If you haven't already taken a peek at the "Specifications" sidebar, you might want to read this review before checking out the price of the Mark Levinson No.40 surround preamplifier-processor. Drat—you looked. Now I have to find a way to hold your attention for this, the first US review of the production version of what may well be the most ambitious piece of home-theater electronics ever assembled.
<I>Jack Nicholson, Kathy Bates, Dermott Mulroney, Hope Davis, June Squibb, Len Cariou, Howard Hessman. Directed by Alexander Payne. Aspect ratio: 1.85:1 (anamorphic). Dolby Digital 5.1, DTS 5.1, Dolby Surround 2.0 (English). 125 minutes. 2002. Warner Home Video 39524. R. $27.98.</I>
Hitachi's TV lineup for the coming year will be one of the first with "plug-and-play" compatibility for high-definition programming delivered over cable systems.
The following reviews appeared as "Reference DVD" features in the Movies section of Sound & Vision. Out of the 22 discs chosen for their exceptional audio and video from September 2000 through July/August 2003, I consider these five the standouts. BLUE CRUSH Universal
Zenith Want a taste of DVD-Audio? Hey, at this price, why not? Zenith's affordable DVB252 five-disc DVD changer can handle the format, feeding high-res audio to your receiver or preamp through its multichannel analog audio output. And if you're sometimes in the mood for compressed audio, the player also reads MP3 and Windows Media Audio (WMA) files on CD-Rs and CD-RWs.
Former Chrysler Corporation CEO Lee Iacocca was famed for saying that, in the auto industry, a company "either leads, follows, or gets out of the way." Fox Television has apparently decided that where high-definition programming is concerned, it had better follow or get left behind.
From the June issue, Steven Stone reviews the competitively-priced HD2-chipped <A HREF="http://www.guidetohometheater.com/showarchives.cgi?129">InFocus Screenplay 7200 DLP projector</A>. Stone observes that the InFocus "lowers the price of an HD2 projector below $10,000." But does it deliver? "That's the $2000 question," says Stone.
In late June, two electronics industry groups presented proposals that could make "plug and play" a reality for high-definition video components,home networking devices, and other types of consumer products.