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Other Tech
S&V Valentine's Day Picks
SV Staff  |  Feb 11, 2003
Edited by Michael Gaughn Photos by Tony Cordoza Share Wear lap2 Like a lot of couples, these two products don't appear to have much in comon.
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Music Reviews
Northwest Passages
Ken Richardson  |  Feb 11, 2003

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Audio Video News
Athena Hits the Big Time
Jon Iverson  |  Feb 11, 2003
Having a great product at a fair price is mandatory practice in the ever-competitive audio business. But getting the word out and placing those products in front of the customer is just as critical—some might argue, even more important. If this is true, then Canadian speaker company Athena has just made the score of a lifetime.
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Audio Video News
Come Together
Steve Guttenberg  |  Feb 11, 2003  |  First Published: Feb 12, 2003
DVD-Audio: The long and winding road to the future of music?

DVD is a hit. Lauded as the most successful format launch since—well, I guess nothing has had this overwhelming level of acceptance in a long, long time. I wish I could say the same about DVD's younger sibling, DVD-Audio. Introduced three years ago, it's just now starting to gather some momentum. On the hardware side, DVD-Audio offerings run the gamut from saucy little $200 players to budget-busting state-of-the-art machines. New DVD-Audio titles are still just trickling out, but even a cursory glance at a typical disc's fairly lengthy production credits might explain the relative paucity of releases. I counted 13 DVD-Audio-related producers, engineers, and mixers on R.E.M.'s Reveal disc and a crew of 21 on Queen's epic A Night at the Opera. Releasing a DVD-Audio reissue or brand-new title is a labor-intensive effort.

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Projector Reviews
PLUS Piano Avanti HE-3200 DLP Projector
Mike Wood  |  Feb 11, 2003  |  First Published: Feb 12, 2003
The upright gets upgraded to a grand.

You'd think there would've been a flood of entry-level DLP projectors since PLUS came out with their HE-3100 last year (see our review in the December 2001 issue). PLUS has even dropped the original Piano's price to $2,700. Usually, this would entice or force others to do likewise. There have been some new entries in the sub-$10,000 price range, but few projectors have reached below $5,000 (except for projectors aimed at the business market). This makes PLUS's step-up model, the $3,299 Piano Avanti HE-3200, even more interesting.

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Gateway GTW-P42M102 42-Inch Plasma HD Monitor
Kevin Miller  |  Feb 11, 2003  |  First Published: Feb 12, 2003
Gateway has thrown down the gauntlet in the budget-plasma arena.

Plasma panel prices continue to drop precipitously as the technology gets hotter and hotter. Gateway, provider of digital-technology solutions, has entered the home theater market with the GTW-P42M102 42-inch plasma panel, which has a native resolution of 852 by 480 in progressive-scan mode. It's a perfect example of plasma's ongoing price reduction. The streamlined display is 25.2 inches high, 40.8 inches wide, and a very slim 3.7 inches deep, and it weighs less than 70 pounds. The handsomely designed set sports a silver finish with a small, dark border surrounding the screen. The GTW-P42M102's performance characteristics are a mixed bag; however, at a list price of $2,999, there's no denying that it's the best value by a country mile in the 42-inch-plasma-panel category.

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Other Source Component Reviews
Onkyo DV-SP800 SACD/DVD-Audio Player
Chris Lewis  |  Feb 11, 2003  |  First Published: Feb 12, 2003
The high-resolution combi-player takeover continues.

How pleased am I that the trickle of combination SACD/DVD-Audio players has quickly reached a full flow? Visitors to my whiskey cellar (all right, my whiskey cabinet) may notice recently cracked seals on more than one of my special-occasion bottles of rare Wild Turkey. I've been on the soapbox about this issue. While no one needed a crystal ball to predict that the market would kick-start once Pioneer released their combi player, I still had my doubts. After all, this SACD/DVD-Audio format war started out as nasty as any of them. But then, I always took solace in precedent. Dolby and DTS didn't exactly exchange Christmas cards at first, either (and they still don't); now, however, you'd be hard-pressed to find applicable hardware that doesn't accommodate both formats. Deep down, I suppose I always knew that high-resolution combi players would ultimately be the norm, but I doubted that it would happen this quickly—and besides, it was more fun to do a bit of preaching.

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Other Tech
HDTV Year in Review
Greg Tarr  |  Feb 10, 2003
Illustrations by Jack Gallagher Whether you think the transition to digital television (DTV) broadcasting made a lot of progress in 2002 will depend on whether you tend to see water glasses as half empty or half full. Sales of high-definition digital televisions (HDTVs) gained momentum as prices dropped.
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Gateway GTW-P42M102 42-inch Plasma TV
Al Griffin  |  Feb 10, 2003
Competition in the computer business has heated up over the past few years, with companies slashing prices to the bone in order to move product. You can now get a PC with a speedy processor and huge hard drive for only $399, and they'll undoubtedly cost less than that by this time next year. What's a forward-thinking computer company to do?
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Audio Video News
Meridian's Digital In-wall
HT Staff  |  Feb 10, 2003
Long known as a leader in digital audio and video technologies, Meridian Audio Limited has taken digital signal processing (DSP) into a new realm with the introduction of the DSP420, an "architectural" in-wall speaker that applies the British manufacturer's expertise to the problems of built-in designs.
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