Ask the Advisors have finally gotten into the headphone business.  Ok not completely true, we have been in the headphone biz for a while…but due to requests from our clients we have expanded our offering dramatically.

So now we should have a headphone for just about everyone.

We are offering these from 2 of the best names in the industry…B&W and Sennheiser.  After doing a lot of listening over the last couple of months these are the ones we decided had the best sound and between the 2 companies we cover just about every use imaginable.

We have active noise cancelling (ANC) headphones for the travelers out there.

We have truly great sounding sets with controls on the chord for you iPod users.  Finally, all the ease of use; and great sound in one headset.

We have great sounding “Kleer” digital wireless headset for home TV and Audio use…they not only sound great the range from the base is amazing

We have superior performing wired headphones for serious home listeners.

We have the Sennheiser Adidas brand of in ear styles for the active listeners.  These feature special designs to keep them in the ear when running or exercising, and extreme water resistance and sweat-proof designs.

And of course in ear designs for the portable user that just wants great sound.

So, no matter what your use is we have an answer available…so stop in and check them out soon.

Ask Ron about Wireless Headphones!

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Perhaps this one is different…after all this is the first Sound Bar type speaker developed by B&W (Bowers and Wilkins). B&W as you may or may not know is a very famous speaker manufacturer from England known the world over for two things. One, their ability to create truly amazing and very high-end speakers…and two, for their uncanny knack for trickling down the crazy technologies they develop for these high-end speakers into speakers we can all afford. Something very few speaker companies on the planet do; or even understand.

So I plug in the Panorama, cue up a Blu-Ray disc and…wow…this thing is really, really good. It is doing things no sound bar I have ever heard from anyone else does; it has detail, dynamic range…it actually sounds like a good speaker! So I change to music; surely music will be the downfall of this device. Wrong again, the music actually sounds good. All the details and subtleties I expect from a good speaker are coming out of the Panorama. So it is possible to have a smallish, convenient, and easy to set up Sound bar…and truly enjoy the way it sounds.

Look, there are a lot of people out there that think a Home-Theater-In-A-Box is good…there are even some people that think the crummy and tiny little speakers in their new TV are “good enough.” They are all wrong! Sound is a very important part of the Television and Movie watching experience…without great sound a movie just becomes so-so. Do not get caught in the “it’s good enough” trap.

If your room does not lend itself to a true Surround Sound system you should stop in and audition the Panorama…it is the first Sound bar I have ever heard that can actually call itself a very good speaker. Kudos once again to B&W for taking the road less traveled and delivering an exceptional product in a me too category.

Ask Ron about B&W Soundbars.

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Let me clarify a bit here… I recently had a client purchase some speakers and express “disappointment” over the fact that they were actually manufactured overseas. This disappointment came despite my explaining to this client that they had purchased a great product by a company that oversaw every aspect of its product’s design and manufacture.

One of the best things about Ask the Advisors is what’s in our name. That is, the benefit of being able to ask experts within the industry just about anything regarding Home or Car Audio and Video. I’ve been asked what makes some brands better than others- and one of the solid reasons I’ve always given has been the retention of great QC (Quality Control) as opposed to some overseas entities that fail to provide a good level of consistency in design & manufacture.

In my previous blogs, I’ve always stated that many of the brands some of us grew up worshiping have long since been sold to overseas companies that design and manufacture far inferior versions of these classics. Names like Fosgate, Polk, Infinity and MB Quart are perfect examples of this- as they no longer have “roots” in this country and generally have everything handled overseas. The exceptions to the rule here include a handful of overseas companies- like Morel- that design, manufacture and bring a superior product to market from Israel.

In today’s audio market, you can still find companies that either manufacture everything themselves- or at least retain control over how their specifically designed products are manufactured outside the US. These companies are few and far between, but they all share the same passion for audio and dedication to the quality of their products.

Now on to my pet peeve…

There IS A DIFFERENCE between “Made Overseas” and “Made Overseas.”
I’m going to compare “Company A”, which could be any one of the aforementioned “American Classics” listed against JL Audio.

“Company A” was once located in the US and provided a good reputable product that many of us knew and loved. Ask the Advisors sold many of these brands back then!
“Company A” ran into tough times when the market changed and was eventually bought out by another company that ended up moving “Company A” to an overseas plant. In the end, there was no continuation of the original design or quality control for products produced by “company A” and the results have been (and continue to be) inferior clone products that don’t come close to the originals.

Take a look at some Infinity or Fosgate car speakers and you can see and feel the “cheapness” here! Crappy lightweight basket designs, poorly engineered speaker cones and I won’t even go into the tweeters or crossovers! Yikes!!

JL Audio began as- and continues to be- a company headquartered in the US. Although JL Audio manufactures most of it’s products at it’s Florida plant, it does have some if its speakers and amplifiers manufactured overseas to save costs, which are passed on to the consumer. Where this DIFFERS from “Company A” is that the folks at JL Audio actually handle ALL the design and QC from start to finish- AND- set standards that their overseas plant must meet.

In the end, you as the consumer still receive a product which meets or exceeds JL Audio’s strict standards for performance and construction.

And that’s what we’re looking for in car audio gear…

Ask Chuck about JL Audio

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Quite surprising to us all is the number of people that have written us and asked us to get going again. It seems that there are a good number of people that actually read and enjoy what we write.

Heck there were even a few people that admitted they learned a few things from us! I cannot tell you how surprised and happy I and the rest of the crew were to hear this.

The internet is a heck of a big place and it is really easy to just keep churning out stuff and never know if anyone ever pays it any attention at all. So to all of you who took the time to write to us…Thanks, and we will try to get a steady stream of information going again.

A few words of caution however…remember that everything I write is my opinion. Strangely enough this is easy to forget. People some times seem to think that if they read it on the Internet it is true…Despite the fact that I and my colleagues here at Ask The Advisors have many, many, many (some of us many more many than this many many’s) years of experience in this industry; at the end of the day you are reading our opinions.

So, let’s move on to something a little bit more interesting.

What is new at Ask The Advisors?

Kenwood Excelon Car Audio has been added to the mix. This is great looking and sounding gear with a huge slate of features. I am sure Chuck will be writing about it soon.

On the flip side Eclipse Car Audio is gone. Not our decision on this one. Fujitsu Ten, the parent company of Eclipse has decided that Eclipse did not need to continue to exist.

JL Audio has a brand new line of Class D car amps that are smaller and cooler than just about anything you have ever seen.

We will be adding Peachtree Audio’s very cool Integrated Amp / DAC soon…keep an eye out for more information in the near future.

Sonos has landed…if you are looking for a cool and easy way to get music throughout your house you have to check this out.

New Turntables and even more accessories are here from Pro-Ject Turntables. If you have an interest in Vinyl you need to check these turntables out.

Transparent Audio has launched a new line of Performance HDMI cables at great price points… they are flexible, and have small ends and we love them.

We have the Klipsch HD theater packages on display in a couple of spots. These are great if you have small space and yet want big theater sound.

We have several new Audio/Video cabinet styles from our good friends at BDI Furniture. And some great prices on a few closeouts as well.

B&W has introduced what may be the best sounding and looking Soundbar yet…the Panorama is on display and available.

Ok, enough teasing for now…but check back often for more information on all of these new goodies and the other things we will be getting in throughout the year.

Ask Ron About What’s New

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So you are ready to shop for a Home Theater speaker system and you have some questions; probably a lot of them. Hopefully the following information will help.

First, be sure and print out all of the spec sheets on all of the speakers you are thinking of buying. These will make wonderful lining for your birdcage, or make it easy to find packing material the next time you need to ship something fragile someplace. You see most if not virtually all of the specs on a speaker mean little or nothing to you. Things like anechoic chamber measurements, and made up power handling numbers do not tell you anything about how a speaker sounds; or how it compares to other speakers. Listening is how you choose speakers.

Great, so now what do you do? Go and visit a really cool store that has a group of people that know what they are talking about…that have listened to and installed a bunch of systems, and have a whole bunch of speakers actually on display that you can listen to. This would be here at Ask the Advisors for example. We also very strongly recommend that you never buy speakers out of a van in the parking lot of a mall.

Now start by letting us know where you would like your speakers to be. This would be floor standing, bookshelf, in-wall, in-ceiling or some combination. This is a good place to start because no matter how great a speaker is…it has to fit into your room to matter to you. The good news is the companies we deal with like B&W, Snell, Klipsch, Aerial Acoustics, Sonance, Velodyne and JL Audio make systems that can fit virtually any environment and provide great sound for just about any budget.

Now tell us what that budget is. I know this sounds dangerous, telling some low life commissioned salesperson how much money you have is just an invitation for them to figure out how to take it from you. Good news, no one at Ask the Advisors is commissioned or spiffed in any way…we are all paid to be here…and because we do not spend a ton of money on advertising we rely on you being thrilled with the system you buy from us so you will tell all of your friends how cool we are; then they will come and buy stuff from us. This only happens when you are completely happy with what you got from us. Also, the speakers are the best place in your entire system to spend a little extra money if you can. Better speakers will always be an improvement!

Now listen…to a pair of speakers…playing music…all by themselves with no sub-woofer playing. Or compare a couple of different pairs to find the sound you really like. What? But I am trying to buy a Home Theater system…have you forgotten that?

No I have not forgotten, and yes you are, and you need to know that a speaker that sounds good playing music can very definitely sound good playing a movie. If someone someplace else has told you that good music speakers are not good movie speakers; or that good movie speakers are not good for music…run from that place now. Think of it this way; there is very little that is more complex to play than music…so if a speaker is good for music it will be good for anything you want to put into it. A great speaker is a great speaker. Also, if you get a pair of speakers you really enjoy; you might find out you play more music on them as a side benfit. Also, we always recommend that you listen to even small speakers without a sub-woofer, because even though your Home Theater will of course have a sub-woofer; you have to be able to enjoy the speakers on their own to really enjoy them when the sub-woofer is added.

Great, so now you have a pair of speakers all picked out. From here we can guide you as to what is the correct center channel to match up to them, as well as recommend the correct rear and possibly side speakers to complete the system. If you have a large room the side speakers are added making your system 7.1 to aid in the delivery of sounds moving or panning around the room. Finally, we will make a recommendation on a sub-woofer that will match up to the speakers you have chosen; and provide enough output to fill the room your system will be in. You see a great Home Theater system is all about balance. Buying an amazing pair of left and right speakers and then skimping on the center speaker will not make a great system. We can make sure you get a system that plays well together.

You will also hear a lot of discussion about having 2 sub-woofers instead of just 1. Adding a second sub-woofer is a very good idea, and believe it or not this is not about power or playing louder. You see a sub-woofer has a lot of interaction with your room; this causes areas where there is a lot more or a lot less bass. 2 woofers placed correctly in the same room will help reduce these “room modes” dramatically and makes the bass much more even throughout the entire listening area. If your room and your budget allow it, add a second identical sub-woofer to your system.

So now you have a little bit of an idea where to start. So come on over to Ask the Advisors and let us help you pick out the speaker system that will make you happy for years to come.

Ask Ron About Your Speaker Selection

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So I got the chance to take a Sonos  multiroom music system home with me last week.

So I brought the system home and unpacked the “Bundle 250” and got started. The first thing I did, and I recommend you do the same, was plug in the charging base and get the C200 charging. Once turned off, it won’t turn on unless it is plugged into a powered charging base. Don’t worry, it’s only powered down for shipping, once you turn it on at home, you’ll never really turn it all the way off again.

Next, the ZP90 went in the Family room where the primary system was already located. It was simple enough as my cable modem and router are already there. So I just connected power from the Panamax M5300-PM, the (included) ethernet cable went to my Airport Extreme, and an analog audio patch cable completed the connections as analog was the only available input at the time.

I should mention that though the Sonos system works both wired or wireless, you must have at least one piece plugged in to a hard-wired Internet connection. For me this was the ZP-90 I mentioned above. But you may not have a wired network connection at any of your Zone Player locations. For this, Sonos developed the Zone Bridge. It’s a little $99 box that lets you have your one hardwired connection without spending $349 or more for a Zone player you won’t use.

Next was the ZP120 in the bedroom. I just plugged it into the Panamax M4-EX and hooked up my trusty B&W CM1 speakers and that was it.

Finally came the S5. I set it on the Kitchen counter and plugged it into the wall. That’s it. Wow, this was just getting easier and easier as I went. Surely something was going to blow up soon.

Instead, once the pieces were all connected, setup was pretty painless. I popped the CD into my computer and followed the directions, registered the system, and bam, everything was done.

I topped it off by adding the C200 and my iPhone as system controllers and I was ready to play. One note about the controllers – iPhone or otherwise – they will only work when connected to your network. You can’t use the iPhone from the office to freak out your spouse at home by turning on creepy Halloween music. It’s a bummer, I know.

Anyway, using the system was a breeze. Finally I had my last.fm, Rhapsody, Sirius, and Napster accounts all in one place at one time. Not to mention the seemingly endless free Internet radio stations. You want traditional Irish music from Ireland? No problem. You want to listen to the news in London for a few days before your next trip there? Just a few clicks on the super-slick C200 controller. It looks like an iPhone clone gone wrong, but it really works like a champ. It’s lightning fast and very easy to use. Oh yeah, it makes for a pretty good alarm in the morning too.

Notice I didn’t say alarm “clock“. While the clock on the C200 is certainly accurate, and it never failed to turn on and wake me up, it really doesn’t get dim enough to be good at night, and there is no setting to make it stay on for more than a few hours when in the cradle, so you’ll still need a clock if you like to know what time it is on occasion. Plus, if your spouse doesn’t have an iPhone, they will always be stealing the C200 to listen to all this new music right at their fingertips. So if you do use it for an alarm, make sure you can find the C200 or your iPhone to turn it off in the morning. Otherwise you have to stumble across the bedroom to hit the “Mute” button on the unit.

As for the Zone Players, the Z90 sounded great, and so did the Z120. That little amp outperforms its size and its price quite well. As for the S5, it really likes to see a better quality source than most Internet radio stations can provide. But if you feed it some 192k or better music from your computer or NAS drive it will wake right up and sing quite beautifully. It plays pretty loud, too. Drag it out on the back porch at a party and I doubt you will be disappointed. It doesn’t run on batteries, but once you hear it, you’ll understand. I’ve never heard anything battery powered that sounded this good.

Speaking of better sources, if you’re going to use your Sonos system a lot, and prefer the better quality afforded by using your existing music, invest in a small NAS drive. It will use a lot less energy than your computer will and may even pay for itself in about a year. A small NAS will draw 25-30 watts of energy and your computer draws 200-300 watts or more. You can save your music on the NAS and tell iTunes to use that as your Library or run the sync software that comes with most NAS drives and then you’ll also have a backup, which is never a bad idea. This way your computer only needs to be on when you’re actually using it. You know, for important stuff, like paying bills online, or Internet porn, or paying your Internet porn bills online.

So I was really impressed with the Sonos system. And not just because I expected it to suck and it didn’t. It is a legitimately good system that is well thought-out and works and sounds great. I was actually quite disappointed to have to pack it back up and give it back. My fiancée loved it too, so I’m hoping we can get one of our own to keep soon.

Ask Jason About Sonos

1.) The Soundbar

This is probably the fastest and easiest way to add a surround sound-ish system to your home. Why do I say surround sound-ish? Well because a sound bar does not actually have side or rear speakers, so it is surround-ish. While some units like the Yamaha DSP series attempt to create the sound of additional speakers; they cannot be completely convincing. Other units like the B&W Panorama are designed to provide very good sound quality but really only posses a Left, Center, Right type of configuration; there is no real attempt made to sound like there are side or rear speakers. Most of these types of solutions do have or provide a sub woofer output so you can add bass and get a fuller sound. These types of units are for situations where adding side or rear speakers are either very undesirable or impossible. A sound bar will give you much better sound than what is built into your television, and give you added volume but it is definitely not real Surround Sound system.

2.) The Home-Theater-In-A-Box

The HTIB is supposed to be a step up from the Sound Bar approach as it will typically have side or rear speakers included. There is a very big however included in this sentence. Most HTIB systems are really designed to be very inexpensive or to ultimately be given away with TV’s. So what does this really mean? It means that although there are more speakers in a HTIB the quality of the speakers and electronics is generally pretty poor, resulting in your taking the time to run wires to the back of your room and still ending up with a pretty disappointing outcome. In fact I would go so far as to say that as a rule I would probably recommend a good sound bar over a typical HTIB. Yes I am sure there are some good HTIB systems out there at some price points, but if you think that is the case please read on.

3.) A Receiver based Home Theater System

Ok, now it is getting interesting. At this point you are starting to look at some good stuff. Please keep in mind that a system based around an A/V Receiver and speaker package from Ask the Advisors could easily sell for $649.00 or so, and that includes products from companies like Klipsch and Yamaha. So this is not all about money. In fact you may spend the same or less here than you could on a Sound Bar or an HTIB. The big advantages here include a few things, like getting to pick speakers you like the sound of that are made by speaker manufacturers. Picking an A/V Receiver that has the features you want or need for your home. Not having to buy everything from one company, because believe it or not most companies do not do everything well. Big receiver companies are rarely good speaker companies, most TV manufacturers should not try to make and sell speakers at all, etc., etc. You see here we are doing the product decisions a-la-cart. You do not have to take what is in the box, you get to decide what is important to you and with our help design the system you want. I will also go so far as to say that this approach dollar for dollar will give you the best sound for your money. These systems are also easy to upgrade and add additional components to; which many HTIB systems are not. So if you are looking for the best bang for the buck and we can run wires for the sides and/or rear speakers this is a better way to go.

4.) A Separates based system

This is the Holy Grail of A/V Systems. Here we are going to choose a Pre-Amp Processor, a separate Amp or Amplifiers, and the Speakers and Sub Woofer to make our room really sing. This type of system has the very best sound and picture, the most flexibility and the most upgradeability of all the types discussed here. Here we are going to look at brands like B&W, Klipsch, Snell and Aerial Acoustics speakers, not to mention sub woofers from all of the previously mentioned companies but also from Velodyne and JL Audio, Rotel, Classe, McIntosh, Marantz and Integra Electronics, and more than likely an RTI Home Theater Master Remote Control to make it all easy to use. This is also going to be the most expensive of the 4 approaches, but if the ultimate in Sound and Image quality is your goal this is the place to be. Needless to say we at Ask the Advisors also carry a wide range of products in this category, and have the people to help you decipher the differences and choose the system that will full fill your desire.

Hopefully this little primer on the 4 main approaches to A/V System nirvana is helpful. Of course we are always happy to answer questions and play equipment for you at the shop. So come on in, get a demonstration of whichever products you are interested in and then go home set it all up and enjoy, or have us do the install and then enjoy.

Ask Ron About Surround Sound

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