Weekly Site Roundup (10/11/04)
ARTICLE SPOTLIGHT
Plasma Television FAQs
Plasma television is finally becoming a viable alternative to those bulky tube and projection sets as prices are coming down and a variety of screen sizes are available. In fact, many mainstream consumers, unexpectedly, have dug deep into their pockets to purchase these units. If you are in the market for a Plasma TV, check out my informative Plasma Television FAQs.
HOME ELECTRONICS INDUSTRY NEWS HEADLINES
JVC Supports Blu-ray Disc Format (Electronic News)
...Move over, DVD players; PMCs Are On The Horizon (Houston Chronicle/Washington Post)
Denon Previews The AVC-A1XV (AVR-5805) Multi-Room Receiver (High Fidelity Review)
Coalition Asks Congress to Stop the FCC from Hawking Digital TV Sets (Common Dreams)
Philips Leaves Rear-Projection TV Market (Motley Fool)
BluRay Camcorders On The Way....Well, Maybe (Camcorder Info)
Best Buy Initiates A Battle Of The Brands (CNET)
PRODUCT OF THE WEEK
Panasonic PT-53X54 Projection Television
The PT-53X54 continues Panasonic's commitment to HDTV at a budget price with a 53-inch 16x9 HD-Ready projection television with a host of features, including: progressive scan line-doubler, 3:2 pulldown function, all the needed analog AV inputs, two component video inputs, HDMI input, and a very easy to use onscreen menu system. Add a great picture and wide viewing angle, this unit is definitely worth the money.
FEATURED LINKS THIS WEEK
Bag End Loudspeakers
FROM THE HOME THEATER FORUM
If you're in Aus, they're $AU150 from good home theater shops.
In my opinion, region coding exists purely to get more money for the film companys. But only one of my overseas relative groups know about DVDs, so I'm pretty safe.
ELSEWHERE ON ABOUT.COM
FROM THE MAILBOX
From Your Guide:
You have two solutions:
One, you can split your incoming cable into two separate cable boxes -- have one hooked up to the TV directly and the other to your DVD recorder and/or VCR - this would allow you, using the DVD recorder or VCR as a tuner, to display another channel from the second cable box via the TVs AV inputs.
The other solution would be to split your incoming cable and have the non-cable box side go directly to the TV -- and have the other side go to the cable box and then to the DVD recorder or VCR and then to the TV via AV connections. The only drawback here would be that you would always have to have the DVD recorder or VCR on in order to watch your "cable box only" channels.
Lastly, I would contact your local cable service for any other options they may have for you.
FINAL WORDS
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TACT Audio
Whether looking for a great subwoofer for your home theater system or a professional speaker system for your musical performances, check out what Bag End has to offer. Site includes product photos and specs.
Featured in the Loudspeakers A - E Category Page.
DVD Region Code/Lock Comments
From JB17KX:
In Australia region coding is a big issue. With most of the rest of SE Asia on codes 3, 2 and 6, a large amount of unthought out gifts arrive from Bali, Singapore and Japan, which are incompatible with the standard noname players most Aussies buy. Fortunately, there are some companies looking out for consumers. Philips have been shipping their 'King of Playability' DVP532K player (for television) (the title is their assurance that it will play DVD+/-R,RW burnt disks, Audio CD, MP3 CD, VCD, DVDVideo/Audio etc. If it doesn't play, you get your money back. So in the box, on a slip of paper titled "How to make your DVP532K/DVP530 play disks from all regions"
Join in on the discussion.
Loudspeaker Review: Klipsch KG4
Sometimes the best electronics products aren't always the newest. This is especially true in the loudspeaker category. Check out a review of some great classic speakers from Klipsch by Anthony Armstrong, About.com Guide For Stereos.
From MT:
...I really need your help.I need to know how to hook up split screen on a Panasonic
34" widescreen (CT-34WX54). I would like to watch one show and have another split. We are on comcast digital cable with motorola box also hooked up to receiver and dvd
recorder and vcr. Everything else works. The split screen works when used for other inputs but not for other channels. I would appreciate your help. Could you please give me some answers. I would appreciate it greatly.
The problem is that you have a cable box in the mix -- basically, a cable box (and most satellite boxes) can only download one channel at a time. If your TV, VCR, and DVD recorder are all hooked up to the cable box, then they will all only receive the channel that is tuned in on the cable box at any given time. Even if your TV has dual tuner PIP, the fact that your cable box can only download one channel at a time, overides your TVs ability to display more than one channel at time, as the same channel is being fed to both tuners in the TV.
Home Theater Magazine.
Stereophile Ultimate AV.
Stereophile Magazine.
with your questions and/or comments.
