experiences Seven-Year Itch
Mark Fleischmann  |  Oct 03, 2007
Once a year I quietly go berserk updating my book Practical Home Theater: A Guide to Video and Audio Systems. Adding new content and revising old content forces me to review what I know about the subject, often prodding me into becoming better informed. And of course it gives me a chance to capture more of your hard-earned nickels and dimes. The 2008 Edition is number seven. It comes in a handsome cream cover and is now available from Amazon in both the U.S. and the U.K. As I often tell people, don't read it all at once or it'll make you violently ill. But this strapping little volume does make an excellent answer book for all the questions a non-engineer might have about how HDTV and surround sound really work. Knock yourself out!
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Ears On
Book Promoted in Guise of HDMI Blog
Mark Fleischmann  |  Oct 05, 2006
If you hate the vulture's nest of ridiculously expensive cables lurking behind your rack, relief is spelled with four letters: HDMI. Someday signal sources will connect with just one HDMI cable. However, depending on what audio formats you want your system to support, you may have to seek out specific versions of HDMI. Having just nailed this for the next edition of my book (not out yet, to appear on Amazon sometime in the next 30 days) I might as well give you this little cheat sheet:
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Ears On
Book Revised, Self Promoted
Mark Fleischmann  |  Oct 01, 2008
Time for an annual act of self-promotion. Every year, usually around October 1, my book Practical Home Theater: A Guide to Video and Audio Systems goes into a new edition. This year's edition is the eighth, cover date 2009, ISBN 9781932732108, and is easily distinguished by its pale blue cover, which replaces last year's off-white. Annually refreshing the book gives me a chance to review and expand what I know about home theater technology as well as bring readers up to date. This year's big news is the DTV transition, scheduled for February 2009, which is mentioned throughout the book. The most poignant aspect of the update was pruning out a lot of material about HD DVD, leaving only one fat graf of historical summary. HDMI got some attention as I flagged the latest versions and added more material about the distinction between Category 1 and Category 2 HDMI cables. Before long, I'll be taking the page layout I've recently labored over and stripping it down to a pictureless Word file, typing new material into the book over the next year for the following edition. Practical Home Theater is the only book on the subject to get this kind of ongoing attention. If you buy it, I hope it serves you well. Annual act of self-promotion completed.
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Audio Video News
Borders Bankrupt, Closing Some Stores
Mark Fleischmann  |  Feb 17, 2011
Another packaged media store is heading for bankruptcy court and it's a big one. Borders Group is filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.

Last month Borders got a $550 million line of credit from GE Capital, noting at the time "the possibility of an in-court restructuring." Now that the deal is done, the initial effect will be closure of 30 percent of the chain's 650 stores. Borders will also delay payments to vendors, landlords, and other creditors.

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Ears On
Bose Cuts the Noise
Mark Fleischmann  |  Jun 15, 2006
Bose product demos always come with a dash of entertainment. At last week's New York press demo for the QuietComfort 3 headphones, hapless reporters entered the room to find a mannequin wearing a pair of large Bose headphones, only to see the earpieces whipped off to reveal the newer, smaller model. The QuietComfort 3 is the third generation of Bose noise-canceling headphones. They cover the ear without enclosing it. They're the first noise-canceling headphones to use a rechargable battery, a 20-hour lithium ion type, and the charger is a cute earcup-shaped object with flip-down prongs that plug into the wall without a cable. A $39 accessory cable allows users to switch between cell phone and music. Check bose.com to see if your phone is compatible. The demo in New York actually used a Nokia cell phone with MP3 files at 192kbps. The headphones were accurate enough to reveal smeary compression artifacts—no surprise to me, since I already use the original QuietComfort 1, as well as the non-NC TriPort, and thought highly enough of the former to have the earpads renovated when they wore out. If you want full-sized cans, the QuietComfort 2 remains in the line for $299, but the new QuietComfort 3 sells for $349 and is available from the Bose site as of today.
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