One highlight of the Custom Electronic Design & Installation Association's annual Expo is the Garden of High Definition Delights. Flagship HDTVs from nearly every manufacturer are lined up in this large, darkened space, all displaying pristine high-def images. You can call up programming on any set to compare performance with identical source material.
People often ask me, "How do you keep up with all the new technologies? The market changes so fast." One of the best ways to stay current is to attend trade shows where the latest gear is on display and you can actually talk with the folks who designed it.
For all of the benefits the digital revolution has brought to music - like streaming, unprecedented portability, and the ease of sorting and managing large collections - some people see it as not only a travesty but also a threat. Granted, these are usually the same people who lament the supposed lack of any advancement in audio quality since the birth of vinyl. But do they have a point?
The first thing my wife told me when I returned from the Consumer Electronics Show in January was that our eight-year-old garage-door opener was broken. When it still produced a banshee-like screech after a liberal dose of WD-40 - the universal cure-all for ailing mechanical devices - I decided we needed a new opener.
Every time a new technology emerges, it seems like pundits can't wait to declare everything that preceded it obsolete. A classic example is the U.S. Postal Service. How many times have you heard that faxes and e-mails are going to replace the good old mailman? But six days a week - through rain, sleet, snow, and dead of night - the mailman still completes his appointed rounds.
People have been making New Year's resolutions since calendars were first invented. "I'm going to alphabetize my CD collection." "I'll use the Soloflex as more than a clothes hanger." And the biggie - "I'm going to get a job that I really enjoy."
Is getting a flat-panel set out of the box and onto the wall something you can do yourself, or do you need to hire a pro? Assuming you don't want to run any wires inside the wall, mounting a flat-panel is probably a "6" on the difficulty scale. So if you think you're up to the challenge, read on!
Marantz introduced its DAvED (Digital Audio via Electrical Distribution) system at this year's Consumer Electronics Show, and I was immediately wowed by the concept of sending audio over a house's electrical wiring. So I jumped at the chance to play with a pre-production sample.