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Disposable DVDs
November 26, 2004
Dear Wes,
I just read an article about "disposable" DVDs.
Are they going to be a real product -- or can I just ignore them?
Campbell
The "disposable" DVD is real, but I hope you
can just ignore them and they will go away. They are manufactured by Flexplay and, as far as I'm concerned,
they are the spawn of Satan.
Supposedly, the discs, called EZ-Ds, are in response to
consumers who can't be bothered to return rental DVDs or are concerned about scratches.
Personally, I'm concerned about waste. One reason I love
rental DVDs is that you use 'em and then someone uses 'em and so on and on and on. If you
want to see a movie more than once or twice, you buy it and keep it.
Supposedly, the nice folks at Flexplay are concerned about
recycling and they point out that EZ-Ds can be recycled by sending them to GreenDisk.
Right.
I live in NYC, where people bitch and moan about having to
separate recyclables from the regular garbage, so I suspect that having to mail out
recycling is not going to be a big success.
We won't even go into quality issues.
I could be wrong, but I'm betting this technology tanks
even faster than DIVx.
Gaming sound
November 18, 2004
Hi Wes,
I don't watch much TV and I don't watch movies, but I'm an
avid gamer. Why don't more reviewers mention how much better games are with a really
bitchin' multichannel system? Is it beneath them?
Freedo
I suspect some of them might feel that way, but based on
my experiences with Halo 2 and URU Ages Beyond Myst, they're wrong. The best modern games
are spending Hollywood-blockbuster amounts on sound as well as graphics, and it really
shows, er sounds...umm, you get the picture.
Oh drat!
What I mean is that you're right, the sound of games does
benefit as much from a good multichannel system as the sound of movies, and I suspect that
HT reviewers are going to have to start addressing that or seem hopelessly old-fashioned.
Upgrading to HT
November 11, 2004
Hi Wes,
First, I'd like to thank you for the great work you do for
us audiophiles! I'm not, however, in the group your articles are primarily aimed at. My
wallet wouldn't afford most of what you're reviewing. Also, I should add that I live in
Norway, and I use the SoundStage!
Network a lot.
But my question is as follows. I live in a quite small
apartment, with a small living room. But I still want a home-theater system. Currently I'm
using an NAD setup with DVD player (T562), CD player (C542) and integrated amp (C350). My
speakers are B&W DM603 S3s. I'm thinking about buying an NAD T743 receiver, and I've
been looking at the Axiom Epic Midi speaker system.
What do you think about this combination, and how do you
think it will compare with my current setup?
Øystein
It's dangerous for me to generalize about the sound of
your current system and the sound of the system you're considering because my values may
not be your values. However, you asked, so here's my guess: heavily weighted by my sonic
prejudices, I suspect your current system is detailed but polite and lacks punch and that
the system you are considering will be warmer, sound fuller, and play louder.
It's not so much a question of quality, however. Obviously,
both systems have NAD receivers and the B&Ws you have now are quite good. So what's
the big difference? The subwoofer in the Epic system, of course, and the sensitivity of
the loudspeakers. You'd get similar differences simply by changing the speakers and
keeping the receiver you have now.
I really like the Axiom speakers a lot, but I also like
the B&Ws, and I suspect you can get the improvement you're looking for by upgrading
the receiver -- and adding a subwoofer, if you wish. You may even save a few bucks you can
put towards some new DVDs, like the Looney Tunes Golden Collection Volume 2 that
came out this week.
Of course, if you've been looking for an excuse to
replace the B&Ws, ignore everything I've said and buy new loudspeakers -- not that you
need my permission.
Measuring for speaker placement
November 9, 2004
Wes,
When someone says that his speakers are, say, 2.5' from the
back wall, does he mean that they are 2.5' to the rear of the speakers or 2.5' to the
front? If the speaker is 12" deep, these two would be quite different. Same question
for distance to the side wall. Is it x' to the side of the speaker or x' to the center of
the speaker?
Randy
I can't speak for all reviewers, but Stereophile,
the magazine I used to write for, marked distances from the speaker wall closest to the
boundary we measured from -- thus, a speaker that was 2.5' from the rear wall had a 2.5'
gap between the rear panel of the speaker and the wall behind it and a speaker that was
2.5' from the side wall had a 2.5' space between its side closest to the wall and the wall
nearest to it.
When we measured the space between speakers, we
measured the distance from the inside panel of one speaker to the inside panel of the
loudspeaker facing it.
I hope that's all clear.
Fading receiver
November 4, 2004
Hi Wes,
I am having difficulty with my receiver. One of the
channels is not working properly. When I tighten or loosen the ground screw on the bottom
of the receiver (a Denon that's about ten years old), it will come in for a while, clear
as a bell, but then it will quickly fade to a barley audible sound. It seems to be
directly related to the ground-connection screw. Is there a trick to fixing this?
Bobby
It probably is a ground problem, but it's hard to say
exactly what the problem is. I doubt that it's directly related to the screw, even though
fiddling with the screw seems to temporarily solve the problem.
My guess is that there's a cracked solder joint somewhere
on the circuit board and that when you play with the screw you're re-establishing contact.
With most ten-year-old receivers, it's probably cheaper to replace them than to repair.
Wish I could be of more help.
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