Home > Podcast > AV Rant #518: Dead to Tom

AV Rant #518: Dead to Tom

December 23rd, 2016

Our Listeners of the Week are: Erik, Geoffrey, and Brian for their donations. And also Jefferson, who ordered an Oppo UDP-203 Ultra HD Blu-ray player and told them he heard about them from AV Rant.

In the news, Amazon Prime Video is now available in over 200 countries. And Kris P. and Joel N. both sent word that Xbox One bitstream audio output is in beta and available right now to members of the Insider Preview Program.

Antoine informed us that no sales bonuses are paid to Best Buy employees, so that was an error on our part last week. Kris P. noted an updated Amazon Video App for Xbox One that adds 4K and HDR support, and he also implores everyone to use the Xbox User Voice Forum to vote for the features we’d like to see added. Jonathan F. gets a few more thoughts on his vaulted ceiling reflections. And Christian S. weighs in on image “burn-in” on various display technologies.

Timothy B. has Infinity Overture 2 Tower speakers, and he wants to know the best way to preserve the longevity of their built-in amplifiers. Josh C. gets our input on his choice of subwoofers for a small home theater that will hopefully be replaced by a larger theater in the future. We also discuss his speaker choices, and mention the forthcoming Ascend Acoustics Sierra Luna as the perfect match for other Ascend Sierra-Series speakers. And Jim B. is annoyed by the backlight in his Samsung KS8000 TV. It seems to have a mind of its own, but outside of using CNET’s recommended KS8000 settings or calling a THX Certified Video Calibrator or ISF Certified Video Calibrator, we don’t know how to fix his particular issue.

Travis D. wants to know if moving his speakers closer to the wall behind them will improve dialogue intelligibility. We say no, and we go over many other things that we think could help. James wants to play the content stored on his NAS using a Roku 4. We go over some Plex settings and offer the Personal Media Apps List for Roku devices. Colin H. wants whole house audio that can be used with two existing AV Receivers, and we think the Dayton Audio DAX66 Distribution System is the perfect solution. And John M. asks if brighter HDR projectors will result in more washed-out images in rooms with light-colored walls.

Nathan D. wonders if advertisers might use HDR to try and grab our attention with obscenely bright commercials. Steve H. needs Atmos speakers to match his Aperion Verus Grand fronts. We highly recommend RBH Sound A-600 in-ceiling speakers with RBH Rear Enclosures, or Focal Bird on-wall speakers, as well as constructing SPC Backer Boxes for any large openings in the walls or ceiling. And Nathan W. wants a device that can play content from a server with lossless audio. For that, we suggest the NVidia Shield TV, or a Raspberry Pi 3 with Kodi, or Plex Media Player on a Raspberry Pi.

Bari W. asks about phantom Center channels and adjusting dialogue intelligibility when anticipating poor room acoustics. Sam P. doesn’t want to upgrade his HDMI 1.4 Pre-Pro, which means his 4K sources either need two HDMI outputs, or he’ll likely need an HD Fury Integral. And Erik S. wants a very small, but still great subwoofer in a white finish. We favor the JL Audio E110, although if it’s more about footprint than height, the Axiom Audio EP500 v4 is also an option.

Infinite Gary used subtitles to discover he wasn’t hearing every single detail with his volume dial well below Reference Volume. We suggest using some mild dynamic range compression. Bill R. wasn’t impressed with Audyssey MultEQ XT32 right away, but some adjustments helped, and he wants to know what target curve we use, why, and when the Audyssey App will finally be available. And Yuri has a wide open room, so he gets our thoughts on speaker choices, whether to use subwoofers, and what to look for in a subwoofer when full pressurization isn’t the goal.

Jeremy P. started his own speaker company, Porter Edwards. He wants to use his house as a showroom, so we discuss equipment layout and how we would set up three different listening spaces. Terry G. wants to know if an Ultra Low Profile Projector Mount will work with his setup or cause any heat issues. And Andrew N. needs a replacement projector lamp. We suggest Projector Lamp Genie or My Projector Lamps.

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