via Star Wars Saga Heading to Blu-Ray in 2011

May the force be with us, in high-definition.

Yes, Star Wars fans, you’ll finally get your wish sometime next year—at the earliest, according to creator George Lucas.

“We’ve been wanting to do it as soon as we possibly could, but we just wanted to do it when enough people would be able to buy it and see it,” Lucas said during last week’s Star Wars Celebration V convention in Orlando, Fla., the New York Times reported.

There was that whole Blu-ray vs. HD DVD format war, don’t forget, and then of course there are always Lucas’ technical demands that anyone familiar with his little ol’ company THX can attest to as well. But the whole shebang finally appears to be coming into reality for 2011, and we can only hope that along with the high-def presentation there are plenty new extra goodies for those who are making this investment yet again—after their previous VHS, Laserdisc and DVD purchases.

We’ll see—fans were already treated to a preview of a lost deleted scene from Return of the Jedi.

Some Star Wars purists may stick to their Laserdisc copies, however. Lucas noted that the Blu-ray releases of the original trilogy will be transfers of the special edition releases that went to theaters in 1997 and were used for the DVD releases, which struck a nerve with some fans who just wanted the originals kept pristine.

Still, whenever the six movies arrive in that big, happy box set, it will definitely be intriguing to see how much better the video and audio quality are from the other home video releases. At least you have plenty of time to start saving.

Here’s the list from blu-ray.com:

• Scenic National Parks: Great Train Rides
• The Square
• WWE: Best Pay-per-View Matches 2009-2010
• Shogun Assassin
• Survival of the Dead
• $5 a Day
• Late Fee
• Redemption: A Mile from Hell
• City Island
• The Back-up Plan
• Time Bandits
• Extraordinary Animals: Bears & Wolves
• Lost: The Complete Sixth and Final Season
• Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood, Part 2
• Lost: The Complete Collection
• Mona Lisa
• The Long Good Friday
• Death Note Collection
• Extraordinary Animals: Africa
• The Great Rift
• The Pixies: Acoustic & Electric Live
• Dorian Gray
• Addicted to Her Love
• 2:22
• Les Paul: Live in New York
• Black Label Society: Doom Troopin’ Live, The European Invasion
• Withnail and I
• Machine Gun McCain
• Ajami
• The Universe: Our Solar System
• Abandoned
• The Simpsons: The Thirteenth Season
• Scenic National Parks: Alaska & Hawaii

via Electronic House: 19 Sexy Speakers

Dexter fans rejoice!  Seasons 1 – 4 now available on Blu-ray!  That is all.

Here’s the list from blu-ray.com:

• TT 2010 Review
• Total Terror 1: Demonic / Uninvited
• Black Orpheus
• Dexter: The Complete Seasons 1-4
• Casshern sins: Part 2
• DOA: Dead or Alive
• Rick Steves: Eastern European Favorites
• Dead Man Running
• Hamlet
• Dexter: The Complete Fourth Season
• The Last Song
• Cemetery Junction
• Casshern sins: Part 1
• The City of Your Final Destination
• Rick Steves: Celtic Charms
• Five K One
• Total Terror 2: Brush With Death / Harvest of Fear
• Furry Vengeance
• Rick Steves: Italy through Back Door
• The Good, the Bad, the Weird
• Nanny McPhee
• Rick Steves: Surprising Cities of Europe
• Red Riding Trilogy

Netflix isnt the only company planning to launch a new streaming-video service in Canada in 2010. Zip.ca, whose Canadian DVD mail-rental service is very similar to Netflixs U.S. DVD rental service, plans to launch its own streaming-video service in calendar 2010, in time for the holiday season.

In July, Netflix said it planned to bring its streaming-video service to Canada this year. That means the Netflix apps present on many flat panels and Blu-ray players will now have a purpose in Canada. With Zip.cas announcement it appears Canadian consumers will a choice of streaming-video serves this year.

Zip.ca has been working on the service for well over a year. In June 2009, Zip.ca signed an agreement with Sonic Solutions that would allow the Canadian company to offer a streaming-video service powered by Roxio CinemaNow that would deliver movies and TV shows to PCs. “Weve been working since then to conclude hardware and studio deals,” Zip.ca CEO Scott Richards told Marketnews in an exclusive interview. “Weve announced that this fall is when well be streaming.”

Richards said important details need to be finalized before the launch. These include deals with studios for content, and deals with hardware manufacturers to embed Zip.ca client software on products such as flat-panel TVs, Blu-ray players and set-top boxes. Richards said it will be possible for manufacturers to add Zip.ca support to existing products via firmware updates.

Richards would not confirm the cost or nature of the service, but did hint that it might involve a hybrid with his companys disc-rental business. Zip.ca has been operating for seven years, and now has an 85,000-title catalog. “Were going to add streaming capability to our catalog,” Richards stated. “Some movies will come by mail, because theyre not in our streaming catalog. This is the only way for consumers to get both selection and convenience. The only thing they should be worried about is what they want to watch.” Online streaming will allow Zip.ca to compete with bricks-and-mortar video stores on new releases, while offering a much richer back catalog, he elaborated.

For streaming, movie studios favour sale as opposed to rental: a business model they call video on-demand electronic sell-through. That means that consumers would be purchasing streamed content. Content could either be stored on a hard drive in the subscribers device itself, or online in the “cloud.”

“We believe in the concept of a digital locker,” Richards said. “We dont think consumers should have to bit on which hardware will be available in a few years.” While Zip.cas streaming service will be strictly a Canadian offering, consumers will be able to access Zip.cas cloud services anywhere they can get an Internet connection.

Any broadband connection will be fast enough for video streaming, Richards said. Bit caps are a bigger issue than download speed, Richards says. Users will hit the caps on typical entry-level high-speed services after six to 10 movies, he explained.

August 10, 2010 | by Robert Archer

There are some that may pine for the good ol’ days, but in the world of electronics, it’s almost always best to move forward.

The freestanding speaker category, for instance, demonstrates that the best is yet to come.

Gone are the days of large boxes and fake-looking wood veneers. Manufacturers are coming out with speakers that feature designs that complement the modern home.

Perhaps most importantly, manufacturers are reaching price points that enable consumers of all economic backgrounds to purchase products that align with their musical and design tastes.

Sure, there are a number of big and cumbersome products that look like they’re from the 1970s still on the market. Moreover, there are a number of products that carry price tags that are more inline with the good times of 2006 and 2007, but the good news is that big, ugly and expensive is quickly becoming the exception rather than the rule.

For a closer look at how the speaker industry is incorporating these new values, here is a roundup of the latest freestanding loudspeakers.

Click here for 32 Popular Freestanding Speakers.

Thanks to Lee Distad for asking my opinion, and actually printing it.

via FEATURE: Custom Corner – Wiring Without Wires.

Custom Corner – Wiring Without Wires

Lee Distad

Published: 08/05/2010 08:20:02 AM UTC in Features

Wireless Moves in, But Wired Still Prevails

One of the questions that custom dealers can expect to hear from clients these days is: “Will it be wireless?” In fact, the entire category of wireless hardware for everything from control to A/V distribution has exploded. Options exist now that were only wishful thinking five years ago. But is the prevalence of wireless the death knell of hard wiring installations?

While the only constant in this business is change, the growth of one category doesn’t automatically presage the extinction of another. In talking to both dealers and vendors, a very clear consensus quickly emerged. While wireless is a big help to the custom channel, hard-wired installations are not even close to being finished. In fact, as we’ll see, wired technology continues to evolve almost as rapidly as wireless.

Beyond that, however, there’s more to completing a successful project, whether wired or wireless, than just the technology. As the saying goes, it’s not the tools; it’s how you use them. With that in mind, as we surveyed the opinions of industry veterans on both the dealer and vendor side, they also shared their expertise and experiences on how to best apply both categories of technology in order to deliver faultless installations. In the vendors’ cases, we also learn of some exciting new products to make installers lives easier.

Hardwired When & Why

How do integrators feel about both wired and wireless technologies, and what are they doing in the field? Ken Borg, Owner of Toronto, ON’s Borg Custom Audio and Video Ltd., remains sold on the importance of wiring as the backbone of custom A/V systems.

“The only wireless work I’ve done at all was Apple TV,” he explains. “And really, that part was just its connection to the network.”

Des Young, General Manager of Barrie, ON’s BravoComm, also voices his support for wired over wireless. For him, it boils down to being “faster with more bandwidth and cheaper reliability for all systems wherever possible. Wireless is just too flaky when it comes to speed,” he opines. Young sees the need for a high bandwidth, structured wiring backbone becoming even more important as networked entertainment grows. “Clients need to consider that when downloading large video files. Waiting to watch something while it buffers is no fun!”

Another seasoned integrator who shares this view is John Stumpf, Sales Manager for Fergus, ON’s Station Earth. Stumpf asserts that it’s simply solid design work to wire everything that can be wired; and he doesn’t see that likely to change any time soon.

“Some ancillary devices can be wireless,” he elaborates, “such as iPads and other control devices like remotes. But for maximum performance, the majority of the installation has to be wired.”

Evan Moorhouse, President of Richmond, ON’s Moorhouse Cabling and Custom Installations, has been in the custom A/V business for almost as long as it’s been a business. He takes pains to differentiate wired and wireless systems, and to categorize them into the purposes where he feels they belong. “What I hear from clients is that they all have wireless in their homes for Internet: to check e-mail and surf the Web.” And he thinks this is entirely appropriate. But when it comes to distributing media, “I use structured wiring,” he says.

Veteran A/V professional Mike Ohman, Owner of Kelowna, BC’s Beyond Audio, cuts right to the chase about the critical nature of a system backbone of structured wiring. “It’s one thing to have your cell phone drop a call,” he says. “It’s another to have the video cut out when you’re watching the big game.” Ohman asserts that if a client wants a full suite of A/V around the house, wireless isn’t an option. Maybe for do-it-yourself (DIY) types with time to kill, he concedes, adding: “When you spend less, your expectations are lower. But an informed choice means deciding based on the cost of what you want to accomplish.” He also points out that so far, he has yet to see a wireless media system that really delivers what he’s looking for: reliability. “We’re seeing more wireless talk from the vendors than anywhere else. They’re trying to talk about wireless solutions, but, in talking to customers, we realize that they won’t do what the customers want.”

Interestingly, the consensus amongst custom channel vendors echoes the views of integrators. It’s not unknown for the two camps to disagree on just about everything, so this is notable. Crestron’s Communications Director Jeff Singer underscores the best practices his company shares with its dealers. It’s Crestron’s official position that when transmitting audio and video, wired is always preferred, although they understand that it’s not always practical or possible. “As far as control and communication, there is no ‘best’ or ‘correct.’” Singer explains. “It’s all about the application and what the client wants to do.” Singer points out that dealers projects often have a combination of wired and wireless within the same system. As a matter of fact, Crestron has several different wireless platforms. “We have standardized on three different wireless platforms to cover a variety of applications. Long-range two-way RF, mesh network technology, and our enhanced WiFi. Each gives you a different data rate, range and functionality depending on the environment and client expectations.”

Singer says Crestron’s wireless systems are very fast, secure and reliable. The technology has really come a long way in the last few years. I wouldn’t hesitate to use wireless wherever necessary.” Singer tempers that opinion by noting that it will always be necessary to pull wire, but today, integrators have many more options and opportunities that they didn’t have in the past.

Brent McCall is the Resident Engineer for cable and accessory maker Ethereal (distributed in Canada by MKHB Enterprises; www.mkhb.ca), and his enthusiasm for emerging signal technologies bubbles over when asked about where the industry is heading. “The reality is that any 1080p HD content, particularly 3D, must be hardwired, either by fibre or copper.” The current standards for wireless HD, he indicates, only support 700Mhz, which won’t support 3D without motion blur.

While McCall acknowledges that wireless is a necessity in places where wire can’t be run, such as historic buildings, he still asserts that for HQ video, 3D and, in his opinion, any screen size 50-inches or bigger, the video has to travel over the wire.

Integrators won’t be surprised to learn that cable vendor Monster (handled in Canada by ReSource Group Canada; www.resourcegroupcanada.com) remains very pro-wire, although its mandate as a systems provider has necessitated the expansion into offering wireless products as well. Vern Smith, Monster’s Director of Product Development emphasizes that previous point, noting that “Our mission is to provide solutions that work for our dealers and their customers.” On the topic of structured wiring, he explains: “Today, there is no substitute for wire when the highest level of performance is required.” Performance, of course, means not only audio and video quality, but reliability as well.

But nothing is perfect, and despite the fan club for wiring, there are still issues that need to be addressed. Kirk Kohn, Senior Sales and Training Specialist for Staub Electronics, which distributes, among others products, SnapAV, points that out in defence of wireless.

“Not to say that wired products don’t have their own set of problems,” he says, but cautions that “running wires in a retro installation can be next to impossible. Damage to the wire can occur from pulling the cable too hard, breaking the wire inside. Cat5e has tensile strength of around 12lbs. If the project has allowed you to pre-wire, you could have cables that have been cut, screwed into, or even removed from other trades.” On the positive side Kohn notes that wired can pass much more information than a wireless system, and is not as subject to interference from outside sources.

“Until wireless products can deliver the baud rate that wired products can,” he concludes, “there will be a need for both. It will depend on the application of the system at hand.”

Moorhouse agrees, and is adamant on the superiority of wiring when it comes to getting media around the house. “Any time you use wireless for media, you get problems,” he says bluntly. “Speed, buffering, reliability, bandwidth issues: those all come into play.” He adds that the time spent troubleshooting wireless jobs after the fact would have been better spent up front running lines in the house in the first place.

Installation Standards for Wire

When it comes to wiring standards, Station Earth is on the same page as other progressive, high end integrators. “We run Cat6 everywhere,” Stumpf explains. “If we have an area where we know there won’t be anything but a telephone, and we happen to have a spool of Cat5e on hand, we’ll use it there. But otherwise, it’s Cat6 through and through.” The other exception to the Cat6 rule for Station Earth is fibre. Stumpf says that the company doesn’t typically use fibre in clients’ main residences, citing the current cost. But they do make regular use of it to link the main home to outbuildings such as garages and guest houses: anywhere that they need to connect to a building where the wire run is going to be 1,500-2,000 feet or more away.

The mandate of running lines is especially clear when an integrator looks hard at what’s coming up on the industry’s horizon. “Looking ahead,” posits Moorhouse, “a flat panel is no longer just a flat panel: it’s a multimedia display device.” With TVs that now feature Web functionality, Moorhouse strongly recommends wiring Ethernet to TV locations in new projects.

Moorhouse asserts that integrators need to educate their clients, and gently move them away from the preconceptions that they have when they first walk in the showroom.

“Clients expect that wireless can do everything,” he explains, “and the reality is that it just doesn’t work that way. I cringe at the idea of trying to run media all around the house to multiple locations via wireless.”

For future proofing, Ethereal’s McCall has two pieces of advice: conduit (or “Smurf Tube,” as he likes to call it), or three lines of Cat6 to every location in the house, or both. He suggests that three lines of Cat6 between source and display locations will provide tremendous capabilities, now and later on. Having said that, he reminds dealers that attention to detail is critical, including handing lines correctly to avoid damaging the conductors, as well as terminating the lines to their connectors with 100% accuracy. Anything less than 100% can lead to hours on the jobsite trying to find a fault in a single pair of conductors.

Related to the last point, and central to the use of Cat6 cables, are baluns: the boxes that translate the signals to be sent down the network and re-translated at the display end. McCall hints that Ethereal is currently in the process of moving its product line from 1080p baluns to ones that can support full 3D. On the topic of best practices, McCall quips “dealers who pay attention in class love baluns.” However, he’s seen dealers who just can’t make them work, and spend some of his workday refreshing dealers on best practices. What’s the root cause of dealers getting grief from baluns? “Bad terminations,” says McCall.

Wireless When & Why

While folks like Moorhouse agree that wireless still needs to play catch up to wired, he isn’t dead set against it. He points out what a boon wireless lighting control has become, and is an avid promoter of ZigBee for lighting control. “Having run a lot of lines for lighting control in the past, the newer ZigBee platform is incredible for this application. With fewer wires, there’s a ton less installation work. Plus, there’s no headaches, and the stuff actually works.” For Moorhouse, that adds up to a big win for wireless, albeit for just this particular application.

Tony DiChiro, Monster’s Director of New Technologies, draws attention to the direction the company has taken with wireless. “Right now we’re pushing the envelope of what’s possible for wireless in AV, control, security and telecom.” When it comes to wireless applications, DiChiro explains that systems can be classed in a couple of different ways: single room and multi-room, and high resolution and low resolution. Naturally, Monster offers systems for all. In room, it’s easier to deliver a high-resolution performance. “Our Digital Express HD is a 60Ghz solution that gives 1080p and latency of less than one millisecond,” he states.

Despite his previously mentioned pro-wire bias, McCall stresses that he is “absolutely a huge fan of wireless” as it relates to problem-solving for retrofit installations. From personal experience, he cites older urban areas, such as in Texas, New Orleans, and parts of Los Angeles, where earlier construction methods make retrofit wiring impossible.

Brian Surrett, Eastern and Northern Ontario Sales Representative for Ultralink, Sharp, and Erikson Consumer, offers some tips on how integrators can best make use of wireless products. He maintains that every product needs to be matched with the system for which it’s best suited. With wireless, he suggests looking for products that use the strongest signals and the biggest bandwidth, to better get the job done. “Soundcast, for example, uses frequency hopping spread spectrum at 2.4Ghz to get wireless audio outside,” he explains of the line distributed by Erikson. “900Mhz product that can be bought off the shelf are more budget-oriented, and as a result, don’t perform as well.”

Echoing the sentiments of other industry experts, he agrees that wireless remains the choice for reaching areas where wires aren’t possible. But, he allows, “wired is still best. If you can get the wire in, then run the wire.” On the other hand, wireless lets integrators get out into the backyard without drilling through outside walls and compromising vapour barriers.

Just before speaking with Marketnews, Mark MacDonald of rep agency M3 in Anmore, BC, had just had a long conversation with Ralph E. Parrett, Director of Quality and Technical Services for Liberty Wire & Cable, a line which MacDonald represents. According to MacDonald, Parrett made the point that while wireless will get stronger, in terms of not only range, and performance, but also market share, those systems will always be problematic with regard to security. “Wealthy clients doing A/V distribution will still have security concerns over wireless,” relates MacDonald, stating that the likelihood of a system being compromised over copper is dramatically less than over wireless.

Performance is the other drum that gets beaten when comparing wired to wireless, and it’s unavoidable. MacDonald stresses that data rates over Cat6 are notably faster to a human observer than a wireless setup. On top of that, he repeats what others have said: that as wireless grows, the demand on the airwaves increases, slowing down the amount of traffic that any one home’s systems can receive. He uses Philips Pronto’s two-way RS232 protocols as an example of the need to keep wireless traffic streamlined.

Wireless Standards for Installation

When it comes to important considerations for utilizing wireless, Moorhouse insists on enterprise-level wireless routers. “With the load that the network will be under, cheaper big-box store routers won’t work. An integrator can’t always work with what’s already in the house.” Moorhouse always gives a heads up to his clients that they will need to invest in a better unit, either by themselves, or supplied by his company. “Quite often, clients who own their own companies understand that need, based on their own IT experiences at work. So it’s not as hard to sell them on more solid network hardware as you might think.”

With that in mind, McCall, who is a go-to guy for almost everything installation-related for Ethereal’s dealers, has some serious advice for integrators when it comes to applying wireless to their projects: know your wireless types, because they each have their applications, and shouldn’t be mixed up. He explains that 5Ghz wireless is pretty close to residential standards, but it’s a penetrating frequency. The other main type, 60Ghz, is a bouncing frequency. It won’t penetrate walls, and uses reflectivity in a room to get a better spread. The latter offers resistance to cell phones and such, but needs line of sight to work.

“I probably end up assisting two or three wireless installations a month,” he says, “where a dealer has an issue.” Pivotal to making wireless work well is the need to understand the importance of device locations and placements. Radio waves can be blocked by dense metal and electronics, such as a flat panel. “Most wireless receivers don’t have to be line of site,” says McCall, but you can’t wedge one into the bracket between a flat panel and the wall and get a good connection.” Another common no-no is placing one inside a metal rack, since all that metal acts as an antenna for interfering RF frequencies. On top of a rack is a better option, he advises.

McCall stresses that integrators need to be able to set up wireless systems without massive automation, which is why Ethereal’s wireless hardware features easy controls, and auto frequency selections. He brags that at CES this year, “we were set up in the same hall with all the automation vendors. You can imagine how crowded the airwaves were. It only took three minutes to find a frequency, then we had no problems for the entire show.”

With regard to in-field testing, McCall says Ethereal’s new HDMI DAD, or Digital Diagnostic Device, was developed to confirm HDMI connections in the field. Instead of just testing connectivity, the HDMI DAD also looks at each signal in the HDMI cable and tests for correctness, including rise times and packet accuracy. “Each signal is a relay of data, coming as voltage on/voltage off,” he explains. If the voltage takes too long to transition, then the source and the display don’t sync.” In those cases, the HDMI DAD strips capacitance off the bus to return the rise time to 275 nanoseconds.

MacDonald notes that when it comes to big installations, “wireless systems have hurdles to overcome: there needs to be multiple wireless access points around the house, so multiple Prontos can run, but encryption becomes an issue. WPA means lengthy reconnection times.” He advises dealers that if their clients want instantaneous gratification, they’re restricted based on designing a robust wireless network, and not just doing it half-baked.

When dealing with wireless, BravoComm’s Young has one rule: security! “We recently moved offices and had a lull waiting for Internet services,” he explains. “I did a quick scan, and the huge industrial automation company across the street had an unsecured WAP! Guess who should have known better but had bandwidth to spare while we waited?”

The Downsides with Wireless

Station Earth’s Stumpf is fairly direct when asked about the prevalence of wireless music distribution systems. “We don’t touch them with a ten-foot pole,” he says. When asked if he really wants to go on the record saying that, he reconsiders. “Okay,” he jokes, “we don’t touch them with a fifteen-foot pole.” His rationale is no less direct than his opinion. “All those wireless music systems work okay, but they’re really the focus of big box stores selling to do-it-yourself types. It’s not really something we need to do along with everybody else that does it. It’s just not our thing.”

Val Marchione, National Sales Director of Thunder Marketing, which makes its own line of Thunder Cables in addition to handling other lines of structured wiring products and accessories, is more dismissive than most of wireless systems. “I see wireless systems as Band-Aids,” he says. “If you can’t do anything else, it’s your last resort.” It’s his contention that in terms of bandwidth, wireless is 10 years behind what copper can deliver, and has its own issues that are absent from hardwiring, such as interference. From that perspective, he says: “No way it can deliver 100% without any problems. Billions are spent on satellite television, and you still lose signal in a storm.” He goes further to exclaim that with wireless systems, performance is measured in terms of “tolerability,” and what customers are willing to live with.

Raymond Augunas, head of the Montreal, QC office of cable vendor Provo Ltd, is blunt about wireless. “It’s a dirty word, here at Provo,” he quips. Like others, he’s certain that wireless works for some applications, but not others. “Most installers we’ve done business with, if they’ve gotten into trouble with one or two wireless jobs, they go back to relying on copper,” he states. As a result, Provo has seen its market share grow. The biggest benefit of a wired installation, according to Augunas, is reproduceable and consistent installations. If it was originally calculated in the quote, you’re going to know what it costs. “When quoting wireless,” he adds, “if something doesn’t work, variable costs occur.”

“I still hear of problems with wireless,” says Staub’s Kohn, “whether it is speakers, subwoofers or Internet. The problems my dealers have relayed to me is that speakers will just stop working, subwoofers ‘pop,’ and static comes through the speakers, just to name a few.” He mentioned another issue that relates to the new category of 3D.

“The complaints I receive is the transfer rate is slow, and that can slow a PC once the transfer has begun. This transfer rate is becoming more and more of as issue as the end users are demanding more information to be transferred, like 3D content.”

But as more wireless products become available, and considering technology gets better every month, Kohn is sure that in the near future, wireless products and the problems associate with them will be rectified.

Getting Enough Fibre

Borg is extremely keen on new developments in advanced wiring systems. He’s especially excited about fibre, especially for the retrofit projects that make up the majority of his jobs. “OW Link fibre optic (distributed in Canada by Positive Marketing), is so miniscule, it can be slid under a baseboard. You don’t even know it’s there, and it’s carrying video, audio, and control. That’s amazing.”

Ohman stresses the need to look ahead. “With a 20 year perspective now, my views are a little different than I had 10 years ago.” He explains that the rate of change keeps increasing, and thus it’s prudent to run more lines than what’s needed right now. “Wire is inexpensive and invaluable. There’s such a broad range of products that can use network cable.” Ohman’s not even projecting into the future here. “Every time we’ve run extra lines, five years later, we were happy to upgrade our clients to great new products.”

Yet this is a lesson that not everyone in his market has learned. “We get calls just about every day from someone whose house was built three years ago and I’ve got to be the bearer of bad news, telling them that we either can’t do something, or it’s going to cost a lot of money to do it.”

In order to understand future structured wiring requirements, it’s necessary to consider the signals it has to carry. Monster’s Smith explains that looking ahead, the current 3DTV formats are within the data rates that HDMI 1.3 and 1.4 carry, so wireless products that can handle those are okay. (Although I’m not aware of any wireless 3D products being available on the market.) However, “for some gaming, we’re seeing data rates that are beyond the current HDMI 1.4 spec.” In order to make it work, vendors are packetizing the data. “They don’t like to use the word ‘compression,’ but they have to in order to fit it into the available bandwidth of the HDMI spec,” Smith explains. The result is that makes wireless video less reliable the harder it gets pushed.

Smith’s colleague DiChiro backs that up. “There’s nothing on the horizon that will supplant hardwiring. Wireless remains a niche problem-solver.” He goes on to stress that as we keep talking about higher data rates for greater bandwidth, the future wont be a wireless system, it will be an optical system. “Particularly for video, as bandwidth increases. We’re still increasing the capacity of copper technology,” he continues, “but we will eventually reach the physical limits. That’s when fibre will really take off.”

On the topic of fibre optic as a successor to copper, MacDonald is keen, yet reserved. He notes that many dealers are running fibre, but few are actually using it. Instead, they’re hedging against the future. Even so, he thinks that dealers need to be cognizant of what they actually plan to do with it. “Are you running single mode or multi mode fibre? Do you even know?” he queries. The risk is that the fibre run today might be a poor choice when paired with a future vendor that the integrator doesn’t even know today. “The Pronto gives true two-way integration with music servers, Apple TV, or others,” he adds. “And to do that, integrators need to be building and developing a good wireless transmitter/receiver system, as opposed to big box routers, in order to get greater range and reliability.”

McCall is very keen on fibre, but has some reservations. He reminds us that it remains a very specific application. “The main problem with fibre at the moment,” McCall explains, “is that all current residential equipment is a standard or two behind current HDMI feature implementation.” As a result, integrators need to quiz their vendors and make sure that fibre connectors will do what they need them to do. “Fibre will support 10Ghz, but 3D is dependant on the bandwidth of the circuit boards at the transmitter and receiver ends of the fibre. Just because the highway is wide enough, doesn’t mean the gateways are,” he asserts. McCall also notes that, most companies offering fibre are relatively small, and may or may not have standards in place for the applications in which integrators plan to use it. While he’s not opposed to fibre, it’s still McCall’s position that copper wiring vendors still run their wires closer to the actual physical spec of the hardware vendors’ products that their wires will be connected to.

Wired & Wireless: Where Do We Go from Here?

Future proofing remains a real concern, and Monster’s DiChiro notes that integrators remain dependant upon cabling for that. “Our cables can handle essentially twice the data rate of what wireless can. Our wireless solutions can handle what’s required today, but looking ahead to higher resolutions, and especially 3D, you’re going to need a cable to handle that.”

Additionally, Monster is reaching out into other distribution avenues, including rolling out PowernetHD, a powerline system that DiChiro says “has applications in all kinds of places where you can’t wire.” Shipping this fall, DiChiro calls PowernetHD a “no new wires’ product that will send HD video plus networking around the house. “Its latency makes it not so good for gaming,” he admits, “but for a Blu-ray carousel in a closet, serving video locations around the house, it’s ideal.” Furthermore, DiChiro points out that by being wired, the video quality, especially for Blu-ray, is superior to what could be expected from wireless video. And being able to bring not just video, but Ethernet and IR control, make the powerline product handy indeed for retrofit projects. “With multiple displays and multiple sources networked over powerlines, that’s a lot of potential for installations.”

“We are developing multiple wireless tech for A/V and partnering with people who have a big stake in it,” says Smith. “We have to be a complete solution in the business, and play with other people’s open and closed networks.”

In the short-term, Surrett sees wireless only becoming more popular going forward, especially with regard to relaying audio from servers to speakers. On the wired side, he suggests that HDMI is quickly becoming the required cable for A/V installations, and he points out that the 1.4 specifications are a concern for consumers. He reminds us that all of Ultralink’s cables are certified as HDMI 1.4 compliant and can pass the required bandwidth, either with or without Ethernet. Along those lines, Ultralink will be marketing high-speed cables with and without Ethernet, as well as standard speed cables with or without. In addition, the company is working on extra-long length HDMI repeaters, which will allow integrators to run over 100 feet of wire without resorting to baluns.

Surrett also points to the growing popularity of powerline products, exemplified by Nuvo’s Renovia hardware, which he represents in his territory for Erikson Consumer. He sees powerline hardware as a great option for existing structures that allow integrators to get from the head end to amplifiers, speakers and even keypads in other rooms with minimal hassle.

He is also excited about the trend towards Ethernet-capable TVs. “Video streaming will be big this year,” Surrett says. “Sharp will be doing more Ethernet-capable TVs this year, with a new range coming out this fall. In addition, Sharp is promising a powerline Ethernet dongle to facilitate getting a network connection to the TV location.

Provo’s Augunas has noticed a growth in the demand for RF mini for installers who are still relying on component video instead of HDMI. In addition, the demand for colour coded network cables has grown. “Now we’re carrying nine different cat5 and nine different cat6 colours in stock that are FT4 rated; six of each that are FT6 rated; and we’re considering adding more.” Augunas normally doesn’t want to have the same SKU replicated over and over again. But colour coding is becoming more common, so he has to have methods in place to help installers manage their jobsites.” On that same topic, like many other vendors, Provo is now carrying higher levels of inventory to better service dealers.

“We have to realize that a lot of installers carry very little inventory job to job. “In order to respond to that, our focus and responsibility is to have a higher level of inventory. We now ship 97% of our orders same day,” he explains.

Backing up Marchione’s adamant support of wiring, Thunder Marketing is bowing a new video distribution unit this fall under the Custom Audio brand that can pass HDMI over RG-6. Details are few at the moment since the product is undergoing the final touches and awaiting CSA certification. But Marchione is excited about it. “Even in homes that don’t have Cat5e wiring,” he enthuses, “installers will have new potential for getting Blu-ray and HD-PVRs distributed through their clients’ homes.”

As mentioned earlier, it’s rare for both dealers and vendors in the custom channel to be in such agreement. However, this overwhelming consensus is clear evidence that both wired and wireless A/V and control technologies are evolving to meet the needs of the channel, and peacefully co-existing. Like much else in this business, each is a tool in the integrator’s toolbox to be wielded appropriately in order to achieve the desired finished product: a winning installation.

Cable Really Does Matter

The cable is very much where the rubber meets the road, so to speak, when it comes to connecting the sources to the displays, with or without factoring in an Ethernet distribution system. And there’s been an enormous amount of contention, mostly online, about how much of a difference cable quality really makes. More than a few pundits and technology blogs have ruled that a $10 generic HDMI cable is sufficient. Obviously, cable makers disagree.

Don Rhule is head of KimberCan, the Canadian distributor for Kimber Cable, and his experience is that both quality assurance and the tolerance of higher-end cables improve HDMI performance, and afford fewer failures. As a result, he reports that higher-end HDMI is growing despite the controversy.

What’s worked well for Rhule is giving dealers demo products of items they’re considering stocking. Veteran A/V companies will recognize this as the “puppy dog close,” where the client gets a chance to learn that he can’t live without a particular product. “Every time I send something out on a trial sample, they end up selling from that,” says Rhule. “Some vendors say their cables will do this or that,” he remarks, “but they say a lot of things.”

Rhule asserts that the track record for HDMI cables speaks for itself in terms of what works and what doesn’t in the field. Indeed, he adds that growth in the upscale category is proof that end-users are experiencing a difference over cheap cables. Rhule also mentions that the return rate on Kimber Cables, which sell in the range of $X,XX.XX, is nearly zero.

Sorry I missed last weeks, but vacation took priority.  I missed some good ones though.  Gladiator for one.  This week there’s Date Night, with Steve Carell and Tina Fey.  You can’t go wrong with a Steve Carell movie.

Here’s the list from blu-ray.com:

• Live
• The Diplomat
• Invisible Target
• Multiple Sarcasms
• Death at a Funeral
• Triage
• The Legend of Fong Sai Yuk
• The Killing Room
• Date Night
• The Joneses
• National Lampoon’s European Vacation
• Tai Chi Master
• In the Shadow of the Moon
• Helen
• Crumb
• An Empress and the Warriors
• Coma: Live
• Forces of Nature
• National Lampoon’s Vacation
• La Mission
• What’s Up, Doc?

RBH, the hidden gem of speaker manufacturers has another good review under their belt, this time from CE-Pro magazine.

Please note, any pricing in this article is in U.S. dollars.

via Review: RBH 8300 SE/R Loudspeaker

Review: RBH 8300 SE/R Loudspeaker

Forgiving sound, sensitivity and near full range reproduction are attractive selling points.

RBH Sound’s 8300 SE/R loudspeaker ($8,500 per pair) was developed after requests from dealers to produce a mid-sized speaker with broad dynamics and high sound pressure levels.

Features
The nearly 5-foot tall cabinet is about 11 inches wide and 17 inches deep. It’s a 115-pound, three-way speaker that includes a third-order crossover network and a multiple driver array that features two 6.5-inch aluminum dome midrange drivers flanking a 1.1-inch silk dome tweeter.

Low frequencies are handled by three 8-inch aluminum cone woofers and all these drivers are loaded into a ported enclosure that is heavily damped to reduce resonances.

RBH says the 91dB sensitive, 4-ohm speaker is rated to handle 100 watts to 400 watts of power and that its frequency response is 22Hz to 20kHz.

Credit: RBH Sound

Other features installers will find helpful include a choice of 30 veneers, dual five-way binding posts and a five-year warranty.

Setup
The speakers arrived to my house in crates and, with the help of my friend Bruce, we uncrated the speakers, installed the floor spikes and carried them into my listening room.

I connected the speakers to my Bryston amp via a set of Transparent cables and tweaked the speakers’ room placement.

RBH bi-amps the speakers during trade events, but I found my Bryston to have plenty of current to effectively drive the speakers.

Even though these are relatively small speakers in the RBH line, the 8300 SE/R is still heavy and awkward and it’s not a speaker an installer should risk handling without help.

Performance
I didn’t run these through a break-in because the company shipped them directly from its 2009 CEDIA exhibit. It’s my experience that RBH speakers take about 100 hours to break-in.

I started my listening with Steve Vai’s “Passion and Warfare” album and found the speakers produced a deep and wide soundstage with upper midrange, high-end detail like the reverb on Vai’s guitar.

I listened to Steve Morse’s cover of “LaVilla Strangiato.” This is a well-recorded track and the speakers impressed me with their ability to keep up with Billy Sheehan’s bass line, which filled the soundstage with firm and punchy upper bass. The speakers produced this content with impressive SPLs even though it wasn’t the tightest representation of the bass line that I’ve heard.

Transitioning to movies like “Cars,” I thought the soundtrack played back with well-defined richness and clarity. The speakers also perfectly matched the performance characteristics of my RBH 12-SE powered subwoofer to create a well integrated experience that didn’t seem to strain to achieve peak levels.

Value
The step-up speaker category is really competitive and the 8300 SE/Rs more than hold their own. The speaker’s forgiving sound, sensitivity and near full range reproduction capabilities are attractive selling points.

My biggest complaint is that even though these speakers are smaller than some of the other products in the company’s line, they are still large.

via Marketnews – Serving Canada’s Consumer Electronics, Computing & Digital Imaging Industry: Marketnews.ca.

I never thought I’d be a snob. I’ve always prided myself on accepting others; and never thumbing my nose at anything. But alas, after watching a primetime television show in (*gasp*) standard definition yesterday, I’ve realized that I’ve become a snob. An HD snob, that is.

This isn’t anything new. I have watched HD content 99% of the time for the past few years, only reverting to SD if the HD channel was experiencing technical issues, or if I was watching online. But I just didn’t realize the level at which my snobbiness had reached until I really put it to the test.

After some convincing from a few colleagues, I picked up the first three seasons of the AMC series Mad Men on Blu-ray a few months ago. I watched every episode of the set-in-the-‘60s drama in their full, high-definition glory. The women’s outfits and flawless makeup were reproduced with beautiful, crystal clear colour and detail. The men’s black suits melted into the screen’s bezel. And the painful and intrigued looks on Don Draper’s visage as he faced his demons and presented his creative advertising ideas came across with so much conviction, in large part because I could see every pore of his face, every crinkle of his eye, every bead of sweat running down his temples.

The fourth season of the show debuted last night on AMC; a network that my provider, Rogers Cable, only offers in standard-definition. I’m told that the program is available in high-definition On Demand the day after it airs. But I was so excited to watch this highly-anticipated first episode that I figured “I’ll just catch the SD version. How bad could it be?”

The answer? Bad enough that I almost turned it off and opted to wait until today. I started watching with the tiny image in the centre of my 55″ screen, pesky black bars all around it. Ugh, this is horrible. Then, out of desperation, I decided to make one of the biggest mistakes that an average customer does: blow the image up to fill the screen. The result? A grainy, low-resolution image that looked almost like I was watching the program through a spy camera 1,000 miles away. Not to mention that the cinched waists of the women became wrapped around what appeared to be much larger bodies. No thanks. Back to the tiny image, it is.

Here comes a close-up on Draper’s face. All I see is a blur that I presume is supposed to be his skin, but looks more like really bad paintbrush strokes. Somehow, Betty Draper doesn’t look as stunning in standard-def; without really seeing that she never has a single hair out of place, I can’t appreciate the perfection that is supposed to embody her character. Joan Holloway’s always bright and form-fitting-yet-professional, frocks simply don’t have the same “pop” like they do in HD. The swirling smoke as the boys converse in the office while cranking butts is virtually unnoticeable; in HD, I could almost smell the nicotine through the TV screen.

Then there’s the scene-by-scene issue. I feel like my pinhole spy cam has zoomed right in on the subjects, and I’m missing integral parts of what’s going on in the background because I’m not getting the full 16:9 aspect ratio. For example, in a scene in the restaurant when Don meet the reporter for Advertising Age, I’m sure there’s so much more to that venue that I just can’t see. In the scene when they walk through the office, I feel like so much detail that really helps to set the scene was just left by the wayside, unviewable but the dastardly 4:3 picture. I wanted to walk up to the screen and scroll the image from side-to-side so I could see the whole picture!

What does this mean? First, I’m going to catch Mad Men On Demand at some point this week in order to get the full effect. I’ll admit that with some programming; game shows, for instance; watching in HD won’t be so critical. In some cases, I’ve even watched primetime programs online, submitting to the dodgy quality simply because 1) it’s the only option available to me, or 2) I’m viewing it on such a small screen (17″) that the quality issues aren’t as apparent as they are on a large screen TV. But in most cases, and especially with such intense shows like Mad Men, or some of my other favourites, being able to see the program like the director and creator intended isn’t just about getting a clearer image; it can really effect the way a scene, a character, a story line, is viewed, both literally and figuratively.

For those who haven’t yet jumped on the HD bandwagon, or claim that the differences aren’t noticeable or important enough to warrant upgrading, I assure you that this isn’t the case; even if you just spend your days watching reruns of Law & Order and catching reality shows like American Idol. Think of it like a Big Mac versus a prime rib steak. The Big Mac will suffice, and in fact it’s quite good. But you probably feel like something’s missing as you’re eating it, and chances are you won’t feel too great once you’re done.

The latest and greatest flat panel TVs, and even some older ones, afford stunning picture quality. We often use the analogy of the “steak without the sizzle.” In my eyes, watching SD on a screen that can support so much more is like not opting for the steak at all. All I’m saying is that it would be a shame to enjoy a night out at a high-end restaurant and only order the burger. Call me a snob if you like. But I take my TV medium-rare, and no, I don’t want fries with that.

Photo: www.freedigitalphotos.net