AV Rant #587: Cursing Canadian
Our Listeners of the Week are Miguel for his donation, our 58 Patreon Patrons, as well as Curt G. for letting Accessories4Less know he heard about them from us, and Bobby K. and John S. for sending links to help Tom’s son build a gaming PC, including a pre-built AMD-based PC for under $700.
In the news, Vizio announced their 2018 TV lineup with the new P-Series looking like the highest value, and the all new P-Series Quantum delivering 98.5% of DCI-P3 color and 192 zones of local-dimming. And the Emotiva HDBaseT Extender offers 18 Gbps over a single Cat6 cable up to 130 feet.
Chris T. shared a photo of all the AVRant-recommended gear he’s purchased and is now ready to install. Ted M. discovered that his new Denon AVR-X4400H Receiver fixed a problem with blurry video he was having before. And Marc N. wanted to share his excitement about finding a lightly used Epson 5030UB projector for $700 on Craigslist.
0:17:25 Chris M. asks if it’s beneficial to use a Y-splitter to feed both the Left and Right inputs on a subwoofer.
0:19:22 Josh F. wants us to “grade” his setup, and we think the most worthwhile upgrades he could make would be a new subwoofer, and some Ascend HTM-200SE, Focal Bird, or NHT Super Series speakers.
0:31:18 Infinite Gary wonders if listening for a phantom Center between Surround Back speakers might be the best way to determine their toe-in.
0:33:42 Jay C. asks if the Focal Sib speakers would be a good alternative to the Focal Birds.
0:35:26 Nathan D. feels like this is an evolution, not revolution product year, so he wants to know if we’re excited for anything that’s launching soon.
0:40:46 Jack H. wants to buy an Oppo player, but he’s trying to decide between an Ultra HD Blu-ray model, or an older 1080p Blu-ray unit.
0:47:02 Allen G. wants to know if a Sony Ultra HD Blu-ray player will play SACDs and provide good upconversion, and he also asks why Dolby Vision isn’t a concern for projectors, and what label he needs to look for on HDMI cables to ensure 4K HDR capability.
0:52:57 Lance H. asks about the 4:4:4 chroma input on LG OLED TVs when you designate an HDMI input as being a PC input, and he asks why images of fire in HDR felt more impressive when viewed on a Sony Z9D TV.
1:02:55 Rob W. shares a ton of experience from his home theater build, then he asks why not all speakers sound very similar to one another, and why a speaker manufacturer would purposely design an inaccurate response curve.
1:22:49 Damien D. can’t connect an external amp to his current AV Receiver, and he doesn’t know what his future speakers will be, but he’s still itching to buy an amp, so we mention the limited stock of refurbished Monoprice Monolith amps, and recommend pairing one with a refurbished Denon AVR-X4300H.
1:31:18 David S. recommends using cinder blocks as speaker stands. Then he asks where we think he should place his absorption panels, how to mount them so that they’ll have an air gap, and which speakers in his collection we think he should mount as his Surrounds.
1:38:57 Justin B. is moving to a new house and is trying to decide if his theater should go in a loft or a spare bedroom.
1:44:41 Don G. gets some advice about how to connect the overwhelming number of wires in a 7.2.4 setup that includes a separate 3-channel amp.
1:50:55 Nick B. asks, what is the highest crossover frequency we would ever consider using?
1:55:32 Jack R. gets our recommendation for an Audio-Technica LP-60 turntable.
1:57:45 Shane T. gets some quick, incomplete advice about his theater build in case some of it is time sensitive.
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