Here are some audio and video trends for 2019:
The global Hi-Fi Systems market was valued at million US$ in 2018 and is expected to grow. EISA Awards has selected Hi-Fi product category winners, but I did not see anything really fancy new innovations that would excite me there. The Hi-Fi speaker market has seen considerable consolidation over the years but is expected to grow. The global Hi-Fi speaker system market is highly competitive. Various established international brands, domestic brands and as well as new entrants form a competitive landscape. The market is expected to have higher growth rate as compared to the previous years due to the booming electronic industry globally. It is due to the rising income of individuals globally and increasing affordability of technology products globally. Due to technological adoption and smart gadgets, North America region is showing steady growth in the Hi-Fi speaker system market. On technology standpoint the Hi-Fi market is mainly based on pretty much stabilized technology as class D amplifiers have been on mainstream for many years.
Smart TVs are everywhere. The vast majority of televisions available today are “smart” TVs, with internet connections, ad placement, and streaming services built in. Despite the added functionality, TV prices are lower than ever. Your new smart TV was so affordable because it is collecting and selling your data. It is clear that TV companies are in a cutthroat business, and that companies like Vizio would have to charge higher prices for hardware if they didn’t run content, advertising, and data businesses. Google wants sensors and cameras in every room of your home to watch, analyze, you, patents show.
Streaming services competition stays high. Apple’s embracing the TV industry for the first time: Vizio and LG TVs will support AirPlay 2 and HomeKit, while Samsung TVs will get an iTunes Movies & TV app, as well as AirPlay 2 support. Google and Amazon are playing are important players on smart speaker markets.
4K video resolution is still as hot as in 2019 – it us becoming mainstream and getting cheaper. Peraso showcases 4K wireless video at CES 2019. LG has produced a market-ready rollable OLED TV. The new 75-inch 4K Micro LED TV announced at CES 2019 proves Samsung is serious about scaling the technology to do battle with OLED. But it seems that even in 1029 “4K” trend remains woefully deficient from a compelling-content-availability standpoint. CES 2019 is already full of weird and wonderful monitors.
But new higher 8K resolution is being pushed to market. The “8K” (resolution) tagline was apparently everywhere at CES this year. Samsung announced a 98-inch 8K TV because why not. LG has come strong to CES 2019 with an 88-inch 8K OLED TV, a 75-inch 8K LED/LCD TV, HDMI 2.1, new auto calibration features, Alexa built in, and many more features. It seems that this ongoing evolution is occurring out of necessity: as a given-size (and -pixel-dense) display becomes a low profit margin commodity, manufacturers need to continually “up-rev” one or both key consumer-attention-grabbing parameters (along with less quantifiable attributes like image quality) in order to remain profitable … assuming they can continue to stimulate sufficient-sized consumer demand in the process. I am not sure if they can stimulate 8K to mass market in next few years.
Wall size TVs are coming. Samsung announced a modular TV at CES. Samsung first showcased this MicroLED TV technology at CES 2018, showcasing how the screens were composed of millions of individual LEDs. Individuals screens could be combined to create massive displays, which the company calls The Wall TV. The wall-sized displays shown in recent years at CES are, in my opinion, quite ridiculous, at least for the masses.
HDMI updates are coming. At present, the HDMI equipment uses the 2.0 standard (adopted in 2013) tht provides support for example for 4K video. HDMI Forum announced a new 2.1 standard already in November 2017, but it just starter showing in CES in January 2019. 8K fiber-optic HDMI cables seen at CES 2019. The 2.1 standard is a big change in technology at the bus bandwidth increases from 18 gigabit to 48 gigabits per second. This enables up to 10K video transmission and up to 120 frames per second.
Bendable displays are really coming to PCs and smart phones. LG’s “rollable” display shown this year neatly showcased the technology’s inherent flexibility while also addressing the question of how to hide a gargantuan display when it’s not in use. Several foldable smart phones have been shown. Chinese company Royole was showing off the FlexPai at CES in Las Vegas.
Micro displays for VR and AR glasses have developed. MicroLED is better looking, more efficient and more versatile than any previous display tech. Now all Samsung, Sony, LG and others have to do is figure out how to manufacture it affordably.Nanoco Technologies and Plessey Semiconductors have partnered to shrink the pixel size of monolithic microLED displays using Nanoco’s cadmium-free quantum-dot (CFQD quantum dots) semiconductor nanoparticle technology. Microchips and organic LEDs that deliver 4K-like high resolution displays a quarter of the size and half the weight of existing virtual reality (VR) headsets have been developed under a European Union project. Marc Andreessen says VR will be “1,000” times bigger than AR even though VR seems to be the popular whipping boy amongst the tech community.
There seems to be no shortage of angst with the current (and unfortunately burgeoning) popularity of usage of the term artificial intelligence (AI). Intelligence has been defined in many ways which makes it hard to get good picture on what is going on. I am still waiting for sensible intelligent AI to do something useful. But the ability for a sufficiently trained deep learning system to pattern-match images, sound samples, computer viruses, network hacking attempts, and the like is both impressive and effective.
Potential problems related to the coming of self-driving car technologies and cameras are expected. A man at CES in Las Vegas says that a car-mounted lidar permanently damaged the sensor in his new $1,998 Sony a7R II mirrorless camera. Man says CES lidar’s laser was so powerful it wrecked his $1,998 camera because the LIDAR laser power rules ensure lasers are safe for human eyes—but not necessarily for cameras. Is this something that camera and car manufacturers need to figure out together?
2019 Will Be the Year of Open Source from software and even hardware. Open source video player app VLC has now reached 3 billions downloads.
When almost all AV products are pushing more and more features, it seems that almost Everything is too complicated for an average Joe.
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Tomi Engdahl says:
10 Groovy Record Players For Listening To Your Favorite Music With Nostalgic Flair
https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbes-personal-shopper/2021/10/05/best-record-players/?sh=2fa73dc97fb3&utm_campaign=socialflowForbesMainFB&utm_medium=social&utm_source=ForbesMainFacebook
Bestselling author Stephen King once wrote, “Sooner or later, everything old is new again.” While he probably wasn’t thinking about record players when he wrote this, as you’re about to discover, the saying definitely applies.
While many people now enjoy streaming their favorite music via Apple Music, Spotify, Pandora, or Amazon Music, for example, the urge for people to step back in time and play vinyl records has become a popular trend. In fact, Variety recently reported that vinyl sales “skyrocketed 94 percent to $467 million” during the first half of 2021. Of course, to enjoy listening to vinyl records, you’ll need a record player.
Many people use the term record player and turntable interchangeably. Technically, a record player has a built-in amplifier and speakers, so it’s an all-in-one unit. A turntable, however, includes a platter (upon which the records are placed to spin them), as well as a tonearm/cartridge that picks up the audio that’s carved into the record. A separate pre-amp, amplifier, and speakers are required and need to be connected to the turntable using cables.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Kaiutinrakennusohje Äänilevy 2×12, 4×12, 2×15 ja 4×15
Ilmavuutta, pakottomuutta ja luonnollista tarkkuutta
https://audiovideo.fi/opas/kaiutinrakennusohje-aanilevy-2×12-4×12-2×15-ja-4×15/
Kotelottomiin kaiuttimiin liittyy hurja määrä mystiikkaa, ennakkoluuloja ja väärää tietoa. Oikein tehty ”soiva levy” voi soida todella kauniisti, toistaa hyvin bassoa ilman välioven kokoista etulevyä ja sitä voi kuunnella muualtakin kuin yhdestä pisteestä.
Uudet Äänilevy-kaiutinrakennusohjeet ovat 12- ja 15-tuumaisiin koaksiaalielementteihin ja samankokoisiin bassoelementteihin perustuvia. 12-tuumaisissa malleissa elementit ovat amerikkalaisen Eminencen valmistamia. Koaksiaalipaketti koostuu Beta-12CX:stä ja siihen isolla kierteellä kiinnitettävästä ASD1001–kompressiodriveristä eli painekammiodiskantista. Bassoelementti on Beta-12A-2, joka on käytännössä identtinen 12CX-koaksiaalin basso-osan kanssa.
15-tuumaisessa koaksiaali on sama B&C 15CXN76, joka osoittautui 15″ Piste -kaiutinrakennusohjeen kanssa erinomaiseksi. Se on hieno yhdistelmä poikkeuksellisen miellyttävää diskanttitoistoa (asia, joka PA-koaksiaaleissa ei ole mitenkään yleistä tai ainakaan itsestäänselvää), jakosuodinta ajatellen selkeää toimintaa ja yleistä erinomaista laatua. Bassona on SB Audience 15OB350, joka on pitkäiskuinen nimenomaan avoimiin ratkaisuihin suunniteltu malli.
Jotta suuntaavuus siirtyy dipolisuuntaavuudesta pinnan mukaan suuntaavuuteen mahdollisimman tasaisesti, rungot ovat juuri elementtien levyisiä eivätkä maailmalla usein nähtyjen huomattavan leveiden open baffle -ratkaisujen tyylisiä. Näin kaiuttimien toiminta on loogista ja reagoi mahdollisimman selkeästi (ja vähän) huoneakustiikkaan ja sijoitukseen.
Miksi rakentaisin kotelokaiuttimen sijaan dipolin?
Kotelottomalla kaiuttimella eli dipolilla (di-poli, kahteen suuntaan säteilevä) on tiettyjä kiistattomia etuja koteloon verrattuna. Ainakin ellei kuuntelutilasi ole akustiikaltaan ja äänieristykseltään samalla tasolla huippustudioiden kanssa… Päinvastoin kuin normaali kotelokaiutin, joka muuttuu täysin ympärisäteileväksi viimeistään alakeskialueella ja bassoilla, dipoli pitää suuntaavuutensa alimpia toistamiaan bassoja myöten. Dipoli säteilee huomattavasti vähemmän sivuille ja ylös/alas kuin kotelokaiutin.
Tästä seuraa se, että dipoli herättää hurjan paljon vähemmän huoneresonansseja kuin kotelokaiutin ja etenkin kivihuoneissa (miesluolat kellareissa, kerrostalohuoneistot ja kivirakenteiset omakotitalot) bassot ja alakeskialue toistuvat oleellisesti kotelomalleja selkeämmin. Usein puhutaan kotelokaiuttimien ”kotelovärittymistä”, jotka sotkevat ääntä, mutta suuri ellei suurin osa siitä ei ole kaiutinkotelon resonansseja vaan ihan sitä, että avoimet dipolikaiuttimet eivät herätä niin paljoa suoraa ääntä sotkevia huoneresonansseja.
Toinen oleellinen dipolikaiuttimen etu tulee samasta suuntaavuudesta. Koska pääosa äänestä kohdistetaan kuuntelupaikalle eikä päin seiniä, ääni häiritsee vähemmän naapureita ja viereisissä huoneissa olevia. Jos kotelokaiutin ja dipoli soivat kuuntelupaikalla yhtä suurella voimakkuudella, dipolista lähtee 4,8 desibeliä vähemmän ääntä ympäristöön kuin kotelosta.
Kuten dipolien kanssa aina, etuseinän läheisyys vaimentaa alabassoja ja tuottaa korostuksen yläbassoille. Hyvä lähtökohta sijoitukselle on laittaa kaiutin noin metrin päähän seinästä ja jatkaa kokeiluja siitä oman maun ja mahdollisuuksien mukaan.
Avoimessa rakenteessa kaiutinelementin etu- ja takasäteily kumoavat toisiaan. Sivuille ja ylös sekä alas kumoutuminen on suurinta, käytännössä voidaan sanoa, ettei niihin suuntiin lähde ääntä. Kumoutumista tapahtuu kuitenkin myös suoraan eteen- ja taaksepäin, siksi säteilevää pinta-alaa on syytä olla bassoilla selvästi kotelokaiutinta enemmän. Siten akustisen oikosulun jälkeenkin kapasiteettia on edelleen jäljellä hyvin.
Kaikissa kokoluokissa perusrakenne on sama: tehostettu kaksitie. Yhdellä lisäbassolla tehdyissä Äänilevy 2×12 ja Äänilevy 2×15 -malleissa niin koaksiaalin kuin bassoelementikin kartio toistaa bassoja, mutta alempi eli bassoelementti suodatetaan pois noin oktaavia alempana kuin koaksiaalielementti. Koaksiaalielementin kartio luonnollisesti toistaa diskanttielementin jakotaajuudelle saakka eli noin yhteen kilohertsiin. Tämä 2.5-tieksi kutsuttu ratkaisu on jakosuotimeltaan kolmetietä yksinkertaisempi ja lisäksi säteilevä pinta-ala bassoilla saadaan tuplattua verrattuna siihen, että vain se varsinainen bassoelementti toistaisi bassoja.
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://audiovideo.fi/uutinen/genelec-esitteli-5-10-2021-6040r-dsp-aktiivikaiuttimen/
Tomi Engdahl says:
Build an Electrostatic Loudspeaker
© May 2004, Rod Elliott (ESP)
https://sound-au.com/project105.htm
Simple electrostatic loudspeaker (ESL)
https://clectronics.wordpress.com/2015/06/09/esl/
An ESL consists of a thin conductive membrane and one or two drilled electrodes. They form a capacitor where high voltage drags the membrane towards the electrode which also shifts air and thus produces sound. The sound signal is amplified in voltage and a high bias voltage is added to attract the membrane more or less with respect to the music signal. Some kilo volts are sufficient for the bias.
The simpler design has a nonlinear characteristic which result in some harmonics. The electrostatic force is quadratic
The force depends on the square of the voltage which is highly nonlinear. The parable can be linearized with a shift of the working point by the bias voltage
With a bias voltage ten times of the music harmonics would be 1% only as it is squared. The force and thus loudness also depends on the bias voltage – the higher, the louder.
As with the displacement of the membrane the electrode distance d changes, another nonlinear behavior occurs but only during loud parts of music. It’s the same with the nonlinear force the membrane tension pushes itself back to its origin.
I decided to generate the bias voltage with the help of the audio signal, so no external power source is needed. A pumping effect appears with fluctuating bias voltage.
I used a car accident rescue foil from an expired pack. Two screws squeeze a cable onto a stack of residual foil at one side. The transformer is a small 230V to 15V 2x1W pcb type.
New Membrane
After some high voltage arcing through the membrane the fine conductive coating vaporized along a fine scratch or a fold. I replaced it with usual household aluminum foil which I bent a little to make it more flexible. The low frequency rendering is litle worse due to the higher stiffness causing resonances. The loudness and treble is not affected by the higher weight.
Symmetrical ESL with constant charge membrane
To get rid of nonlinearities, a symmetrical built ESL with a membrane between two perforated electrodes is essential. The membrane is charged to a static high voltage only. The surrounding electrodes form a capacitor with constant plate distance and carry the high voltage music signal. The membrane’s charge feels a force due to the electrostatic field which is linear to capacitor voltage. No current flows to the membrane which doesn’t require a good contact.
With the higher electrode distance a higher voltage can be applied until corona discharge occurs. The symmetrical construction needs a center taped high voltage transformer. For this purpose four transformer connected in series will generate a voltage high enough to play music loud. Thanks to the symmetrical distortion free membrane movement. The applied DC Voltage doesn’t have to be much higher than the AC music signal on the electrodes to diminish nonlinear curves because there are none. The membranes polarity is unrestricted; maybe a negative polarity will cause corona winds to blow the near membrane away.
The 10M resistor maintains the quasi static charge of the membrane. The lamp is absolutely essential when using transformers. Once their core saturates the inductance drops thus a high current will overload the amplifier without this protection.
Tomi Engdahl says:
The 7 Most Common Home Theater Mistakes
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ke6nL4h07GQ
Tomi Engdahl says:
Why do speaker drivers use different materials?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OAjIUabmKAo
Paper, metal, carbon fiber, all manner of exotic materials are used in the making of loudspeaker drivers. But why? Isn’t there one material that beats everything else?
I love how he acknowledges other companies making good products. This definitely isn’t the first time.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Why aren’t all loudspeakers high sensitivity?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rGNBu3O_2vw
Tomi Engdahl says:
The People Who Were Sued for Downloading Music… What Ever Happened?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QUm6no5MXYA
Lawsuits against downloaders were meant to scare people into buying CDs again. However in the late 2000s a pair of cases went way too far, with even the judge calling the outcome “monstrous and shocking.” Interestingly, the fight against digital music began as early as the 1980s. Enjoy the full history of the RIAA vs digital music!
Tomi Engdahl says:
Lines of Light: How Analog Television Works
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l4UgZBs7ZGo
You can support this channel on Patreon! Link below
Have you ever wondered how old-school television worked? It seems almost impossible for a device to make moving images without a computer being involved. Yet analog television is very, very old. How on Earth did it work? Find out in this video.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Creating a soundstage in a small room
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=82iup2hsX4o
Not all of us are blessed with a big room from which to play our stereo systems. What can one do with a small room to get that magical depth of soundstage?
Tomi Engdahl says:
Go full wireless…. wireless lan. Wireless sound via bt. Wireless power via qi . Wireless display via streamcasting. Wireless mouse and keyboard via 2.4gh receiver.
Tomi Engdahl says:
CATEGORY 10.0 POWER AMPLIFIER SOUND CHECK W/ P-AUDIO HALIMAW BOX,IMIX CA9, SUBSCOOP BATTLE 15,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EaJ2J2lEx_k
LIVE CATEGORY 10 version 2. Srp 88,000 with case n caster
https://www.facebook.com/MaciasElectronic/videos/live-category-10-version-2-srp-88000-with-case-n-caster/305086040557164/
Tomi Engdahl says:
The Making of a loudspeaker voice coil
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6qjcIXaE7gc
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.sweetwater.com/insync/best-power-amplifiers-for-live-sound/
Tomi Engdahl says:
P.S. AUDIO ELECTRONICS DESIGNER DARREN MYERS AT AXPONA 2019
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oFspgDyjEQo
Electronics engineer Darren Myers is responsible for designing many recent P.S. Audio products. He’s finishing up the new P.S. Audio Stellar phono preamp. At AXPONA 2019 AnalogPlanet editor Michael Fremer sat down with Mr. Myers to discuss the new phono preamp. He also learned that Myers was influenced years ago by an email exchange with Fremer that helped set him on a positive career path. More very soon from AXPONA 2019.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Digital and analog connections
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mVGSMxJlQnA
Ever wonder about ADCs and DACs and how they fit into a stereo system? Paul helps us understand the digital to analog and back again chain. (Please forgive me for the occasional bleeps and static that crept into my wireless microphone).
Tomi Engdahl says:
Know Audio: It All Depends On The DAC
https://hackaday.com/2021/10/20/know-audio-it-all-depends-on-the-dac/
Our trip through the world of audio technology has taken us step-by step from your ears into a typical home Hi-Fi system. We’ve seen the speakers and the amplifier, now it’s time to take a look at what feeds that amplifier.
Here, we encounter the first digital component in our journey outwards from the ear, the Digital to Analogue Converter, or DAC. This circuit, which you’ll find as an integrated circuit, takes the digital information and turns it into the analogue voltage required by the amplifier.
There are many standards for digital audio, but in this context that used by the CD is most common. CDs sample audio at 44.1 kHz 16 bit
Remembering that i2s is a technology from the end of the 1970s, it’s a surprisingly simple one to create a DAC for. The original Philips specification document contains a circuit using shift registers and latches to capture the samples, which can be fed to a simple resistor ladder and filter to perform the conversion. This is an effective way to turn digital to analogue, but as with every audio component it carries with it a level of distortion.
If you look at the output of any DAC in the frequency domain rather than the time domain, you’ll find noise along with the spectrum of whatever signal it is processing. For instance, the sampling frequency will be there, as will a multitude of spurious mixer products derived from it and the signal. In an audio DAC all this out-of-band noise can manifest itself as distortion.
The problem faced by audio DAC designers is that the sampling frequency is relatively close to the signal frequency, so while the low-pass filter does its best to remove the offending spectrum, it has a difficult job.
Shifting The Problem Upwards For A Better Sound
The solution found by the DAC designers of the 1980s and 1990s was to move that out-of-band noise up in frequency such that it could be more efficiently rejected by the filter. If you remember CD players years ago boasting “oversampling”, “Bitstream”, or “1-bit DAC”, these referred to the development of more advanced DAC designs that performed the shift upwards in out-of-band noise frequency by various different techniques. At the time this was a hotly contested marketing war between manufacturers as a CD player was seen as a premium device, from a position three decades later when a CD is something that has to be explained to children who have never seen one.
All of these are essentially sigma-delta DACs, and they approach the problem of moving the out-of-band noise upwards by producing pulse chains at a high multiple of the sample clock where the number of pulses corresponds to the value of the sample being converted. By sampling with lower resolution, but much faster, the associated out of band noise is shifted much higher up the frequency range, which makes the job of separating it out from the signal much easier. It can be decoded into an analogue signal by means of a fairly straightforward low-pass filter. These are the “Bitstream” and “1-bit” DACs advertised on those 1990s CD players, and what was once the bleeding edge of audio technology is now commonplace.
A Good DAC Can’t Compensate For A Poor Source
Although a good DAC makes a huge contribution to audio quality, we’ve assumed that the digital data comes from a source without much compression, such as a CD. CDs are now no longer mainstream, and the data is much more likely to have come from a compressed source such as an MP3 file or an audio streaming service. Compression is a topic in itself, but it’s worth making the point that the quality of the audio expressed on the data stream reflects the characteristics of the compression algorithm used, and no matter how good the DAC may be it can not make up for the quality of its source.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Musiikin kuuntelu digitalisoituu – kännykästä ykköslaite
https://www.uusiteknologia.fi/2021/10/20/musiikin-kuuntelu-digitalisoituu-kannykasta-ykkoslaite/
Kännykkä on pian ohittamassa pian radiokuuntelun musiikin osalta, kertoo Teoston ja musiikkituottajien uusin selvitys musiikinkuuntelusta Suomessa. Lisäksi yhä useampi suomalaisista on valmis myös maksamaan striimatusta musiikista – niin premium-palveluista kuin keikoistakin.
Kaikkiaan radio on silti edelleen ylivoimaisesti suosituin musiikin kuuntelun väline Suomessa. Siitä pitää huolen koko maan kattava fm-radioverkko useine kanavineen sekä ilmaiseksi tarjolla olevat radio.fi ja Ylen Areena sekä muut yleisradoyhtiöiden verkkolaajennukset, joita voi kuunnella myös kännykän kautta. Suomalaisista on 60 prosenttia radiota autossa viimeisen vuorokauden aikana. Erityisesti kuunteluun käytetyssä ajassa radio on selkeä ykkönen. Puhelin ottaa kuitenkin radiota kiinni musiikinkuuntelulaitteena kovaa vauhti.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Vanha televisio kiertää vielä uuteen käyttöön
https://www.uusiteknologia.fi/2021/10/21/vanha-televisio-kiertaa-viela-uuteen-kayttoon/
uore Traficomin tutkimus paljastaa, että suomalaisten kierrättävät televisionsa aktiivisesti usein ensin jollekin toiselle käytöön ja vasta rikkinäisenä suoraan kaatopaikalle. Monet hyödyntävät vanhaa televisiota myös kesämökillä kakkostelevisiona. Lähivuosina antenniverkon muutos kokonaan terävämpiin HD/DVB-T2-lähetyksiin vaikuttaa silti myös vanhojen televisioiden uusiokäyttöön.
Traficommin tuoreen tutkimuksen mukaan 82 prosenttia suomalaisista kokee television kierrättämisen helpoksi ja valtaosa hankkii uuden television vasta tarpeeseen. Viime vuonna kiertoon laitetuista televisioista lähes 99 prosenttia voitiin hyödyntää uudelleen.
Tomi Engdahl says:
http://allthemusic.info/
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graphics_display_resolution
https://www.rfwireless-world.com/Terminology/Difference-between-XGA-WXGA-and-WUXGA.html
Tomi Engdahl says:
Luxonis Teases OAK-D Pro, OAK-D Pro-PoE Smart Cameras with Gigabit Ethernet, Active Depth Sensing
https://www.hackster.io/news/luxonis-teases-oak-d-pro-oak-d-pro-poe-smart-cameras-with-gigabit-ethernet-active-depth-sensing-f690999ff7c2
More robust, full-sealed camera systems boast some impressive features — including IR illumination for dark rooms.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Vinyl Is Selling So Well That It’s Getting Hard to Sell Vinyl
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/21/arts/music/vinyl-records-delays.html
Left for dead in the 1980s, vinyl records are now the music industry’s most popular and highest-grossing physical format. Getting them manufactured, however, is increasingly a challenge.
Within the Indianapolis office of Joyful Noise Recordings, a specialty label that caters to vinyl-loving fans of underground rock, is a corner that employees call the “lathe cave.”
There sits a Presto 6N record lathe — a 1940s-vintage machine the size of a microwave that makes records by cutting a groove into a blank vinyl platter. Unlike most standard records, which are pressed by the hundreds or thousands, each lathe-cut disc must be created individually.
“It’s incredibly laborious,” said Karl Hofstetter, the label’s founder. “If a song is three minutes long, it takes three minutes to make every one.”
This ancient technology — scuffed and dinged, the lathe looks like something from a World War II submarine — is a key part of Joyful Noise’s strategy to survive the very surge of vinyl popularity the label has helped fuel.
Left for dead with the advent of CDs in the 1980s, vinyl records are now the music industry’s most popular and highest-grossing physical format, with fans choosing it for collectibility, sound quality or simply the tactile experience of music in an age of digital ephemerality. After growing steadily for more than a decade, LP sales exploded during the pandemic.
In the first six months of this year, 17 million vinyl records were sold in the United States, generating $467 million in retail revenue, nearly double the amount from the same period in 2020, according to the Recording Industry Association of America. Sixteen million CDs were also sold in the first half of 2021, worth just $205 million. Physical recordings are now just a sliver of the overall music business — streaming is 84 percent of domestic revenue — but they can be a strong indication of fan loyalty, and stars like Taylor Swift and Olivia Rodrigo make vinyl an important part of their marketing.
Yet there are worrying signs that the vinyl bonanza has exceeded the industrial capacity needed to sustain it. Production logjams and a reliance on balky, decades-old pressing machines have led to what executives say are unprecedented delays. A couple of years ago, a new record could be turned around in a few months; now it can take up to a year, wreaking havoc on artists’ release plans.
Adele, whose album “30” is due Nov. 19 — and is sure to be a blockbuster on LP — said her release date had been set six months ago to get vinyl and CDs made in time.
“There was like a 25-week lead time!” she exclaimed. “So many CD factories and vinyl factories, they bloody closed down even before Covid because no one bloody prints them anymore.”
Music and manufacturing experts cite a variety of factors behind the holdup. The pandemic shut down many plants for a time, and problems in the global supply chain have slowed the movement of everything from cardboard and polyvinyl chloride — the “vinyl” that records (and plumbing pipes) are made from — to finished albums. In early 2020, a fire destroyed one of only two plants in the world that made lacquer discs, an essential part of the record-making process.
But the bigger issue may be simple supply and demand. Consumption of vinyl LPs has grown much faster than the industry’s ability to make records. The business relies on an aging infrastructure of pressing machines, most of which date to the 1970s or earlier and can be costly to maintain. New machines came along only in recent years, and can cost up to $300,000 each. There’s a backlog of orders for those, too.
The limits of this infrastructure are being tested as major artists — and super-retailers like Walmart and Amazon — increasingly push vinyl. It is not hard to see why: At a time when CD sales are vanishing and streaming has left artists complaining about minuscule payouts, a new LP, especially if offered in eye-catching colors or in collector-baiting design variants, can sell for $25 or more. As some see it, releases by top pop acts are gumming up the production chain, crowding out the smaller artists and labels that have remained loyal to the format all along.
“What worries me more than anything is that the major labels will dominate and take over all of the capacity, which I don’t think is a good idea,”
Others say the big labels are just a convenient target. The real problem, they believe, isn’t celebrities jumping on the vinyl bandwagon but that the industrial network simply has not expanded quickly enough to meet growing demand.
“Am I mad that Olivia Rodrigo sold 76,000 vinyl copies of her album?” said Ben Blackwell of Third Man, the record label and vinyl empire that counts Jack White of the White Stripes as one of its founders. “Not at all! This is what I would have dreamed of when we started Third Man — that the biggest frontline artists are all pushing vinyl, and that young kids are into it.
Still, there are worries that the renaissance may be at risk if further delays frustrate consumers and artists — or if vinyl comes to be treated as just another merchandise item, like T-shirts or key chains, from which fickle fans will simply move on.
Among old-school record types, there have long been suspicions that many new fans buy vinyl for a collectible thrill but never actually drop a needle.
For artists, especially ones without major-label backing, sticking with vinyl has now become a question about whether it is worth the trouble.
“Right now vinyl feels legitimizing,”
“It’s an investment for an artist,” she added. “I want these objects that I can sell, so I am going to invest in that.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.paroc.fi/dokumentit-ja-tyokalut/suunnittelijoille
Tekniset eristeet Ääniopas
Tekniset eristeet Ääniopas sisältää yleistä tietoa äänenvaimennuksesta ja -eristyksestä sekä talotekniikka-, prosessiteollisuus- ja Marine-tuotteiden äänenvaimennusominaisuuksista. Tuotekohtaisten absorptiokertoimien lisäksi oppaasta löytyy kattavasti tietoa Marine-tuotteiden ääneneristävyydestä sekä putkien ja kanavien lisäysvaimennuksesta.
Tomi Engdahl says:
DVI connector
https://www.conceptdraw.com/examples/connector-pinout-diagram
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.nme.com/blogs/nme-blogs/12-amazing-songs-with-just-three-chords-7381
Tomi Engdahl says:
What song drops the deepest bass?
https://www.head-fi.org/threads/what-song-drops-the-deepest-bass.97744/page-4
HD280s — I used to wonder why people raved about the Telac recording of the 1812 Overture until I heard it on the 280s. basshead.gif Woah! So those ARE cannons, not just little pop-guns, after all!
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://jackaudio.org/
Tomi Engdahl says:
8.3-Mpixel sensor delivers high dynamic range
https://www.edn.com/8-3-mpixel-sensor-delivers-high-dynamic-range/
Onsemi’s AR0821CS CMOS digital image sensor features on-chip HDR technology that achieves a dynamic range in excess of 140 dB. The 1/1.7-in. sensor provides 4K video with 8.3-Mpixel resolution at 60 frames/s, while consuming very low power.
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.soundguys.com/sennheiser-hd-280-pro-review-53109/
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://telephoneworld.org/landline-telephone-history/pink-floyds-young-lust-explained-and-demystified/
Tomi Engdahl says:
Dual vs mono subwoofers
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hesQz58MW_U
Is it better to have left and right separated subwoofers or can you get away with a single mono subwoofer?
Viewer comments:
Paul is so right about this. Most systems can benefit hugely by adding a subwoofer and if you have enough money, get 2 of them. But, especially for a smaller room, it’s better to spend the extra on a high quality subwoofer than two mediocre ones. High quality sub bass means low distortion, quick decay, linear response going down to near 20Hz or below with no very dominant resonances and a high sound pressure that can shake your room. Putting it in the right spot of the room and tuning it (if such option is available) can easily make or brake the experience. Hopefully PS Audio will make an awesome subwoofer some day.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Vizio In Hot Water Over Smart TV GPL Violations
https://hackaday.com/2021/10/22/vizio-in-hot-water-over-smart-tv-gpl-violations/
As most anyone in this community knows, there’s an excellent chance that any consumer product on the market that’s advertised as “smart” these days probably has some form of Linux running under the hood. We’re also keenly aware that getting companies to hold up their end of the bargain when it comes to using Linux and other GPL licensed software in their products, namely releasing their modified source, isn’t always as cut and dried as it should be.
Occasionally these non-compliant companies will get somebody so aggravated that they actually try to do something about it, which is where smart TV manufacturer Vizio currently finds itself. The Software Freedom Conservancy (SFC) recently announced they’re taking the Irvine, California based company to court over their repeated failures to meet the requirements of the GPL while developing their Linux-powered SmartCast TV firmware. In addition to the Linux kernel, the SFC also claims Vizio is using modified versions of various other GPL and LGPL protected works, such as U-Boot, bash, gawk, tar, glibc, and ffmpeg.
Software Freedom Conservancy files right-to-repair lawsuit against California TV manufacturer Vizio Inc. for alleged GPL violations
Litigation is historic in nature due to its focus on consumer rights, filing as third-party beneficiary
https://sfconservancy.org/copyleft-compliance/vizio.html
IRVINE, Calif. (Oct. 19, 2021) Software Freedom Conservancy announced today it has filed a lawsuit against Vizio Inc. for what it calls repeated failures to fulfill even the basic requirements of the General Public License (GPL).
The lawsuit alleges that Vizio’s TV products, built on its SmartCast system, contain software that Vizio unfairly appropriated from a community of developers who intended consumers to have very specific rights to modify, improve, share, and reinstall modified versions of the software.
The GPL is a copyleft license that ensures end users the freedom to run, study, share, and modify the software. Copyleft is a kind of software licensing that leverages the restrictions of copyright, but with the intent to promote sharing (using copyright licensing to freely use and repair software).
Software Freedom Conservancy, a nonprofit organization focused on ethical technology, is filing the lawsuit as the purchaser of a product which has copylefted code. This approach makes it the first legal case that focuses on the rights of individual consumers as third-party beneficiaries of the GPL.
“That’s what makes this litigation unique and historic in terms of defending consumer rights,” says Karen M. Sandler, the organization’s executive director.
Tomi Engdahl says:
‘Rust’ Tragedy Reflects Troubling Trends on Movie and TV Sets: ‘We Did This to Ourselves’
https://variety.com/2021/film/news/rust-halyna-hutchins-death-alec-baldwin-production-1235096161/
Inexperience among crew members: The huge spike in the demand for content during the past decade has stretched below-the-line talent beyond its breaking point. “In some places you can’t find qualified people for these jobs so you are taking (crew) with very little experience,” said a veteran producer.
Inexperience among producers: The low barrier to entry in producing for streamers who pay production costs upfront has allowed smaller companies and startups to attempt large-scale productions without adequate staff, skills or equipment. Among the seven production entities listed as backing “Rust” was Streamline Global, a company founded in 2017 to use films produced with production tax incentives as vehicles to create tax breaks for wealthy investors. Streamline Global co-founders Emily Hunter Salveson and Ryan Donnell Smith serve as executive producer and producer, respectively, on “Rust.” Industry sources cite inherent problems that can occur when goals and incentives among producers are not aligned.
“We have developed new financial models to attract capital that would otherwise be unavailable to the film industry,” Salveson told Variety in 2017. “Films are the byproduct of the comprehensive tax planning strategies we employ for our clients.”
Complacency: Many producers and crew members have been working at the kind of high volume and pace that can breed a sense of complacency and over-confidence in key positions.
“You live in this fantasy land where you’re fake shooting people and blowing things up,” says Harris, of Atlanta-based Harris Lowry Manton, who also represented the family of “The Walking Dead” stuntman who died of a head injury on set in 2017. “It’s easy to get into a false sense of complacency of ‘Oh we’ve done this a million times.’ ”
Producers were quick to blame the Peak TV phenomenon for stretching the talent pool for below-the-line, craft and technical crew positions well beyond the breaking point.
“As an industry, in Peak TV times, we did this to ourselves,” said a producer.
Multiple sources pointed to the importance of having experienced skilled technicians on set when weapons are involved. The details of “Rust” situation are not clear, but industry veterans noted that Westerns typically involve a number of firearms for multiple actors.
“On some shoots you might have a truck full of (firearms) and somebody has to keep track of every one of them and how they’re being used,” the producer said.
The armorer on set typically “spends a lot of time coaching people how to handle a gun safely,” the producer said. “In between takes that person is always standing around coaching.”
The producer added that there can often be problems with actors not taking the gun safety training seriously – that’s another reason for having experts on the set and maintaining safety protocols down to the letter. “This protects people from themselves,” the producer said.
Attorney Harris noted that the use of firearms on a set involves extra layers of disclosure and planning for insurance purposes. Harris and other industry veterans said producers are usually required to submit their plans for using firearms on set for review by insurance officials as part of the overall bond for the production.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Petition:
Time to ban the use of real firearms on set and demand better crew working conditions!
https://www.change.org/p/hollywood-it-s-time-to-create-halyna-s-law-which-will-ban-the-use-of-real-firearms-on-film-production-sets-and-create-a-safe-working-environment-for-everyone-involved
On October 21st, 2021 we lost an unbelievably talented cinematographer on the film set of RUST, due to a real gun being discharged with live ammunition in it. I am in shock and numb to my core. The bullet also wounded Director Joel Souza.
This up and coming Cinematographer was named as an ASC “Rising Star Cinematographer” in 2019, and was finally breaking into the Hollywood film industry after hustling and shooting amazing content for half a decade. She shot three feature films prior to Rust, but this would have been the movie that would have put her on the Hollywood map as a talented, female cinematographer working with an A-list celebrity.
We need to make sure that this avoidable tragedy never happens again. There is no excuse for something like this to happen in the 21st century. Real guns are no longer needed on film production sets. This isn’t the early 90′s, when Brandon Lee was killed in the same manner. Change needs to happen before additional talented lives are lost.
Please sign this petition and demand for Alec Baldwin to use his power and influence in the Hollywood film industry to make change and ban real guns on film sets.
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://hackaday.com/2021/10/26/theres-not-a-cassingle-thing-missing-from-this-cassette-deck-masterclass/
https://www.instructables.com/Intro-to-Cassette-Recorder-Operation-Maintenance-a/
Tomi Engdahl says:
They FINALLY Made a PERFECT CAMERA [DJi RONIN 4D]
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=V7DnNoAnbDc&feature=share
THIS EPISODE ► Niko reveals and reviews the newest camera coming to market from DJI thats going to change everything.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Speaker ‘Stun Gun’ Aims To Combat China’s Dancing Grannies
https://hackaday.com/2021/10/28/speaker-stun-gun-aims-to-combat-chinas-dancing-grannies/
One of the more popular social activities in China is group dancing in public squares. Often the pastime of many middle-aged and older women, participants are colloquially referred to as “dancing grannies.” While the activity is relatively wholesome, some dancers have begun to draw the ire of their neighbourhoods with their loud music and attempts to dominate the use of public parks and recreational areas.
Naturally, a technological solution sprung up promising to solve the problem. The South China Morning Post has reported on a “stun gun” device which claims to neutralise speakers from a distance, in an effort to shut down dance gatherings. The device created a huge stir on social media, as well as many questions about how it could work. It’s simpler, and a bit less cool, than you think.
The devices are hard to find concrete details on, particularly in the English world. Listings on Western-facing websites like eBay and Aliexpress have been deleted with remarkable speed. It only adds to the mystery around a device that can supposedly shut down audio device at long range.
However, dig deep enough, arm yourself with some translation apps, and talk to a few friends in China, and you’ll learn the truth. The devices are not some all-powerful stun gun that can blast speakers into submission. Instead, they are but simple infrared remote controls, built into a familiar flashlight-style housing. Combining a powerful infrared LED and a lens to focus the beam means the devices can shoot infrared signals over 50 m in ideal conditions. It’s then a simple matter of modulating the infrared LED with the right signal. Have the LED match the “power off” command used by remote controls for the common portable PA speakers used by the dancing grannies, and you’re in business.
It’s the same concept as the famous TV-B-Gone.
China’s dancing grannies: ‘stun gun’ claims to solve square dancing dilemma by sabotaging the music
https://www.scmp.com/news/people-culture/trending-china/article/3151243/chinas-dancing-grannies-viral-stun-gun-claims
The device looks like a flashlight and can be used from a distance of between 50 to 80 metres
Dancing grannies are an important form of exercise and social activity for older Chinese people, but are also a source of public annoyance
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://musictech.com/news/behringers-flow-8-is-an-alternative-to-rode-and-zooms-podcast-mixers/
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.iflscience.com/brain/this-optical-illusion-will-make-you-question-your-eyes-brain-and-possibly-your-life/
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://news.samsung.com/global/samsung-digital-signage-the-story-so-far
Tomi Engdahl says:
PS AUDIO / PAUL McGowan: HIGH-TECH MANUFACTURER
https://www.subwoofermania.com/2021/10/ps-audio-paul-mcgowan-high-tech.html
During the hot summer of 1973, later PS Audio founder Paul McGowan (the “P” in the company name) was program director of a rock and roll radio station in Santa Ana, California. The station received a reprimand from the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), an independent authority that is responsible in the USA for compliance with certain technical standards in broadcasting. The sound quality of McGowan’s radio station left a lot to be desired, so the allegation. The reasons for the lousy sound could be found comparatively quickly with the phono preamplifier used and the transformer with which the studio audio signal is sent to the actual transmitter.
Paul McGowan, who was living in precarious circumstances at the time and was always looking for sources of additional income, recognized the opportunity for himself to earn a few extra dollars.
The construction of a new transformer was beyond his possibilities, but he dared to redesign the phono preamps of the studio turntables so that they would sound significantly better. He only had a week window for this.
McGowan found a circuit based on operational amplifiers in a specialist book – and, inspired by it, built a phono preamplifier powered by nine-volt batteries in a cigar box within just one day.
Stan Warren (later the “S” of the company name), who turned out to be an avowed audiophile – and recognized the potential of the cigar box phono amplifier, because shortly afterward he founded PS Audio together with Paul McGowan.
A good year later, the amplifier was ready for series production and was sold directly to end customers for an affordable 59.95 US dollars from April 1974 – at a time when the term “high-end audio” had not even been invented.
Old love doesn’t rust: Paul McGowan bought back the naming rights to the company that he had once founded and again took over the chairmanship and the post of chief designer, which he still holds today. He rebuilt the company,
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.audioholics.com/room-acoustics/human-hearing-phase-distortion-audibility-part-2
Tomi Engdahl says:
In “On the Audibility of Midrange Phase Distortion in Audio Systems” by Lipshitz, et. al. we have:
” 1) Even quite small midrange phase nonlinearities can be audible on suitably chosen signals.
2) Audibility is far greater on headphones than on loudspeakers.
3) Simple acoustic signals generated anechoically display clear phase audibility on headphones.
4) On normal music or speech signals phase distortion appears not to be generally audible, although it was heard with 99% confidence on some recorded vocal material.”
And from Dr Floyd Toole:
” It turns out that, within very generous tolerances, humans are insensitive to phase shifts. Under carefully contrived circumstances, special signals auditioned in anechoic conditions, or through headphones, people have heard slight differences. However, even these limited results have failed to provide clear evidence of a ‘preference’ for a lack of phase shift. When auditioned in real rooms, these differences disappear.. .”
https://www.audioholics.com/room-acoustics/human-hearing-phase-distortion-audibility-part-2
Tomi Engdahl says:
So what useful information can we draw from this particular study?
Phase distortion is audible, but only under very specific circumstances, using very specific, types of test signals.
There exists in this study no statistically significant evidence supporting the audibility of phase distortion in the musical samples provided, using the all-pass filter implementations chosen by the researchers.
Introducing the room acoustic variable in to the equation further lowers the already poor scores phase distortion audibility scores.
So what conclusions regarding the audibility of phase distortion can we draw from the all of the above?
Given the data provided by the above cited references we can conclude that phase distortion is indeed audible, though generally speaking, only very subtly so and only under certain specific test conditions and perception circumstances.
The degree of subtly depends upon the nature of the test signal, the dB SPL level at which the signal is perceived, the acoustic environment in which the signal was recorded and/or played back as well as the Q & fo of any filter networks in the signal stream. Certain combinations of conditions can render it utterly inaudible.
Room acoustics further masks whatever cues that the hearing process may depend upon to detect the presence of phase distortion.
https://www.audioholics.com/room-acoustics/human-hearing-phase-distortion-audibility-part-2
Tomi Engdahl says:
Fresh From the Bench: Dayton Audio Test System (DATS) V3
https://audioxpress.com/article/fresh-from-the-bench-dayton-audio-test-system-dats-v3
https://www.hifikulma.fi/Dayton-Audio-DATS-V2
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.hoistmagazine.com/features/hoisting-upside-down
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://fohonline.com/articles/tech-feature/dyi-loudspeaker-design-the-bc-215-dcx/
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.avinteractive.com/home/
Tomi Engdahl says:
use this:
https://prosilentium.de/idiotenbremse-19.html
(german website, its a limiter that reduces the signal by 2 dB for every dB over the treshold and is manipulation-safe)