Stroll through any large store that sells audio and video equipment, and it's mind-numbing how similar the products in each category look. If you close your eyes, point to any receiver or DVD player, and guess "black and boxy," you'll almost certainly be right.
Conventional wisdom dictates that there are good reasons why A/V design is so homogeneous.
It's the week before Christmas. You've taken a good look at your extended family, gotten all of the naughty and nice stuff out of the way, and finally arrived at a list of who's deserving of a little holiday cheer. But you're drawing a big blank when it comes to little Susie, big brother Ned, and jolly Uncle Phil.
Running with a stack of my favorite CDs compressed into a player no larger than a deck of cards, I set a personal best on the trail around the Central Park Reservoir.
Over the years personal stereo has evolved from an offensive weapon (think boombox) to a defensive one. When you're wearing earphones in a crowd, you're ensconced in a zone of privacy. People don headphones at a health club or on the street in part to signify they don't want to be approached.
Photo by Tony Cordoza Check it out:Getting HDTV on Cable Rumors began circulating in the fall of 2001 among the more technologically advanced New York City customers of Time Warner Cable (TWC) that there was a secret HDTV waiting list hidden from the customer-service representatives, the people who u
Sure, Hewlett-Packard's ambitious Media Center PC 883n ($1,999) could replace many of the A/V components in your home theater-including your DVD player, TiVo or ReplayTV hard-disk video recorder, and CD jukebox. But HP will be the first to admit that its chrome and black computer is not likely to become many families' main entertainment center.
