AVRant #130: SCSCISISCSSSSsssss
May 28th, 2009
Clint’s in for Dina this week. We’ve got another unbelievable deal this week, check it out. A few listener questions including one about audition music, one about line level inputs on a sub, and a third about the new SVS EQ. Update on the contest. An evaluation of the PS3 by Tom (where he says oh so nice things… yeah, that’s the ticket). Clint’s reviewing the new Oppo Blu-ray player and gives you a preview. What’s the deal with GameStop’s return policy and how can you use it to your advantage? NAD confuses Tom and Clint (that just sounds wrong). E-Play – the GameStop/Amazon killer? Tom calibrated his ears. Thanks for listening and don’t forget to vote for us at Podcast Alley.
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I have so many comments this week! Let’s get to it:
1) I love the pic! lol It’s the mystery witness interviewee 😀
2) Awww…have faith, Tom. Those of us who have sent in auditions won’t let you down 😀
Of course, putting my ugly mug in place of the mystery witness might be bad for listener numbers :p
3) Testing speakers for dynamic range with your ears alone is very very difficult. A speaker really does need to have a minimum 20 dB range in which it does not compress or audibly distort. Not all speakers can achieve that, but without measurements from test equipment, it is darn hard to determine with just the human ear.
4) The subwoofer connection question – this is actually a topic I was hoping to discuss if I get to be a guest co-host!
I’ve had plenty of instances where the receiver (and I’m talking about well known and well regarded brands like Yamaha and Onkyo here) does not steer all of the bass to the subwoofer output as it should. In my experience, sometimes, when setting all 5/7 speakers to “small”, the bass from the front L/R channels gets “lost” and doesn’t come out of the subwoofer output the way it is supposed to. The only way to “get it back” is to either set the subwoofer output to “double bass aka LFE + Mains” or else set the front speakers to “large” the subwoofer to “off” and then use the speaker wire connection to the subwoofer.
5) The PS3.
Oh, Tom…so bitter :p
It seems as though the whole fan noise thing is different from unit to unit because my 80GB (which is one of the older 80GB models which has the 4 USB ports and PS2 backwards compatibility via emulation) is definitely audible in terms of fan noise, but I’ve heard 40GB units that are very close to silent. I was hopeful that all current units would be equally quiet, but I guess that’s not the case 🙁
I don’t know that the PS3 advocates are Xbox360 haters though. I think Tom might just be a Xbox360 fanboy 😉
6) I’m with Clint – Annie is painful to watch at first. Although…if you can tough it out at get through the first 20 minutes, you sort of get into it and then it’s good 🙂
7) E-Play sounds cool. And WAY to complicated for the average person :p I predict many dented E-Play kiosks from people kicking them.
8) NAD – New Acoustic Dimension
Do I win? 😀
As to claiming that it can handle “HD Audio” – technically, it can, because S/PDIF can transmit 2-channel uncompressed PCM, which, being a 2-channel integrated amp, is all the NAD can accommodate in terms of channels anyway. All Blu-ray players, by mandate, can decode 2-channels of Dolby TrueHD, so I think that is how NAD is able to make that claim.
9) Any chance we can see pics of Clint’s friend’s theatre? I’d love to see it!
10) Dang it! My streak of being mentioned has ended 🙁
Oh well… :p
Looking forward to the Video Calibration Interview!
10) You think you’ve got it bad, Jeremy is still providing pics and I keep forgetting to mention him. Jeremy, YOU ROCK!!!!
I’ll get to the rest later, work to do…
I have a 60GB and I think it is loud, especially when my kids forget to open the cabinet door when they are using it…
HL2 is awesome, one of the few FPS that I will play the whole way through. Love Portal just needs more levels.
Not sure if you have it for your 360 but Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare is still one of the best FPS out there. People complain the campaign is too short but that is one of the reasons I like it, I would chose quality over quantity in video games.
Since you have used both the SMS and bass traps could you discuss the differences you noticed using each one? The SMS without the traps, the traps without the SMS and then using both.
I’d love to see a few recommendations of tracks or passages from tracks that you guys like to use to test various aspects of speakers. You mentioned several elements that you listen for and specific examples of test material would really fill in the blanks for someone like me. I know that you’ve mentioned a few tracks here and there, but a brief listing posted somewhere easily accessible would be great. What you like to listen for on said tracks & passages for each example would be helpful for us who would like to step up our room treatments, speaker quality/placement and don’t have friends with this kind of knowledge and equipment that we can experience firsthand.
Fox – Good idea, I’ll try and do that
Spencer – If you are looking for a few specifics, check out the shootout article (link). It has the six tracks we used listed. Other than that, you can always just read the reviews, I often list the tracks I used during the review.
Honestly, I’ve been trying to compile just such a list myself with the help of Clint, Gene, and J. The minute I get a specific list, I’ll be sure to share it.
“i Can wear the PS3 as a Hat and cant hear a thing” Ja ja ja !!!!!! LOL funny stuff man. But really, I cant hear anything