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While large Japanese electronic firms have always raced neck and neck to bring consumers all the latest features in surround-processor technology, smaller "high-end" manufacturers on this side of the Pacific seem less inclined to frequent the bleeding edge. Bucking the trend is Canadian manufacturer Classé, whose newest surround processor is as full-featuredly up-to-the-acronym as Tokyo's finest. The SSP-60's multichannel analog inputs are de rigueur for reproducing discrete SACD and DVD-Audio surround formats, while the inclusion of both Dolby Pro Logic II and DTS Neo:6 will breathe new life into your 2-channel movie and music collections.

Five years ago, Panasonic produced the very first DTV receiver set-top box. All of the company's succeeding generations of these products have been among the best. The latest incarnation, the surprisingly small and inexpensive TU-DST52, is no exception.

Let's say you have around $2,500 to spend on a new high-definition widescreen television monitor. If you plan to put it in a small room, you'd be hard pressed to do better than the Sony KV-34XBR910 34-inch direct-view set that we reviewed in the November 2003 issue of Home Theater. In a big room, however, you need a big screen, and most big-screen HDTVs are more costly than your budget will allow.

If Magnepan has a company motto, it might be something along the lines of, "If it ain't broke, don't fix it." For more than 30 years, this Minnesota company has been busy making its Magneplanar loudspeakers for those audiophiles who care more about great sound than they do about owning the latest candidate for loudspeaker of the month. Magnepan rarely introduces a new model; when they do, it's generally just another evolutionary step in their continual refinement of the planar magnetic approach that they use in all of their products. This conservatism breeds long-term customer loyalty, and Magnepan invariably trumps other high-end manufacturers in the areas of customer satisfaction and repeat business.