Welcome to My Podcast

By Scott Wilkinson • Posted: Feb 5, 2010

To paraphrase The Firesign Theatre, we're all A/V geeks on this bus. We can't get enough about Blu-ray players, high-def displays, receivers, speakers, room acoustics, content creation and distribution, and all the other elements that contribute to an exceptional audio/video experience. To feed that need, I'm delighted to introduce a new feature to UAV—Home Theater Geeks, a weekly, hour-long podcast in which I chat with the most important and influential technical experts in our industry about all things audio and video.

The podcast is produced by our friends at TWiT (This Week in Tech), the online home of Leo Laporte, nationally syndicated radio talk-show host and tech guru to millions of fans around the world. Aside from his weekend call-in radio talk show that covers all aspects of digital technology—on which I appear as a regular guest—Leo's team produces a bunch of tech-oriented podcasts, including Home Theater Geeks, which is now available right here on UAV.

So far, my guests have included industry legend Tomlinson Holman (the "TH" in THX), video guru Joe Kane, Pioneer VP of advanced product development Andy Parsons, Sony Pictures VP of advanced technology Don Eklund, venerated home-theater designer Anthony Grimani, THX Senior Fellow John Dahl, and Stacey Spears and Don Munsil, creators of the HD Benchmark setup and test Blu-ray. Upcoming guests are scheduled to include AIX Records founder and recording engineer Mark Waldrep, LCD-projector inventor Gene Dolgoff, and pre-eminent speaker designer Kevin Voecks. And there's plenty more where they came from!

So there you have it—a podcast by home theater geeks for home theater geeks. I hope you enjoy it! And if there's someone in the industry you'd like to be a guest on the show, please let me know by posting a comment here or e-mailing me at scott.wilkinson@sorc.com. Until then, geek out!

Comments

Submitted by David Vaughn on February 5, 2010 - 3:27pm.

Scott has had some amazing guests on his show and it's well worth your time investment to listen to these podcasts. Glad they are available on UAV now! Best, David

Submitted by Bob on February 5, 2010 - 3:32pm.

Hi scott, I have a suggestion guest for the show. It be awesome if you can get Graig Eggars from dolby. That be so cool,his great on dolby podcast :)

Submitted by Scott Wilkinson on February 5, 2010 - 3:41pm.

Thanks for the vote of confidence, David! Bob, I certainly know Craig Eggers, but I thought he was more of a marketing guy than a tech geek. Am I wrong about that? I certainly plan to have someone from Dolby on the show.

Submitted by Jeremy Sauer on February 6, 2010 - 9:59pm.

Scott, how about Joel Silver from ISF?

Submitted by Scott Wilkinson on February 7, 2010 - 1:27pm.

Jeremy, Joel is definitely on my list; in fact, we've been e-mailing and playing phone tag to find the right date. He's at ISE in Amsterdam right now, so we should be able to set the date next week. It'll probably be some time in Mar ch.

Submitted by David Perl on February 7, 2010 - 3:17pm.

Just stumbled into your blog and have a question as to what's happening to my Integra DPS-6.7? On every disc its asked to play, at some point it "blanks out...freezes and we get to see squares. Sounds like it trys to get moving, but once it starts, it really doesn't correct itself? Put the disc in another player and its fine? Whaaazzzuuup? Any suggestions? Or, where I can research this? Thanks David

Submitted by Scott Wilkinson on February 7, 2010 - 6:48pm.

David, it sounds like the player is broken. I'd contact Integra to see about getting it fixed.

Submitted by David Vaughn on February 7, 2010 - 8:51pm.

David, Sounds like the laser pick-up is out of alignment or is damaged. It will need to go into service. David

Submitted by Oscar Worthy, DDS on February 11, 2010 - 5:13pm.

Hello Scott, plasma question for you. I have recently learned some disenheartening information that Panasonic plasma black levels on the newer (08,09) models have a built in voltage adjustment that with pre-determined hours of use increases the black level. For me this means a loss the contrast I enjoy. I had heard of color shifts in plasma over time from phosphor aging, but is this black level shift common practice for plasma set designs among brands. Panasonic apparently felt there wasn't a problem, but the users have seen a double in black level shift. What gives?

Submitted by Scott Wilkinson on February 12, 2010 - 2:06am.

Oscar, that's the topic of my next blog, which I'll post on Friday.

Submitted by Roy Parret on February 12, 2010 - 2:49pm.

Scott, I've heard all of your podcasts from the beginning and enjoyed them very much. I have a request though. In addition to the great guests you've been having on, I would enjoy it if you did some shows where you discuss new products, perhaps giving condensed reviews, etc, kind of like the discussions you have on Leo LaPorte's radio show. Perhaps you could rotate through your coworkers and have them discuss the products and movies they review. You could also discuss tech. issues like A/V component features & set-up, speaker set-up, etc. These shows might be like mini audio versions of Home Theater Mag. Just a thought.

Submitted by Scott Wilkinson on February 12, 2010 - 3:56pm.

Roy, that's a great idea; thanks for suggesting it! I'm planning to have David Vaughn, our movie reviewer, on as a guest, and I could also have other reviewers on as well. I'll definitely work on making that happen.

Submitted by Ty on February 25, 2010 - 3:38pm.

Scott, you fit in great with the TWIT lineup. I really enjoy your perspective on the industry. I think Paul Barton would make a great guest on the show. Keep up the good work! Thanks, Ty