January 11, 2007 - Modern A/V systems are so complex, it's easy to miss a setting and end up with an experience that is less than ideal. Setting aspect ratio is a perfect example.
PS Audio is showing a new version of their Power Plant. The Premier is smaller and runs cooler than its predecessor yet puts out 50% more power (1500 watts continuous). At $2195, it’s not a budget power conditioner, but it’s really in a league of its own. The Premier is actually a power amplifier capable of outputting pure, distortionless (and thus noiseless) 120 volt sine wave AC sufficient to power most entire home theater systems. A case could be made that no combination of conditioners, power line filters and expensive power cords could ever match this at any cost. Included is filtration and surge protection for cable and telephone plus 10 AC outlets.
Bang & Olufsen is showing their latest plasma TV product—the Beovision 9, shown here with B&O NA President Kim Gravesen. On the surface, it appears to be just a good 50” plasma with unusually advanced styling, but underneath it’s really far more. B&O claims it’s run by the fastest picture engine in the world. Various parameters (black level, sharpness, white level, etc) are controlled dynamically to maintain an optimum picture regardless of source content. An integrated center channel speaker has an acoustic lens to provide extremely wide horizontal dispersion. Aside from these basics, the Beovision 9 also serves as a home cinema master fully integrating and controlling music files, photos, net radio, and other web media, plus controlling lights, screen, and drapes—all with one remote. An HD video output will drive a projector in a separate dedicated theater. Up to 10 Beolab speakers and 2 subwoofers can be connected simultaneously. It’s not cheap (about $20,000) but then it IS B&O.
TAD (division of Pioneer Electronics) is showing the Reference One, their latest ultra high-end loudspeakers. At $60,000/pr they’re certainly not for every home theater, but the sound was outstanding (warm, powerful, and detailed) and the cosmetics superb. Sound source here was open reel tape. Both the midrange cone and tweeter dome (made into a concentric driver) are made of beryllium. This one driver covers the entire range from 250 Hz to a staggering 100K Hz.
While next-gen disc formats have made big poop at this year's CES, the wireless HDMI demo I witnessed this morning from Amimon is by far the most significant new technology I've seen here in Vegas.
Silicon Optix was demonstrating the 1080p HD beta version of its renowned <I>HQV Benchmark</I> disc with deintlacing, scaling and other various torture tests for displays. On top of that, select memebers of the press, including yours truly were given copies that we can run the tests on our HD DVD players and displays upon returning home.
Get ready for wireless everything, a major theme at the show. Apple TV is grabbing the headlines, with MacWorld happening in SF at the same time as CES, but those wanting a cable-free life got a bunch of new options in Vegas this week. Going wireless is Neosonik's whole raison d'etre. Plug in your video source via HDMI 1.3 and watch (if such were possible) your video signals fly as an H.264 video transmission with audio in a separate stream. Depending on the size of supplied speakers, cost ranges from $6000 for Series 4 to $10,000 for Series 6.
