The Big Picture

You probably don't recognize the name Mel Harris, who passed away at the age of 65 on September 6, 2008. But you most certainly know the results of his work in the broadcasting and entertainment industry. Let me tell you a bit about the impact he had on TV and movie viewers everywhere...

Dang! Tom Norton stole my thunder by blogging about the upcoming CEDIA Expo just one day before I was going to. Oh well, I can still add my two cents before I head off to Denver for the annual confab dedicated to custom consumer-electronics installation.

As many of you may know, I'm a regular guest on a nationally syndicated radio talk show hosted by Leo Laporte, aka The Tech Guy. The show is broadcast live from 11AM to 2PM Pacific time on Saturdays and Sundays, and my segment is right after the 11:30 news on Saturday.

I got home from my THX adventure on Saturday, after three <I>long</I> days of hard-core tech training in a darkened room while the most perfect weather I can imagine beckoned just beyond the walls. But it was worth it&#151;although I already knew most of the material, I did learn a number of useful things, and I got to observe the course itself to see what aspiring calibrators can expect if they take it.

Colin Robertson, a thoughtful commentator on many <I>UAV</I> blogs, is facing the age-old question as he contemplates upgrading from 2-channel to surround sound:

Mike Slough in Australia has some questions about A/V receivers:

If there's a choice between convenience and quality, convenience usually wins out. The best example of this is the sad tale of DVD-Audio and SACD vs. MP3, all of which were introduced at roughly the same time. The convenience of quickly downloading MP3s into portable players easily trumped the vastly superior quality of DVD-A and SACD. Granted, the skirmish between the two high-res audio formats didn't help, but I suspect the outcome would have been much the same even if there had been no competition at the high end. So what's an audiophile to do?