Paramount Skydance gave their best and final offer to buy Warner Bros Discovery, and Netflix declined to match it. RTings now requires a paid membership to view their full product reviews, a change made in light of AI scraping all their data and leading to far fewer page visits. Tom has updates about his back, and his house.
Pictures shown in this episode: https://flic.kr/s/aHBqjCMhvv
00:00:00 – Intro
Updates on Tom’s bad back.
00:07:31 – The New House Leak
Uh oh. That water leak Tom told us about last week? It’s turning into another saga.
00:16:22 – Hey, Scott! Tom Wants “The Product”
Shout out to SVS for their Prime Elevation wall-mount bracket. And Tom would like to take Scott up on his speaker cable offer.
– “The Product”: https://www.instagram.com/reel/DUTZ_ilDl41/
00:21:00 – What We Watched
Tom is still watching The Olympics. Rob watched Frankentstein.
00:34:10 – Listeners of the Week
Our Listeners of the Week are our 120 Patreon Patrons, including Patricio.
We also appreciate the notes of gratitude for keeping the podcast going from: Patricio, David, Steve, John, Dan, Jorge, and Karl. Thank you to everyone for continuing to listen!
In the news:
00:37:22 – News: Paramount Buying Warner Bros.
Paramount Skydance’s best & final offer was declared by Warner Bros. Discovery to be superior, and Netflix quickly declined to match it: https://tinyurl.com/558dhzf9
00:44:37 – News: RTings Goes Membership-Only
With AI scraping all their reviews, RTings has decided to put all of their full product reviews behind a paywall. Early bird members get a discount: https://tinyurl.com/2d2rvnp9
QUESTIONS:
00:49:29 – Infinite Gary: Speakers for the New Pup
A bunch of questions from Gary from last week and this week: “Dark” Picture Modes aren’t dark enough; buttons vs. touch panels; Phantom Center imaging; describing what his EQ did in subjective terms; stories of when we threw out gear instead of repairing it; and which speakers should he buy for his new puppy, Sparky?
– Polk Signature Elite Series: https://tinyurl.com/yzp4fkpe
01:16:55 – David: Universal Disc Player
Which modern disc player will let him connect via HDMI to enjoy multi-channel SACDs and DVD-Audio Discs? And does it matter if DSD gets converted to PCM?
– Sony X800M2: https://tinyurl.com/yr7ahj29
01:30:16 – Patricio: Acoustic Treatment Plan
We examine his REW measurements to figure out what he needs to do to reduce the strange “pressure on his eardrums” he’s experiencing, even during dialogue.
– https://avrant.com/a-12-step-guide-to-setting-up-dual-subwoofers/
01:49:53 – Henry: Physical Media Future
Will Skyworth also take over Panasonic’s Ultra HD Blu-ray Players? Are Ultra HD Blu-rays the “new vinyl”? And is Apple the best place to buy movies?
01:59:22 – Trevor: Panels Attached to Speaker Stands
He can’t easily wall-mount panels directly behind his speakers, so how close should they be if he builds his own bracket to attach to his speaker stands?
– https://avgadgets.com/determining-the-perfect-distance-of-speakers-from-walls/
02:10:55 – Steve: From GoldenEar to Focal?
His GoldenEar SuperSat 50 on-walls require a high crossover frequency. Will upgrading to Focal on-walls be worth it?
02:16:05 – John: Bigger or Smaller?
He’s decided to get ELAC Debut 3.0 Bookshelf speakers for Surround and Surround Back duty. Should he get the bigger ones or the smaller ones?
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