Tom Norton

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CES 2010
Atlantic Technology Gets aH PAS
Tom Norton  |  Jan 09, 2010  |  Published: Jan 10, 2010  |  0 comments
Atlantic Technology was showing a near finished prototype of its H-PAS speaker, first seen in early form at CEDIA. H-PAS stands for Hybrid Pressure Acceleration System, a fancy name for what is claimed to be a breakthrough in bass loading. It combines several speaker technologies, including bass reflex, inverse horn, and transmission line. The system is purely passive;there is no subwoofer hidden in the box and the only drivers in the design are the two 5.25" woofers and soft dome tweeter seen in the photo (which does not do the gloss black design justice).
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Atlantic Upgrades
Tom Norton  |  Jan 11, 2007  |  Published: Jan 12, 2007  |  0 comments

Atlantic Technology has modified its flagship System 8200 THX Ultras2 speaker line. The revised version, the 8200e, does away with the pedestal subwoofers and replaces them with a passive pedestal/stand. The system may now be set up with the user's choice of subwoofer(s), such as Atlantic's THX-certified 642eSB ($1000). This change lowers the height of the speaker by about 10 inches. The side panels are now fixed instead of removable, and there is only a single finish available— gloss black. The 8200e C three-way center channel speaker also has fixed side panels in the same gloss black finish, plus a slightly modified crossover said to smooth the response in the lower midrange for improved dialogue reproduction. A complete 8200e 5.1-channel system starts at $10,000.

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A/V Veteran
Audio Grins
Tom Norton  |  Mar 28, 2023  |  4 comments
Cartoon by Charles Rodrigues.

In a flash of inspiration last week I decided it was time to sort through the mass of paperwork squirrelled away in my office. That’s when I discovered a long-forgotten folder labeled “Humor”…

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CES 2012
Audio Research
Tom Norton  |  Jan 15, 2012  |  0 comments
You will see a few asides in these postings that are not speaker-related, but interesting nonetheless. Shown in the photo is the first preamp ever produced by audio specialist Audio Research, the SP-3 from the mid 1970s. It was on static display in the Audio Research room. Audio Research founder William Z. Johnson passed away in 2011. Johnson and his company were key players in the birthing of high-end.
Audyssey Restores the Balance
Tom Norton  |  Sep 06, 2007  |  0 comments

Audyssey, the company behind the room compensation system that is appearing in more and more AV receivers and pre-pros, introduced its latest technology: Audyssey Dynamic EQ. it's designed to compensate for the loss of sound quality that results as the volume level, is reduced.

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CES 2016A/V VeteranAudio Video News
AV Highlights from the Frontlines of the Big Show
Tom Norton  |  Jan 12, 2016  |  2 comments
Another year, another CES. I’ve been doing them for so long you think they’d become second nature, or even boring. But they always surprise, and there’s always too much of interest to see in the show’s four short days, jostling through 175,000 of my closest friends.
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Aviamo
Tom Norton  |  Sep 07, 2007  |  0 comments

I think Aviamo in Italian must mean "expensive," if it means anything at all. At $18,000 this 65" 1080p Fujitsu plasma looked great, but it faces stiff competition for a lot less money. And we thought that the new 60" Pioneer Elite was steep at $7500.

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A/V Veteran
AXPONA 2019: A Guide to the Best Sound
Tom Norton  |  Apr 23, 2019  |  1 comments
The annual Audio Expo North America (AXPONA) show in Chicago has exploded into the biggest audio show in North America. 2019 was my first experience there, and it lived up to its reputation. The only show that’s now bigger, based on the number of exhibitors (though I understand it’s heavy on static displays), is May’s Munich show in Germany.
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B&K
Tom Norton  |  Sep 07, 2007  |  0 comments

B&K showed its new Reference 70 Series 2 AV pre-pro. It will accept multichannel PCM audio over HDMI, but does not decode Dolby TrueHD or DTS HD Master Audio internally. It does offer full video transcoding, as well as video processing via the HQV REON chip from Silicon Optix.

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CES 2009
Baby Mythos
Tom Norton  |  Jan 10, 2008  |  Published: Jan 11, 2008  |  0 comments

Fred Manteghian recently reviewed the Definitive Technology Mythos ST and had a lot of good things to say about it. Now Definitive has introduced the Mythos STS, a similar but smaller design at $2998 per pair.

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