Acoustic Frontiers Hi-Fi and Home Theater Blog

DEQX release HDP-4 and HDP-Express II; HDP-3 and HDP-Express discontinued

Nyal at Acoustic Frontiers — Mon, 21 May 2012 20:59:28 +0000

DEQX have released their new HDP-4 and HDP-Express II digital crossover / loudspeaker / room correction processors. The first production run is expected to be completed end of May 2012 with Acoustic Frontiers receiveing our initial inventory shortly afterwards.

RED tease with digital laser projector at NAB

Nyal at Acoustic Frontiers — Mon, 14 May 2012 16:58:00 +0000

RED Digital Cinema, makers of the 4k cameras used in many recent and upcoming movies such as Margin Call, The Hobbit and District 9, have teased us with a glimpse at a laser digital projector designed for the home! Price is slated to be around 10k which for a 4k native projector is way cheaper than the 25k that Sony are currently charging for their VPL-VW1000ES.

Check out the new RPG website!

Nyal at Acoustic Frontiers — Sat, 14 Apr 2012 18:22:27 +0000

RPG, one of our favorite suppliers of acoustical products, have finally updated their website. It is now much easier to navigate through, find products, see application photos and download specification sheets. So be sure to click through to the new RPG website and take a look around.

If you'd like to purchase RPG products then see our product pages where we have put their most popular products up online. And if you'd like to have an audio listening room or home theater designed using their products please contact us!

Bryston factory tour reveals why they can offer 20yr warranties

Nyal at Acoustic Frontiers — Sat, 14 Apr 2012 17:56:18 +0000

Soundstage Global, an online magazine, recently completed a photographic factory tour of the Bryston facilities in Canada. Bryston make fantastic, if expensive, equipment but are perhaps most well known for their industry leading 20 year warranties. Bryston's extensive quality control and burn in processes make this possible. So please click through to the Soundstage blog article for the full virtual tour!

Introducing the EP-2050 Environmental Potentials Waveform Correction Absorber

Nyal at Acoustic Frontiers — Fri, 06 Apr 2012 16:58:39 +0000

Acoustic Frontiers is happy to announce that we are now stocking and recommending the Environmental Potentials EP-2050 Waveform Correction Absorber!

The Schroeder / Transition Frequency Explained

Nyal at Acoustic Frontiers — Thu, 15 Mar 2012 01:49:46 +0000

You have at least two listening rooms. Even if you live in a studio apartment, you have at least two listening rooms. Well, in a sense. Every listening room is, in essence, two listening rooms when you look at it from the perspective of sound.

Torus Power Selected for 'World's Best Audio System 2012'

Nyal at Acoustic Frontiers — Thu, 08 Mar 2012 17:16:23 +0000

Torus Power products, specifically the WM100 BAL and the RM20 AVR have been selected by Jeff Fritz of Soundstage Network for the 2012 edition of the World's Best Audio Systems (TWBAS)

Power and Grounding for Audio Systems, Home Theaters and Studios

Nyal at Acoustic Frontiers — Wed, 07 Mar 2012 01:28:40 +0000

We recently spent some serious research & development time developing what could be called the Acoustic Frontiers approach to power and grounding for audio, home theater and studios.

Here are some of the juicy topics covered on our power pages:

Why should you care about how your system is powered and grounded?
What is the anatomy of the power and grounding system feeding your AV gear?
Do you know that there are 8 power and grounding issues that can affect the performance and lifespan of your AV system?
What are the causes and cures of 60Hz hum and powerline harmonic buzzing?
Why are 99% of all (Metal Oxide Varistors) no good for AV equipment?
Why do you need a UPS for your projector?
What is the concept of whole room power conditioning?

The Audiophiliac Reviews the DEQX HDP-Express

Nyal at Acoustic Frontiers — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 17:02:21 +0000

The Audiophiliac is a blog over on CNET written by Steve Guttenberg, a former movie projectionist turned hi-fi and home theater journalist. He wrote about his experience listening to the DEQX HDP-Express ($1995) providing speaker and room correction in a system with $30k Focal Utopia speakers...

Software update available for all XTZ Room Analyzer users

Nyal at Acoustic Frontiers — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 01:00:17 +0000

If you are an owner of the original XTZ Room Analyzer you might like to know that XTZ have kindly offered the upgraded Pro version of the software to you at no additional charge! The Pro version comes as standard with XTZ's new Room Analzyer II Pro which was released at the end of 2011.

Key new functionality available in the new software includes:

Higher resolution (1/12th octave) frequency response measurements
Unique 'delay finder' tool to optimize the setting of time delay in a home theater receiver
SPL meter with A, C and Z (flat) weighting
Tone generator with sine waves, white noise and pink noise

To download and install the software go to the XTZ support page and download the file 'XTZ Software Downloader II Pro.exe'.

Note that the old microphone is accurate to +/-3dB from 20Hz-20kHz whereas the new models are accurate to +/-2dB (II Standard) or +/-1dB (II Pro).