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The News-Gazette, Champaign-Urbana, Ill., Electronics Review Column

Posted on: Tuesday, 5 July 2005, 09:00 CDT

Jul. 4--NEWS IN AUDIO/VIDEO: On this natal day for our Republic I'd love to write a column about wonderful American audio/video products, but they are so few and far between as to barely fill a column. If you want to buy American, most of the high-end audiophile electronics are still handmade in the U.S.A. Many speaker companies assemble their systems here, but buy the components elsewhere. So we'll move on to some news in the audio/video arena.

If you're feeling flush, but feel better when buying a bargain, Fujitsu lowered the price of one of its premium plasma video displays by almost one-third. The Plasmavision® P63XHA40US 63-inch HDTV monitor has been reduced by $5,000, from $18,000 to $13,000. You also could buy a decent new car for that price.

A few years ago an investment company bought and merged the fine brands of Marantz and Denon, which remain two of the best audio/video electronics companies around. Known as D&M Holdings, it now adds the respected Boston Acoustics speaker company to its portfolio. The purchase includes the high-end Snell brand owned by Boston Acoustics. D&M also owns the famed McIntosh brand (no relation to the Apple) and Rio, which specializes in MP3 players. I find it an irony that arch competitors Frank McIntosh, founder of McIntosh, and Saul Marantz, founder of the company that bears his name, are now owned by the same corporate entity. Both names have gone through several owners on their way to D&M.

The FCC is finally codifying the digital radio standard proposed by iBiquity, which has been in use on the FM band on a temporary experimental basis for the past 18 months. The good news is that as a part of this process, the FCC will finally consider permitting digital AM broadcasting at night. This is great news for listeners to WDWS and WILL-AM.

Both stations fade into the ether at night by law, to protect more powerful stations on the same frequencies elsewhere. Digital signals can be transmitted at very low power, yet cover a surprisingly wide area, without interfering with distant stations. The National Association of Broadcasters accepted tests by iBiquity, the proponent of the digital terrestrial broadcast system, and is now lobbying the FCC to authorize digital AM.

For example, when WILL-AM reduces power to 50 watts an hour after sundown, its signal barely reaches Mahomet and Ogden. With digital transmission, the signal will clearly reach those locations and possibly further. Listeners in Chicago still will not hear WILL-AM at night, but our local area will hear it clearly.

Meanwhile, according to a report in Twice, an electronics and appliance trade magazine, the NPD Music Lab conducted a survey that revealed satellite radio (XM and Sirius) listeners are older than those people who listen to MP3 music players. Not much surprise there. Interestingly, both tend to buy more CDs than people who listen to conventional terrestrial radio.

Although I understand the convenience of a Swiss Army knife, I always found them bulky and a bit cumbersome. I have the same reaction to the new breed of cell phones on which you can watch videos and download and listen to MP3s. From reviews I've read, these all-in-ones fail to do any of their tasks particularly well and are larger than phone-only models. Beyond the novelty, what pleasure is there in watching videos on a 2.5-inch screen?

I have a little Sony Watchman with a screen not much larger and never enjoyed watching TV on it. Give me that 63-inch Fujitsu plasma any day, along with a very large raise.

Rich Warren can be reached at hifiguy@mchsi.com.

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FJTSY, FJTSF, 6702, BOSA, AAPL, 6689, XMSR, SIRI, SNE, 6758,

Source: The News-Gazette

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