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Audio Video NewsNew Products
Elac to Start Shipping Reference Speakers This Week
Bob Ankosko  |  Jul 12, 2021
Germany’s Elac plans to start shipping the recently announced Uni-Fi Reference series of speakers this week. The line builds on the success of its highly rated Uni-Fi 2.0 series.
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Signals
Receiving the Zombie Apocalypse
Ken C. Pohlmann  |  Jul 12, 2021
Those poor dumb bastards didn't make it. But you did. At least so far. Every night, when the Zeke's come out to play, it gets pretty intense – all alone in your basement, crouching in the darkness. If only there was some way to connect to the outside world. There must be other survivors, but where are they? Fortunately, you remember a blog you once read.

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Music Reviews
Al Stewart: Year of the Cat: 45th Anniversary Deluxe Edition
Mike Mettler  |  Jul 09, 2021
Performance
Sound
Al Stewart is the kind of seasoned artist known for being well worth the wait. The Scottish-born and London-bred Stewart initially focused on mining a folk-driven vein when he made his debut with October 1967's orchestrally buttressed Bed Sitter Images, and it took the burgeoning singer/songwriter five more albums and another eight years until he truly hit his stride with March 1975's Modern Times.
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Audio Video News
Midyear Review: Best Gear of 2021
Bob Ankosko  |  Jul 08, 2021
With a little over six months under our belts — and COVID now thankfully behind us — now is the perfect time to review our Top Picks for the first half of the year. In all, we’ve highlighted more than two dozen products that have made the cut.
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Stream On
Masterclass Acts at the Rock ’n’ Roll Fantasy Camp
Mike Mettler  |  Jul 08, 2021
The Rock ’n’ Roll Fantasy Camp changed its tune during the pandemic from offering in-person seminars with stars to streaming Masterclass sessions. In many ways, the shift broadened the scope of what the Camp has to offer.
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Streaming Device Reviews
Simaudio Moon 280D Streaming DAC Review
Howard Kneller  |  Jul 07, 2021

Performance
Features
Ergonomics
Value
PRICE $3,000

AT A GLANCE
Plus
Outstanding performance and build quality
Wireless multiroom streaming-capable
Roon Ready and AirPlay 2-compatible
Minus
Lacks front panel display
No HDMI input

THE VERDICT
Simaudio's Moon 280D is a bit light on features when compared with its wireless network music streamer/DAC competition, but it offers exceptional build quality and audiophile-grade sound.

Simaudio, an audio manufacturer located in Quebec, Canada is well-known for both the build quality of its products and the whopping ten-year warranty it offers. Many of the company's wares are decidedly high-end—the 230-pound Moon 888 monoblock amplifier ($118,888 per pair), which is rated to output a massive 888 watts at 8 ohms and double that down to 1,776 watts at 4 ohms, for example.

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A/V Veteran
Cleanup On Aisle A/V
Thomas J. Norton  |  Jul 06, 2021
Remember the scene in Oblivion where Jack cues up a record in his secret hideaway? I could expand here on the ratty condition of the record sleeves, but I'm referring instead to the clump of dust on the stylus—the "needle" for the analog-deprived. In the movie world, and in the absence of a proper stylus brush, he might use a finger swipe to clean it off (yikes!), but since he (and the movie's art director) has only recently experienced the vinyl enlightenment if at all, and in the absence of a proper stylus brush, he simply ignores it. The record plays nevertheless.

But this tome isn't about vinyl. It's about the sticky business of keeping our audio-video systems relatively tidy. Working on this should be at least an annual event for every A/V fan, and for the inveterate tweaker and/or reviewer it should happen even more often.

Begin with the equipment stand or rack...

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Audio Video NewsNew Products
LG Rolls Out QNED Mini-LED TVs, Announces Dolby Vision Update
Bob Ankosko  |  Jul 05, 2021
LG announced pricing and availability for the LCD-based QNED TVs it previewed at CES 2021 and has started rolling out a firmware update that adds support for Dolby Vision high-dynamic range (HDR) at 4K/120 Hz to a number of its TVs.
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Music and Soundtrack FeaturesThe S&V Interview
Genuine But Better: How Bob Clearmountain Mixes The Band in Surround
Mike Mettler  |  Jul 02, 2021
Bob Clearmountain knows how to move mountains with his mixes. Ok, ok, maybe I'm exaggerating just a little bit here—but the fact is, Clearmountain has been a go-to mixer/engineer/producer for A-list musicians for decades, having shepherded the sound of landmark albums by artists like Bruce Springsteen, The Rolling Stones, Simple Minds, Bryan Adams, and Roxy Music. (And that barely scratches the surface of his top-shelf mixing C.V., btw.)
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The S&V Interview
A Hi-Res Call to Arms
Bob Ankosko  |  Jul 01, 2021

15 Minutes with Jon Kiachian, VP, Hearing Health Technologies at Knowles Corp.

Jon Kiachian has spent the past 16 years working with the likes of National Semiconductor and Texas Instruments in technology-management positions. Today he is a vice president and general manager at Knowles, the global company responsible for developing the tiny microphones that allowed us to hear sound from the surface of Mars earlier this year. Kiachian oversees the business unit that develops technology to improve sound quality in a variety of electronics devices — a pursuit that’s more important than ever as high-resolution (hi-res) music reaches the masses through the likes of Amazon, Apple Music, Spotify, Tidal, Qobuz, and other streaming services. In his role at Knowles, Kiachian has become a hi-res evangelist of sorts who believes audiophiles are “duty bound” to convince the millions of listeners who settle for bad sound that there’s a better option — a way to make the music they love really come alive.

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