Digital amplifiers are nothing new - they've been around for years in powered subwoofers and, more recently, home theater box systems. But standalone digital receivers are a somewhat new revelation.
Walk down any city street and you'll see nearly everyone sprouting earbuds and singing along to music heard only by themselves. Call me old-fashioned, but that bugs me. Back in the day, people who heard voices and music in their heads were thought to be witches and were burned at the stake. Today, they're just "Podding."
As I unpacked the box, I kept asking myself, "Yes, but where are all the speakers?" Your friends will ask, too, when they see the SurroundWorks 200 from Cambridge SoundWorks - and might wonder if you've decamped from the 21st century and returned to the days of mono.
Sorry to break the news, but your shiny, spiffy iPod is an obsolete piece of junk. Ditto the other electronic toys you tote in your L.L. Bean knapsack. They'll soon be vacuumed up, integrated, and reissued as a new paradigm that we can't live without.
Last time I checked, there were five different recordable-DVD disc types - a potential compatibility catastrophe. Wouldn't it be great if someone invented a player that could play all kinds of DVDs? Even better, what if it was also a recorder?
Starved for new music? For talk (left, right, or center)? Sports? Comedy? Weather and traffic? Satellite radio delivers all these and more by the dozen. Yamaha is among the first A/V receiver makers to bring satellite radio home, via a new XM-ready line that includes the RX-V657 model here.
